First civilians evacuated from Ukraine's Sumy arrive at destination

The first convoy carrying civilians from the city of Sumy in northern Ukraine arrived via a humanitarian corridor in the central city of Poltava, Ukraine's presidency said late on Tuesday.

"The first column of 22 buses has already arrived in Poltava," the president's deputy chief of staff Kyrylo Tymoshenko said on Telegram, hailing this as "good news."

He added that 1,100 foreign students would travel onwards by train to Lviv in Western Ukraine.

A second convoy of buses had already reached Poltava region, the presidential administrator said.

The humanitarian corridor was also used by drivers of civilian vehicles, he added.

Sumy, 350 kilometres (220 miles) east of Kyiv, has experienced days of heavy fighting.

The Ukrainian authorities said that 21 people, including two children, were killed in air strikes in the besieged city on Monday.

"I am glad that the work of the evacuation team at this stage was completed successfully," Tymoshenko said.

Evacuations also took place outside the capital Kyiv.

But attempted evacuations from the port town of Mariupol have failed on several occasions in recent days, with both Kyiv and Moscow blaming the other side for the failures.

Moscow has announced a humanitarian ceasefire in Ukraine for Wednesday morning to carry out the evacuation of the civilian population, Russian news agencies reported.