Status: 01.05.2022 18:03
According to the UN, an evacuation operation is underway to rescue civilians from the besieged steelworks in Mariupol. Ukraine’s President Zelenskyy said about 100 civilians were on their way to Zaporizhia.
According to Ukrainian information, around 100 civilians have been freed from the steelworks in Mariupol, which was surrounded by Russian troops. The people are on their way to Zaporizhia in Ukraine, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on Twitter.
The Russian side confirmed that civilians had left Mariupol and spoke of 80 people. The authorities in Mariupol are now saying that the evacuation has been suspended. According to the information, the operation should continue tomorrow morning.
“Very complex location”
The United Nations reported in the afternoon that an evacuation operation to save civilians from the steelworks had started. A spokesman for the UN emergency relief program, Saviano Abreu, said the operation was being carried out in cooperation with the International Committee of the Red Cross and was coordinated with Ukrainian and Russian authorities. The helpers would have reached the steelworks yesterday.
Abreu described the situation as very complex and did not want to give any details about the operation. About 1,000 Ukrainian civilians and 2,000 fighters are suspected to be in the basement of the sprawling Azovstal steelworks. The site is the only place in the city not controlled by Russian forces.
Ukrainian army reports several attacks
According to information from Kyiv, several people were killed in a Ukrainian attack on the quarters of the Russian army headquarters in the city of Izyum. Among them are high-ranking officers, an adviser to the Ukrainian Interior Minister, Anton Herashchenko, reported on Telegram. The city of Isjum, with a population of 50,000, is located in eastern Ukraine. According to Ukrainian sources, the Russian chief of staff, Valeri Gerasimov, is staying there to command the Donbass offensive. The attack is said to have taken place yesterday. There was no confirmation from Russia – not even for Gerasimov’s stay in the area.
Almost 100 civilians can be evacuated from the steel plant in Mariupol
Birgit Virnich, WDR, daily news 4:00 p.m., May 1, 2022
The Ukrainian side also claimed to have attacked Snake Island in the Black Sea. The island had already been conquered by the Russian army at the beginning of the war in February. It is about 35 kilometers off the Ukrainian coast. Several air defense complexes and a communications unit were destroyed in the attack, the Ukrainian army’s “South” command said. 42 Russian soldiers are said to have been killed. There is no Russian confirmation of the attack.
conflicting parties as a source
Information on the course of the war, shelling and casualties provided by official bodies of the Russian and Ukrainian conflict parties cannot be directly checked by an independent body in the current situation.
New damage to Russian infrastructure
According to Russian authorities, a fire broke out in a facility belonging to the Russian Ministry of Defense near the Ukrainian border. One person was slightly injured in the fire in the Belgorod region, regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov reported on Twitter.
It is unclear whether the partial collapse of a railway bridge near the Russian-Ukrainian border in the Kursk region is related to the war. Specialists are currently determining the cause, Governor Roman Starovoit wrote on Telegram. Nobody was injured. The western Russian district of Suja, in which the bridge connects the town of the same name with the town of Sosnovy Bor, borders on the north-eastern Ukrainian region of Sumy, from which the Russian armed forces had withdrawn. It is not yet clear whether there is a connection with the war in the neighboring country. Most recently, Russia had repeatedly accused Ukraine of attacks on its territory. The Russian authorities have raised the level of alert in the region due to the “danger of terrorism”.
Shaded in white: advance of the Russian army. Shaded in green: Russian-backed separatist areas. Crimea: annexed by Russia.
Image: ISW/04/30/2022
Russia confirms attacks in south and east
Russia has confirmed renewed attacks on the east and south of neighboring Ukraine. In the Zaporizhia region, S-300 anti-aircraft missile systems were destroyed, Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said in Moscow. Two fighter jets were shot down in the Kharkiv region. The Ukrainian side, in turn, spoke of several injuries as a result of the Russian attacks on Kharkiv. Konashenkov also confirmed an attack on an airfield in the Black Sea metropolis of Odessa. The runway was destroyed with rockets as well as a hangar in which weapons delivered from the USA and Europe were stored.
Zelenskyj appeals to the Russian military
According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Russia is strengthening its armed forces in the east of the country. “Russia is gathering additional forces for new attacks against our military in the east of the country,” Zelenskyy said in his regular video address. Russia is trying to increase military pressure in the Donbass. He appealed to the Russian military: “Any Russian soldier can still save his life. It is better for you to survive in Russia than to die in our country.”
According to Ukrainian figures, 23,000 Russian soldiers have died in Ukraine since the beginning of the war. In addition, more than 1,000 Russian tanks and almost 2,500 other military vehicles have already been destroyed, Zelenskyy said in his video speech. Actual military casualties are difficult to estimate. Moscow has so far admitted more than 1,000 fallen soldiers and for its part put the number of fallen Ukrainian fighters at more than 23,000.
According to the Unian agency, Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych reported that no troop movements from Russia towards Ukraine have been observed for four days. On the other hand, “a large number of broken equipment, wounded and dead” will be brought back to Russia.
Killed in attacks on villages in Kherson
According to Russian sources, Ukrainian forces shelled villages in the Kherson region. Civilians were killed and injured, the Russian news agency RIA reports with reference to the Russian Ministry of Defense. The ministry said Ukrainian forces shelled a school, a kindergarten and a cemetery in the villages of Kyselivka and Shyroka Balka. It gave no indication of the time of the attack or the number of dead and injured. Ukraine has not yet responded to the report. The information cannot be independently verified.
Ukraine and USA agree on arms deliveries
According to Ukrainian sources, the Ukrainian and US military again agreed on the delivery of weapons, ammunition and other equipment. According to a phone call between the Ukrainian Commander-in-Chief Valeriy Saluschnyj and US Chief of Staff Mark Milley Saluschnyjs, the process is constantly being strictly controlled. He stressed that the Ukrainian army must switch from Soviet equipment to NATO models. “And the sooner we start this process, the sooner we will complete it,” it said.
confiscation of company assets?
Russia says it is considering confiscating assets from companies in “enemy” countries. Parliament Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin wrote on Telegram that this was a possible reaction to the US announcement that it would transfer confiscated assets from Russian oligarchs to Ukraine. The money raised through the possible sale of the assets should benefit the development of Russia.
It is about “companies based on Russian territory whose owners are citizens of enemy countries” in which the decision to confiscate was made. Volodin accused “a certain number of enemy countries – Lithuania, Poland and even the USA” of “pure theft”.