11-year-old Milena Uralova[/B] recalls losing consciousness and that when she came to she saw her mother Yelena crying as her daughter had been injured while her family was trying to leave besieged Mariupol two weeks ago.
Recovering now in the relative safety of a children's hospital in the town of Zaporizhzhya, some 200 kilometres away, she calmly recalls the incident, with her facial and neck injuries still visible.
"I saw darkness and a loud noise echoed in my ears," the girl said."
"When I opened my eyes, I saw my mother holding me in her arms. She put me down and started crying and asking for help."
According to Yelena, Milena was injured when Russian troops opened fire as the family passed a checkpoint en route to Zaporizhzhya, an industrial city that has become a key crossing point for those leaving Mariupol.
Buses full of people fleeing their homes arrived in the city before moving further west, following a path taken by about a quarter of Ukraine's 44 million people, who were forced to seek refuge either in other, safer parts of the country or abroad.
Next to Milena is Sasha, an 11-year-old boy, also from Mariupol, with a large white bandage on his face from an injury he suffered from a rocket hit while playing with friends.
[BR][BR]"I was very scared, there was a lot of blood everywhere," he said.
Mariupol, a port city on the Sea of Azov, has been a symbol of suffering for more than a month since Russia invaded its neighbour in what the Kremlin calls a 'special operation' to disarm and 'denazify' Ukraine.
According to Mariupol municipal authorities, nearly 5,000 people, including some 210 children, have been killed since the Russian offensive began.
Russia denies that its forces are targeting civilians, but local authorities say at least 80 percent of the city has been destroyed and UN agencies have warned of "particularly adverse" conditions in Mariupol and other cities.
People who manage to reach Zaporizhia, usually after an arduous and dangerous journey by car or bus, speak of a ruined, desolate land, full of rubble with no electricity or heating, where people cook on fires that have been lit and drink rainwater or melted snow.
"Mariupol is gone, it has been bombed," said Katia Semeniuk, 77, sitting in a crowded supermarket turned reception centre where people who have fled their homes are offered food, warm clothes and help.
A notice board is covered with handwritten messages appealing for missing relatives to be located or offering help with transport. Volunteers are helping with paperwork and organising details of people who have lost their personal documents.
Semenyuk arrived in Zaporizhia after spending weeks moving from shelter to shelter in Mariupol, where she had gone to shelter with her son as bombing forced her to abandon her home in a village just outside the city.
"There was a house, we had everything and now there is nothing left," she said."
For many of those who survived, the future is uncertain as no one can predict how long the fighting will last."
But Milena, who loves gymnastics, has some ideas. With their town destroyed, the family heads west to neighbouring Lithuania. "I have a dream that when we get to Lithuania, we'll find a gym and I'll be able to train again," she said."
Source: APM
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