(Reuters) – All women, children and elderly people have been evacuated from the besieged Azovstal steel plant in the southern port of Mariupol, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister said on Saturday.
“This part of the Mariupol humanitarian operation is over,” Iryna Vereshchuk wrote on the Telegram messaging service.
Ukraine announced on Friday an evacuation plan from Azovstal and other parts of Mariupol for Saturday.
Earlier, Russian-backed separatists in Donetsk region said that 50 civilians had been evacuated from the steel plant on Saturday. Reuters had not seen any evidence of their arrival at a nearby separatist-controlled reception point as of 1600 GMT.
(Reporting by Max Hunder; Editing by Frances Kerry)
