AP Photos: People wait in bomb shelters in Kyiv and Mariupol. As the exodus from Ukraine continues, the humanitarian situation in the country’s besieged cities is becoming more dire.
Meanwhile, Poland said it would give Soviet-era fighter jets to the U.S. for transfer to the Ukrainian military, which risks provoking a response from Moscow. And President Joe Biden banned Russian oil imports to the U.S., seeking to further cripple the Kremlin’s ability to finance the invasion.WHAT HAS BEEN DIRECTLY WITNESSED OR CONFIRMED BY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS?
Earlier, a video from Sumy showed rescuers pulling the wounded out of debris following an overnight airstrike. A woman who was trapped under the rubble survived, according to the Ukrainian Interior Ministry. Meanwhile, buses emblazoned with red cross symbols carried water, medicine and food toward Mariupol, where authorities planned to start digging mass graves for all the dead. The plan was for them to then ferry civilians out of the city of 430,000 people, Vereshchuk said.
Russia said Monday that civilians would be allowed safe passage out of several cities, including Sumy, Mariupol, Chernigiv, Kyiv and Kharviv. But it wasn’t clear if evacuations happened in any of those cities aside from Sumy. Attempts to create safe evacuation corridors have stumbled for days amid continuing fighting andUkrainian officials said a safe corridor did open early Tuesday from Irpin, a city near Kyiv that has been without electricity, water and heat for days.
In the nearly two weeks since Russian President Vladimir Putin launched the invasion of Ukraine, his forces have captured a swath of southern and coastal Ukraine but have seen their advances stopped in many areas, including around Kyiv.Thousands of people are thought to have been killed, both civilians and soldiers, though the actual number remains unknown.