Ukraine refugee numbers pass 1.5 million

| March 6, 2022

More than 1.5 million refugees from Ukraine have fled the country in the last 10 days.

It is the fastest growing refugee crisis in Europe since World War II, UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi says.

“More than 1.5 million refugees from Ukraine have crossed into neighbouring countries in 10 days — the fastest growing refugee crisis in Europe since World War II,” he tweeted.

There are plans for residents to be evacuated from the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol from noon local time on Sunday (9pm AEDT) under a temporary ceasefire.

A similar deal a day earlier collapsed with Russia and Ukraine blaming each other for the failure.

The city council said the evacuation would begin at noon and would extend until 9pm (8am Monday AEDT ).

Russia’s assault on Ukraine has entered its 11th day and refugees continued to flood across the border into Ukraine’s neighbours.

The Mariupol mayor has said he wants to help more of the city’s 400,000 residents to leave.

Elsewhere in Ukraine, police said there was relentless Russian shelling and air raids in the northeast Kharkiv region.

The World Health Organisation said there had been several attacks on Ukrainian healthcare facilities. 

The attacks caused multiple deaths and injuries, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a Twitter message, but gave no details.

“Attacks on healthcare facilities or workers breach medical neutrality and are violations of international humanitarian law,” he said.

People who have been able escape Ukraine spilled into Poland, Romania, Slovakia and elsewhere. 

“We don’t want to leave Ukraine – we love it,” said Olha Kucher, director of the Zaporizhzhia Central Christian Orphanage, speaking in the western city of Lviv as she evacuated children. 

“But unfortunately we must leave.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called on those in areas occupied by Russian troops to fight.

“We must go outside and drive this evil out of our cities,” he said in an address on Saturday night.

British military intelligence said on Sunday that Russian forces were targeting populated areas in Ukraine, comparing the tactics to those Russia used in Chechnya in 1999 and Syria in 2016. 

But it said Ukrainian resistance was slowing the advance.

Russian President Vladimir Putin reiterated on Saturday that he wanted a “demilitarised” and “denazified” neutral Ukraine. 

He likened Western sanctions “to a declaration of war,” adding: “Thank God it has not come to that.”

The United States has promised to send more weapons and has said it could escalate sanctions. 

US President Joe Biden has sought $US10 billion ($A14 billion) in emergency funding to respond to the crisis.

Zelenskiy asked for help securing aircraft from European allies in a call with US lawmakers. 

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken  said the United States is considering sending planes to Poland if Warsaw decided to send fighter jets to Ukraine.

“We are looking actively now at the question of airplanes that Poland may provide to Ukraine and looking at how we might be able to backfill should Poland decide to supply those planes,” Blinken said on a visit to Moldova on Sunday.

Zelenskiy also called for more lethal aid and repeated a call for a no-fly zone, a move NATO has resisted for fear that it would escalate the conflict beyond Ukraine’s borders.

Russia has told the EU and NATO to stop sending “state-of-the-art weapons systems” to Ukraine.

In the latest sanctions US payment companies Visa and MasterCard said they would suspend credit card operations in Russia.

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett met Putin on Saturday and spoke to Zelenskiy, while Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan is expected to talk to Putin on Sunday.

Russian media reported Ukraine was close to building a plutonium-based “dirty bomb” nuclear weapon, citing an unidentified source and giving no evidence.

Putin previously said Ukraine was using Soviet know-how to create its own nuclear weapons, a charge Ukraine denies.

Ukraine’s military said more than 11,000 Russian troops had been killed so far and 88 Russian aircraft shot down. Reuters could not corroborate the claim.

More than 350 civilians have been killed, according to the UN rights office, with hundreds more injured.

The UN refugee agency estimated the number of refugees could swell to four million by July.