Ukraine: Russian Forces Pushed Back From Kyiv but Fighting Continues

A man rides his bike past a destroyed Russian tank in Trostyanets, Ukraine, on March 30, 2022. (Chris McGrath/Getty Images)

Officials in Ukraine on Friday said that Kyiv’s forces have pushed back Russian troops near the capital, Kyiv, although fighting is reportedly still raging in the area.

“Our troops are chasing them both to the northwest and northeast (of Kyiv), pushing the enemy away from Kyiv,” Oleksiy Arestovych, a political adviser to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, told the Reuters news agency.

Arestovych said Russia was carrying out a partial troop rotation and sending some of its forces to fight in eastern Ukraine. The Kyiv region’s governor, Oleksandr Pavlyuk, wrote on the Telegram messaging app earlier on Friday that some Russian troops had moved back and were heading toward the border with Belarus, a Russian ally.

Russian forces had left the village of Hostomel, which is next to an important airport, but they were digging in at the town of Bucha, Pavlyuk also said.

“The risk of dying is pretty high, and that’s why my advice to anyone who wants to come back is: Please, take a little bit more time,” Kyiv Mayor Vitaly Klitschko, a former heavyweight boxing champion, said via social media.

Earlier this week, Russian Defense Ministry officials said that Moscow would pull some of its troops away from Kyiv and Chernihiv, which was met with skepticism by U.S. and Western officials.

It comes as Ukrainian officials said that evacuation buses filled with civilians have left the southeastern city of Melitopol, which has come under Russian occupation.

Fire burns in a building after a shelling, as Russia's attack on Ukraine continues, in the town of Irpin, Kyiv region, Ukraine March 30, 2022. (Reuters/Oleksandr Ratushniak)

Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, wrote on Telegram that “about 500 people are on buses departing from Melitopol to Zaporizhzhia” in southern Ukraine. “About 300 private cars joined the evacuation column.”

In a post on Facebook, Melitopol Mayor Ivan Fedorov also said that civilians of Melitopol must leave due to “Russian occupiers” and accused Russian forces of blocking the “‘green’ [humanitarian] corridor and did not allow buses to enter Melitopol.”

Approximately 1,000 people have assembled to wait for evacuation, he said.

“I assure those thousands of Melitopol residents who wanted to, but for various reasons could not evacuate today, our team will not stop,” Fedorov said. “We are already forming another humanitarian convoy, which will soon deliver the necessary aid to Melitopol and pick up people from the city on the way back.”

Earlier on Friday, Iryna Vereshchuk, the Ukrainian minister of reintegration of temporarily occupied territories, claimed to CNN that buses carrying humanitarian aid to Melitopol were stopped and packages with food and medication were confiscated.

“We are negotiating for the buses to be returned and for the Melitopol residents tomorrow to evacuate using these buses,” she said.

Reuters contributed to this report.