Frightened residents of the east Ukraine city of Donetsk filed into a humanitarian aid centre on Thursday to collect clothes, food and medicine as others fled the city amid fierce fighting on the outskirts.
Clutching letters stating their family’s requirements and photocopies of their passports, around a dozen people could be seen outside the building next to the regional administration offices and a similar number was being helped inside.
Piles of clothes and blankets were spread across a theatre inside, draped over the red velvet seats and on the stage.
Pasta, buckwheat and a few bottles of sunflower oil could be seen stored in an office space next door with idyllic pictures of Ukraine’s countryside.
“They’re bombing night and day now. It’s terrifying!” said Tatyana Zakharenko, a 74-year-old pensioner who lives near the airport — retaken by Ukrainian forces in recent days but still the scene of fighting with rebels.
“I got my last pension payment on July 14. They’re not giving them out any more. What am I meant to do? I was born here and my legs aren’t good,” Zakharenko said, leaning on her walking stick.
In another part of the centre, 37-year-old mother of four Yelena Medvedeva was handing in her application.
“They told me at the bank that they couldn’t give me my child benefits any more. I’m hoping to at least get some bread and baby food,” she said.
In the queue, Lyudmila Antonyan, could barely speak through her tears.
“They’re bombing civilians now! Our neighbour lost his arm. How can we live like this? I heard that maybe they can help me here,” the 60-year-old said.
A team of a dozen people — officials and volunteers — works at the centre, which they said was one of several in the city along with canteens for civilians.
“Before we were getting five or six people coming to us every day. But we had 40 yesterday. They’re coming from the whole region now,” said one official, who gave only her first name, Larisa.
The official explained that humanitarian supplies were arriving from all over Russia, as well as through small private donations from local residents.
“Businessmen? Let’s just say they’re not being over-generous,” she huffed.
Larisa said the shipments of humanitarian aid from Russia had been held up because of combat operations along the border.
“They told us today that a corridor has been opened. Let’s hope so,” she said.
Boxes filled with medicine and bandages — many of them marked with stickers from the Russian nationalist LDPR party and like-minded organisations — were also being kept in a refrigerated part of the building.
“We’re running out because the conflict is getting worse,” said Yulia Zhiltsova, a pharmacist in charge of the storehouse, which also supplies rebel fighters.
“We’re particularly low on heart medicine. The elderly and the refugees really need any medicine that can lower their blood pressure,” she said.
Thousands of residents have fled the city and families could be seen at the bus station making their way out as Ukrainian forces have made gains and fighting has come ever closer to the city itself.
Russia’s migration service say half a million have fled to Russian soil from south-east Ukraine since April 1, but there was no indication of how many others have been displaced to other parts within Ukraine.
Around 1,000 people are estimated to have been killed in the conflict so far, including the 298 passengers and crew on board downed Malaysian flight MH17.
“We hear bombing every day. The office where I work has closed down,” said Lyudmila Boichuk, 50, as she waited with her two daughters and large suitcases for a bus to Zaporizhya — a city in southeast Ukraine not under rebel control.
Sitting next to her on a bench was 34-year-old Oksana with her son and daughter — headed for the Russian city of Belgorod and on to Omsk in Siberia.
“Everyone on my street has already gone,” she said.