Russia's Deadly Raids Plunge Ukrainians Into ‘Nightmare'

Exodus nears 3 million as bombardment goes on and aid agencies warn of chaos in besieged cities

- Isobel Koshiw Kyiv Lorenzo Tondo Lviv Jon Henley

Russian forces kept up their relentless bombardment of Ukraine’s big cities yesterday as the number of people fleeing the country neared 3 million and the Red Cross said conditions for those left behind were “nothing short of a nightmare”.

As Russian airstrikes and artillery fire continued to pound residential areas across the country, Ukrainian prosecutors said 90 children had now died in the conflict. The UN said it had confirmed 636 civilian deaths but the real toll would be much higher.

UN data also showed that more than 2.8 million civilians had fled the onslaught since it began on 24 February, with millions more internally displace. EU officials have said 5 million people may end up fleeing and other estimates are even higher.

Airstrikes again hit residential buildings in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, and second city of Kharkiv yesterday, killing at least three people and wounding dozens more, rubble,” said the governor, Vitaliy Koval.

Some civilians were able to flee, with frontline towns around Kyiv being partially – if slowly – evacuated for a fifth consecutive day, according to the regional governor, Oleksiy Kuleba, who added that a ceasefire to allow civilians to leave was “holding, albeit it is very conditional”.

A senior official in President Volodymyr Zelenskiy ’s office said more than 1,700 people had also been evacuated through humanitarian corridors in the eastern region of Luhansk, despite what Ukrainian authorities described as constant fire.