Wheeling suitcases and hauling bags, residents of Svitlodarsk peered into a bus departing from this heavily shelled east Ukrainian town.
"Is there still room?" one woman asked, anxious to send her teenage son to safety.
The town, controlled by Ukrainian government authorities, has been under rocket fire day and night, said residents, desperate to get their children away from the frontline as pro-Russian separatists push a new offensive.
"Everyone who wants to leave will be able to!" a Ukrainian soldier accompanying the bus told the waiting crowd.
Some were in tears, convinced that not securing a seat on the bus would condemn them to mortal danger in a town almost encircled by separatist forces.
"They promised us we would be able to leave, but now they say there is no more room," one woman, Olena Lifikova said, crying.
Lifikova, 42, had already fled once this summer, leaving with her three-year-old diabetic daughter from Debaltseve, a town about 10 kilometres (six miles) away. Fighting has been especially vicious there in recent days, with rebels almost surrounding the town and the Ukrainian government forces there.
"She needs insulin! I need to get out, it doesn't matter where I go, I just want to leave!" she said.
Svitlodarsk, a town that had about 13,000 inhabitants before the conflict, is also the location of a major power plant which serves part of the Donetsk region. It sits north of the separatist-controlled territory and about 50 kilometres northeast of rebel hub Donetsk.
The plant organised buses to take its employees' children along the only road out of the town to Artemivsk, a large city further north that is controlled by the Ukrainian army.
"Why are people being killed?" said Valera, 21, also originally from Debaltseve. He said that his sister and nephews were still trapped there, living in a basement and too terrified to try to leave.
"Everyone is guilty, both the Ukrainian authorities and the rebels. The Grad (multiple rocket launchers) are firing from all sides," he said.
After being turned away from the bus, one mother of two exclaimed angrily: "Do we have to die here or what?"
"Our house was bombed. They are bombing everywhere," she said. "My husband works at the plant but I and my children are not on the list."
- Hospital devastated -
"Starting on Saturday, Grad rockets have been hitting us. There is damage and one person was killed," the mayor of Svitlodarsk, Anatoliy Brekhunets, told AFP.
The victim was a nurse at the local hospital who died after one missile landed nearby on Tuesday. The explosion destroyed some of the walls and blew out the windows.
The increase in violence convinced Brekhunets to "close all schools and preschools," he said. The power plant where most of the population of Svitlodarsk works, is bussing some to Kharkiv region -- also in the east but far from the fighting.
Svitlodarsk has evacuated 10 to 15 percent of its residents, mainly women and children, the mayor said.
Some however are staying put for lack of other options. "We are still here, all of us. We don't have a place to go," said Svetlana Ponomarenko, an employee of the stricken hospital.
"We want to work, we want a peaceful life, to have at least something, but we're left with nothing," she said in a break from sweeping up hallways littered with broken glass in the hospital, now empty of patients.
"But this is what has happened to our jobs, which used to put food on our tables," she said, making a sweeping gesture to point out the level of destruction.
Wheeling suitcases and hauling bags, residents of Svitlodarsk peered into a bus departing from this heavily shelled east Ukrainian town.
“Is there still room?” one woman asked, anxious to send her teenage son to safety.
The town, controlled by Ukrainian government authorities, has been under rocket fire day and night, said residents, desperate to get their children away from the frontline as pro-Russian separatists push a new offensive.
“Everyone who wants to leave will be able to!” a Ukrainian soldier accompanying the bus told the waiting crowd.
Some were in tears, convinced that not securing a seat on the bus would condemn them to mortal danger in a town almost encircled by separatist forces.
“They promised us we would be able to leave, but now they say there is no more room,” one woman, Olena Lifikova said, crying.
Lifikova, 42, had already fled once this summer, leaving with her three-year-old diabetic daughter from Debaltseve, a town about 10 kilometres (six miles) away. Fighting has been especially vicious there in recent days, with rebels almost surrounding the town and the Ukrainian government forces there.
“She needs insulin! I need to get out, it doesn’t matter where I go, I just want to leave!” she said.
Svitlodarsk, a town that had about 13,000 inhabitants before the conflict, is also the location of a major power plant which serves part of the Donetsk region. It sits north of the separatist-controlled territory and about 50 kilometres northeast of rebel hub Donetsk.
The plant organised buses to take its employees’ children along the only road out of the town to Artemivsk, a large city further north that is controlled by the Ukrainian army.
“Why are people being killed?” said Valera, 21, also originally from Debaltseve. He said that his sister and nephews were still trapped there, living in a basement and too terrified to try to leave.
“Everyone is guilty, both the Ukrainian authorities and the rebels. The Grad (multiple rocket launchers) are firing from all sides,” he said.
After being turned away from the bus, one mother of two exclaimed angrily: “Do we have to die here or what?”
“Our house was bombed. They are bombing everywhere,” she said. “My husband works at the plant but I and my children are not on the list.”
– Hospital devastated –
“Starting on Saturday, Grad rockets have been hitting us. There is damage and one person was killed,” the mayor of Svitlodarsk, Anatoliy Brekhunets, told AFP.
The victim was a nurse at the local hospital who died after one missile landed nearby on Tuesday. The explosion destroyed some of the walls and blew out the windows.
The increase in violence convinced Brekhunets to “close all schools and preschools,” he said. The power plant where most of the population of Svitlodarsk works, is bussing some to Kharkiv region — also in the east but far from the fighting.
Svitlodarsk has evacuated 10 to 15 percent of its residents, mainly women and children, the mayor said.
Some however are staying put for lack of other options. “We are still here, all of us. We don’t have a place to go,” said Svetlana Ponomarenko, an employee of the stricken hospital.
“We want to work, we want a peaceful life, to have at least something, but we’re left with nothing,” she said in a break from sweeping up hallways littered with broken glass in the hospital, now empty of patients.
“But this is what has happened to our jobs, which used to put food on our tables,” she said, making a sweeping gesture to point out the level of destruction.
