March 8, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

Ukrainian officials say the planned evacuation route to help civilians leave the northeastern city of Sumy, which has experienced sustained Russian attacks and airstrikes in recent days, is now operating.

The corridor is between Sumy and the Ukrainian city of Poltava -- a journey of just under 100 miles.

"This route has been agreed by the Ukrainian and Russian sides," Dmytro Lunin, head of the Poltava regional administration, said on his Telegram channel.

"The ceasefire regime is from 09:00 till 21:00 Kyiv time. Ukraine adheres to it," he said.

Lunin added that several dozen buses have already left Lokhvytsia, a city southwest of Sumy, to pick up civilians, and that 20 tons of humanitarian aid, including food and medicine, has also been sent.

Some background: The announcement of an evacuation corridor in Sumy comes after a Russian airstrike on an apartment building in the city killed nine civilians, including two children, according to the State Emergency Services (SES) in Ukraine.

On Monday, Ukrainian officials rejected Russia's unilateral proposal for evacuation corridors for civilians as an unacceptable non-starter, as most of the routes lead to Russia or its staunch ally Belarus and would require people to travel through active areas of fighting.

Several previous attempts to evacuate civilians failed earlier this week, with Western leaders accusing Russian forces of continuing to target pre-approved safe routes.

On Sunday, a Russian strike hit an evacuation crossing point outside Kyiv, killing eight people including two children trying to flee.

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Oleksandr Markushyn, the mayor of the Kyiv suburb of Irpin, says he has rejected a demand from Russian forces to surrender the town.

In a Telegram account on Tuesday, Markushyn said he had received a threat on his "life and health and demanding for the complete surrender of Irpin" the previous day.

"I have a counter-offer to the occupiers to leave [the] Irpin community within 24 hours and save the lives and health of several thousand Russian conscripts, whose mother, sister, daughter, grandmother and partner are waiting for them at home."

The Russians declared a ceasefire for the Kyiv area on Tuesday. It's unclear yet whether a cessation of hostilities is being held around the Ukrainian capital.

The UK defense ministry on Monday accused Russian forces of targeting evacuation corridors and killing “several civilians” trying to evacuate Irpin, according to the latest intelligence assessment released publicly by the department.

The ministry noted that due to heavy fighting Irpin has been without heat, water, or electricity for several days.

Eight civilians were killed in the midst of an evacuation of the town, Mayor Markushyn said in a statement on Telegram Sunday.

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The Ukrainian government has agreed on an evacuation corridor for fleeing civilians from the northeastern city of Sumy, which has seen sustained Russian attacks and airstrikes in recent days.

Iryna Vereshchuk, the Ukrainian minister of Reintegration of Temporarily Occupied Territories, said the corridor had been agreed by the Russian Ministry of Defense in a letter to the International Committee of the Red Cross. 

The route for the evacuation corridor would lead from Sumy through Holubivka and Lokhvytsia to Poltava, a city in central Ukraine. It will open from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Tuesday, Vereshchuk said, adding that "all obstacles ... must be removed along the entire route."

"No other routes were agreed," she said. "We call on Russia to agree on these routes immediately and ensure a stable ceasefire on these routes." 

She added that Ukraine hoped the Sumy corridor would be followed by others.

Bombing in Sumy: The announcement comes after a Russian airstrike on an apartment building in Sumy killed nine civilians, including two children, according to the State Emergency Services (SES) in Ukraine.

Several previous attempts to evacuate civilians failed earlier this week, with Western leaders accusing Russian forces of continuing to target pre-approved safe routes.

On Sunday, a Russian strike hit an evacuation crossing point outside Kyiv, killing eight people including two children trying to flee.

On Monday, Ukraine's Ambassador to the UN accused Russia of blocking attempts to evacuate civilians, adding it was “appalling” that Russian troops were opening fire on evacuees after both countries had allocated certain roads to be utilized as evacuation corridors. 

Nine people were killed by a Russian air strike of the northeastern city of Sumy on Monday night, according to the State Emergency Services (SES) in Ukraine.

Two children were among the dead, SES said.

Ukraine's Interior Ministry said the attack was an air strike against an apartment building. One injured woman was rescued from the rubble. 

The walls of Lviv's National Museum stand bare. Elaborate gold lacquered panels, on display after being recovered from 17th century Baroque churches, have been bundled up and hidden in the basement in a race to save the city's cultural treasures from possible Russian attack.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has already destroyed a museum containing works by renowned Ukrainian painter Maria Prymachenko, whose vivid and imaginative art was admired by both Pablo Picasso and Marc Chagall.

Now, the city of Lviv, often dubbed Ukraine's cultural capital, is racing to protect its rich collection of historic art.

Ancient artifacts in cardboard boxes: The rush to save its books, paintings and other artifacts has left little time to wait for specialized packing materials. Instead, volunteers make do by hastily nailing together crates from whatever wood is available.

On Monday, volunteers hastily packed ancient manuscripts into cardboard boxes originally intended for transporting bananas to supermarkets. Among them was a thousand-year-old bible decorated with gold thread.

At religious sites, people are also preparing for the worst. The Armenian Cathedral of Lviv removed a medieval wooden sculpture, depicting the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, for safe storage. Having survived World War II, the giant stained-glass windows of Lviv's Latin Cathedral have now been boarded up with steel plates. Many of the city's landmark statues are now swaddled in bubble wrap.

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Atika Shubert, CNN

At least 1.2 million refugees have crossed the border from Ukraine into Poland since the Russian invasion began on February 24, the Polish Border Guard tweeted early Tuesday.

141,500 refugees passed through the border on Monday alone, according to the Border Guard.

In total, at least 1.7 million refugees have left Ukraine, according to the United Nations. Though the majority have crossed into Poland, many others have also entered Hungary, Slovakia, Moldova and Romania.

The mayor of Lviv said on Tuesday that the city, located in western Ukraine, was struggling to provide food and housing to some 200,000 displaced Ukrainians who fled there from war-torn parts of the country.

He urged international organizations to provide help "here in Lviv, in Ukraine."

"We need mobile centers for temporary stay with equipped bathrooms and food outlets. Medical and psychological support, medicines, bulletproof vests, and helmets. Mobile hospitals for children and adults,” he said.

In a separate statement Monday, Sadovyi had said the city was reaching the limit of its capacity. About 440 cultural and educational facilities in Lviv are being used to house displaced persons, along with 85 religious buildings, the mayor’s office said.  

The US-based organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Russian forces had "violated their obligations under international humanitarian law not to conduct indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks that harm civilians."

The comments come after eight civilians were killed over the weekend while fleeing the Russian army's advance.

HRW added that over recent talks between Russia and Ukraine have “failed” to establish safe routes of evacuation, and urged all parties involved to "take all feasible steps to remove the civilian population from the vicinity of fighting or military objects.”

Some context: Several attempts to evacuate civilians during temporary ceasefires have failed, with Western leaders accusing Russian forces of continuing to target pre-approved routes.

Almost all of Russia’s proposed routes out of Ukraine lead to Russia or its close ally Belarus, which Ukrainian authorities described as unacceptable.

On Monday, Ukraine's Ambassador to the UN accused Russia of blocking attempts to evacuate civilians, adding it was “appalling” that Russian troops were opening fire on evacuees after both countries had allocated certain roads to be utilized as evacuation corridors. 

The US Embassy in Ukraine said Tuesday the security situation throughout Ukraine “continues to be unpredictable,” warning US citizens trying to flee that conditions at each border “can change very quickly.”

Wait lines can also change without warning, the embassy said.

Photos from various border points have shown long lines of thousands of people waiting to cross.

The embassy also reminded its citizens not to cross into Belarus, citing “the arbitrary enforcement of laws, the risk of detention, the Russian military attack on neighboring Ukraine and the build-up of Russian military in Belarus along the border with Ukraine.”