Ukrzaliznytsia, the state-owned railway operator, has suspended all passenger traffic to the front line city of Avdiivka until Sept. 3 after Russian-backed militants shelled an area near the railway line.
Ukrzaliznytsia announced on Aug. 28 that it was suspending the two regular passenger services to Avdiivka until Aug. 30, then extended the stoppage until Sep. 3.
The Aug. 28 shelling forced all passengers and staff at Avdiivka’s main railway station to take cover in bomb shelters.
Avdiivka is in Donetsk Oblast and sits next to the front line between Ukrainian forces and the Russian-sponsored forces who have been at war with Ukraine since 2014.
Officially the city has a population of 35,000, although unofficial estimates place it closer to 20,000, as many residents fled the fighting and did not return.
The last large-scale evacuation in the city occurred in February 2017, when nearly 200 civilians were temporarily moved out during the 2017 Battle of Avdiivka.
According to the press service of the Joint Forces Operation, on Aug. 28 the separatists fired rounds from 120mm mortars and 122mm artillery pieces at the civilian infrastructure of Avdiivka.
Under the Minsk Agreemement, the ceasefire signed by Ukraine, the militant leaders, Russia, and the OSCE in Sept. 2014, indirect weapons of that size are forbidden within 15 kilometers of the contact line, well beyond the range of conventional mortars.
Passenger services will run to Pokrovsk or Ocheretyne until Sep. 3. Passengers going to Avdiivka will have to take buses.
There are no restrictions on cargo trains, meaning that they will be able to reach the steel giant Metinvest’s coking plant in Avdiivka, the largest in Ukraine.
Ukrzaliznytsia only restored inter-city passenger services to the city in December 2020, when the company announced a Kyiv-Avdiivka route. A service from Dnipro was launched in June 2021.
