Mayor of Kyiv, Ukranian capital, Vitali Klitschko, says about two million people have fled the city as Russian forces sustain onslaught on the country.
The number is half of the city population estimated at about 3.5 million people last year, according to citypopulation.de, a website that tracks population statistics across the world.
“From our information, one in two Kyiv residents has left the city,” Klitschko told Ukraine television on Thursday.
“Half of the Kyiv population has fled. A little less than 2 million have fled the capital,” the mayor was also quoted by The Guardian.
Russian forces have reached the northeastern edge of the city, with heavy battles for control of the main highway reported during the night.
Moscow has also been making progress against the cities of Kharkiv in the east and Mykolaiv in the south, amid heavy fighting.
Klitschko said Kyiv had been “transformed into a fortress,” noting that “every street, every building, every checkpoint has been fortified.”
On Wednesday, two bombs hit two hospitals in a city west of Kyiv, according to the mayor. The World Health Organization said it had confirmed 18 attacks on medical facilities since the Russian invasion began two weeks ago.
An air raid also hit a maternity hospital in the port city of Mariupol, killing three people including a child and drawing widespread condemnation.
“What kind of country is this, the Russian Federation, which is afraid of hospitals, is afraid of maternity hospitals, and destroys them?” Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy asked in a televised address late on Wednesday.
United Nations spokesman Stephane Dujarric said no health facility “should ever be a target” and called for an “immediate halt to attacks on healthcare, hospitals, healthcare workers, ambulances”.
United States Vice President Kamala Harris also called for an investigation into Russia’s conduct in Ukraine and condemned what she said described as “atrocities of unimaginable proportions” carried out by Russian forces.
United Kingdom Minister for the Armed Forces, James Heappey, said hitting the hospital was “a war crime” regardless of whether it had been a deliberate act or not.
Russia Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov claimed the Mariupol hospital had been seized by far-right fighters who were using it as a base.
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