The invading Russian troops have been preventing Ukraine from evacuating civilians from areas suffering a humanitarian catastrophe, Interior Minister Denys Monastyrskyy has told Ukrayina 24 news TV channel.
"The Russists do not give a damn about Ukranian civilians who have had no access to water or food for five days," the minister said.
He noted that the country's eastern regions were in a difficult humanitarian situation at the moment.
"The issue of evacuation from the towns of Volnovakha, Sartana and Talanivka is particularly pressing […] This is where active hostilities are underway. The Russian side has not responded to our calls to evacuate the population. We have now resorted to all possible international tools to make it happen. Around 40,000 people have had no power supply and food for five days now," he explained.
The State Emergency Service said later that around 400 people, mostly children, had been evacuated from Volnovakha after all.
As reported earlier, the Russian troops have blocked the delivery of food to the population in Kyiv Region, shooting to kill.
The parliamentary health committee asked the International Committee of the Red Cross to ensure safe corridors for evacuation of the sick and wounded from the areas occupied by Russia.
Earlier, Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Reintegration of Temporarily Occupied Territories Iryna Vereshchuk asked international humanitarian oranisations, including the ICRC, to do their best to arrange a corridor for the evacuation of civilians from Donbas towns occupied by the Russian military and other hotspots.
The Kherson mayor also requested a safe corridor for residents of the city that is tittering on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe, being besieged by the Russian troops.
Since it invaded Ukraine on 24 February, Russia has been bombing and shelling urban and rural areas, indiscriminately hitting hospitals, kindergartens and schools.