A grandmother fears loved-ones are dead after Russian troops obliterated a theatre in Mariupol.
Nina Slastian wept as she told how she has been unable to contact close friend Nadia, who lives in the city with daughter Luda and grandchildren aged six and eight, for three weeks.
The 53-year-old Ukrainian is terrified after Russia bombed the venue, where up to 1,200 locals were sheltering, on Wednesday. The theatre had the word ‘children’ written on the ground outside.
Rescue workers have been searching the rubble for survivors and last night the number of casualties was unconfirmed.
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Speaking via a translator, Nina said: “There is no phone connection with Mariupol and we don’t know if they are dead or alive.
“If they are alive they cannot leave - they might get shot, because there are dead people in the streets who tried to leave, or taken hostage.”
The port city is encircled by Russian troops and remains under constant bombardment. Almost 400,000 people are thought to be trapped without running water, with food and medical supplies quickly running out, while 500 Ukrainians are being held hostage.
At least 20,000 are reported to have fled via a humanitarian corridor - but Nina said she does not trust the safety of such routes.
“We heard of a baby who was 18 months old being shot in a car with his parents as they were trying to leave Mariupol through a humanitarian route,” Nina said after crossing the Polish border with three-year-old grandson Mark.
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She said Ukrainian soldiers escorted them through a forest from their hometown Boryspil this week after reports of civilians using humanitarian corridors being shot.
Nina said the route she and Mark used has now been taken over by Russian troops who are taking hostages to use as “human shields.”
She explained: “They are putting [hostages] on the front of tanks and driving them so [Ukrainian soldiers] do not shoot at them, and they take all the women’s jewellery and gold.”
Nina and Mark left Boryspil after spending seven days hiding in a basement with the town under attack.
“We looked out the window and rockets were shooting everywhere,” she said. “I try to protect Mark and make him watch cartoons but when he heard bombs he falls to the floor and cries.
“Now he is very unstable.”
Emergency medics at a refugee camp in Korczowa said “mental trauma” is evident in “nearly every” patient they see.
Doctor Alice Silvestro, of the humanitarian non-profit organisation InterSOS, explained: “People cannot sleep, they have stress and anxiety and we are treating people for nerves and panic attacks.
“We try to help people to understand that here is safe, we give babies a chance to play together to begin to move past what they have seen, and give women a space to cry, or if they don’t want to cry in front of their children then at least relax a bit.”
Around 3 million refugees have left Ukraine since Russia invaded on February 24.
At least 1.7 million have fled to Poland, like Nastia Hrytsai - who travelled alone for two days to meet her family in Lviv before they crossed into Korczowa together on Thursday.
The economics student, 19, spent three days hiding in a basement as rockets fired near her university campus in Kyiv before embarking on the solo 300-mile journey.
She was relieved to reunite with her mum Olga, 40, and six-year-old brother Yakiv in Lviv. “I was scared travelling alone but I had no choice because Kyiv was bombed,” she explained. “It was too dangerous there. I had not seen my family for two months and needed to be with them.”
Her dad Roman, 42, a medicines manager, has remained at the family home in Poltava, central Ukraine, which Olga says is becoming “much more dangerous”.
The mum, who works in sales, said: “Last week there were three or four hours of warning sirens every day.
"In our house we cannot go underground so we had to run to another one on the street, and we could hear the rockets coming down.
“My son is always okay - but not when he heard the bombs.”
The trio are travelling to Warsaw initially, then on to Szczecin, near the German border, to stay with a friend for three nights.
Olga added: “After that we have no idea what we will do.”
