Some 100 people have left the sprawling Azovstal steel plant in the Black Sea port city of Mariupol and are heading to territory controlled by Ukrainian forces, President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed in a Twitter post on Sunday. The plant remains the last pocket of Kiev's resistance in the city otherwise controlled by Russian forces and the militias of the Donbass republics.

Ukrainian officials are still working together with UN representatives on evacuating civilians from the area, Zelensky outlined, adding that the evacuees will be transferred to the Ukrainian city of Zaporozhye on Monday.

A spokesperson for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Saviano Abreu, has also confirmed to Reuters that the evacuation operation began on April 29 and is being coordinated by the International Committee of the Red Cross, as well as by Russia and Ukraine.