MARIUPOL, Ukraine, May 7 — The territorial defence headquarters of the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) said today that 50 more people had been evacuated from the besieged Azovstal steelworks in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, according to Russia’s Interfax news agency.

Around 50 civilians had been evacuated yesterday to a reception centre in nearby Bezimenne, in the separatist DPR, whose forces are fighting alongside Russian troops to expand their control of large parts of eastern Ukraine.

Scores of civilians have been trapped for weeks alongside the remaining Ukrainian forces holding out in the bombed-out plant. — Reuters