Survivors emerge from theatre debris
SURVIVORS have begun to emerge as authorities work to rescue hundreds of civilians trapped in the basement of a theatre blasted by Russian air strikes in the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol, the local governor said.
The strikes the previous evening had left a large section of the grand, three-storey theatre building in the centre of Mariupol collapsed in a smoking ruin, according to photos released by the city council.
Inside, hundreds of men, women and children – up to 1,000, according to some officials – had taken shelter in the basement, seeking safety amid Russia’s three-week siege of the strategic southern port city.
Rescuers worked to clear rubble that had blocked the entrance to the basement, despite new strikes reported elsewhere in the city yesterday.
Miraculously, the shelter stood firm, officials said.
“The building withstood the impact of a high-powered air bomb and protected the lives of people hiding in the bomb shelter,” Ukraine’s ombudswoman Ludmyla Denisova said on the Telegram messaging app.
She and Ukrainian parliament member Sergiy Taruta said some survivors had emerged.
“People are coming out alive,” Mr Taruta wrote on Facebook, though he did not say how many.
It was not known if there were injuries or deaths among those inside.
Another legislator, Lesia Vasylenko, who was in London in a delegation visiting Parliament, said there were reports of injuries but no deaths.
At least as recently as Monday, huge white letters on the pavement in front of and behind the theatre spelled out ‘children’ in Russian to alert warplanes of those inside, according to images released by the
Maxar space technology company.
The Russian Defence Ministry denied bombing the theatre or anywhere else in Mariupol on Wednesday.
The strike against the theatre was part of a furious bombardment of civilian targets in multiple cities over the past day.
Also struck in Mariupol on Wednesday was a municipal pool where pregnant women and women with children were taking shelter, according to Pavlo Kyrylenko, head of the Donetsk regional administration.
Hours later, there was no word on casualties in that strike.
To the north, at least 53 people were brought to morgues over the past 24 hours in the city of Chernihiv, killed amid heavy Russian air strikes, artillery bombardment and ground fire, the local governor Viacheslav Chaus told Ukrainian TV yesterday.
Ten people were killed while lining up for bread in the city.