Nearly 70 vessels, including six foreign-flagged ships, are stuck at Ukrainian ports. “Currently, almost 70 vessels are blocked in ports from which it is impossible to navigate. The worst situation with the crews was in Mariupol because in other ports the crews had the opportunity to evacuate by land,” Ukraine’s deputy minister of infrastructure Yuriy Vaskov said.
Some of the six foreign-flagged ships that are stuck in Mariupol will “not be able to leave without proper repairs”, Igor Barsky, director of the port, said.
Meanwhile, Russia on 24th February launched its invasion of Ukraine. And, according to the latest updates, Evacuation operations are continuing from the besieged southern city of Mariupol with 40 civilians rescued on Friday, Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy confirmed in his latest national address. Three evacuation buses left the besieged Azovstal steel plant in the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol on Friday, according to Russian media reports. However, the latest US military aid package to Ukraine, announced by president Joe Biden on Friday, is worth $150m. Germany will also send seven self-propelled howitzers to Ukraine, on top of five artillery systems the Dutch government has already pledged, the German defence minister, Christine Lambrecht, said. Also, the UK government has said it will give Ukraine 287 mobile generators in addition to 569 generators it had donated earlier.