ZAPORIZHZHIA: Russian forces launched an offensive on Tuesday against the Azovstal steel plant, the last hold-out of Ukrainian forces in the battered southern port city of Mariupol, after a ceasefire that had allowed civilians to evacuate.
"Using artillery and aircraft, units of the Russian army and the Donetsk People's Republic are beginning to destroy" the "firing positions" of the Ukrainian troops, the defence ministry said in a statement carried by Russian news agencies.
The ministry accused members of the Azov battalion and other Ukrainian troops of using a pause in fighting to take their combat positions at the plant.
It was not immediately clear what the attacks meant for the fresh attempt that had been planned on Tuesday to evacuate civilians from the Azovstal complex, from where Kyiv said around 100 people had been brought out over the weekend.
Meanwhile, Britain's Boris Johnson became the first foreign leader since the war to address Ukraine's parliament, promising another £300 million in military aid.
Speaking via videolink, the premier evoked Britain's fight against the Nazis in World War II in hailing Kyiv's resistence as its "finest hour", and vowed to help ensure "no-one will ever dare to attack you again".
In a further attempt to punish Moscow for the February 24 war on its neighbour, the European Commission was also set Tuesday to propose a new package of sanctions, including an embargo on Russian oil.
Fighting meanwhile raged in the east and south of Ukraine, with Kyiv reporting attacks in and around Kharkiv, in the Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk regions.
At least nine people were killed on Tuesday in the Donetsk region, according to regional governor Pavlo Kyrylenko, including three women in Vugledar as they tried to find water.
The conflict has killed thousands of people and displaced more than 13 million, creating the worst refugee crisis in Europe since World War II.
The strategic southern port city of Mariupol has been under constant siege, with the last Ukrainian forces now confined to the sprawling Azovstal steel plant, where hundreds of civilians are also believed to be hiding in a maze of underground tunnels.
At the weekend, Kyiv said around 100 civilians were brought out although by mid-Tuesday, there was no sign of the planned convoy in Zaporizhzhia, 200 kilometres to the north-west, where a parking lot has been transformed into a reception centre.
"The evacuation continues'', the Ukrainian presidency said early on Tuesday, before the Russian war, following an agreement with the UN and the Red Cross.
Sviatoslav Palamar, deputy commander of Ukraine's Azov military unit, said another 20 people were transferred out late on Monday after a five-hour delay as "the enemy's artillery caused new rubble and destruction".
Elsewhere in Mariupol, residents are emerging from two months of hiding to find their once-vibrant city in ruins.
The city is now largely calm, journalists saw on a recent press tour organised by Russian forces, with daily life dominated by the hunt for the most basic of essentials. — AFP
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