Twelve people who had been hiding in the shelter of the Avdiivka Coke Plant since the beginning of the full-scale invasion by Russia have been successfully evacuated to a safer region. Vitaliy Barabash, the head of the Avdiivka City Military Administration, shared this information.
According to Barabash, these twelve individuals sought refuge in the plant's shelter at the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine and requested protection.
"There were 12 people left; they were civilians, some of them worked for subcontracting organizations that worked on a contractual basis for the Coke Plant. They knew what shelters were available there. So, they asked to stay," he explained.
Barabash mentioned that it was challenging to persuade these people to evacuate as they were reluctant to leave.
"After the withdrawal, for about a month, probably since all the employees of the Coke Plant were evacuated, these people refused to be evacuated from the plant and stayed behind. Initially, there were 17 of them; then we convinced three, then two more. As of yesterday, there were 12, and now we have managed to convince all of them and evacuated everyone. Psychologists are currently working with the evacuees," Barabash stated.
As of the morning of December 9, there were 1,253 people remaining in Avdiivka, and there are no children in the city. On December 4, the Avdiivka City Military Administration announced that they had finally confirmed that a 12-year-old boy who had been sought for several months had left the city.
