This is what I want to explain to the international media about Azovstal

This is what I want to explain to the international media about Azovstal

This is what I want to explain to the international media about Azovstal.
There are our military, as well as about 1000 of our civilians at Azovstal.
There is such thing as a corridors for the military to surrender. The russians have provided one, but we don’t need it, as our military don’t want to surrender.
There is also such thing as a humanitarian corridor to evacuate the civilians out of the combat zone. We need such corridor from Azovstal to evacuate women, children and the elderly.
The russians refuse to open a corridor for civilians, cynically pretending that they do not understand the difference between a corridor for the military to surrender and a humanitarian corridor to evacuate the civilians.
But they do understand it all. It’s just that they are trying to lay extra pressure on our military.
Very few of the russian official speakers are not ashamed to tell lies that the humanitarian corridor has been provided, but for some reason our civilians don’t want to use it.
It is important the international media clearly understand the truth: the russians are afraid to storm Azovstal, but at the same time they are knowingly and cynically blocking the release of civilians from Azovstal, thus trying to put additional pressure on our military.
Again, we call on world leaders and the international community to take every effort immediately to open humanitarian corridor from Azovstal for women, children and the elderly.
Ірина Верещук

Віце-прем'єр-міністр України - Міністр з питань реінтеграції тимчасово окупованих територій України