AFP, Donetsk :
The once-bustling leafy boulevards of central Donetsk are now deserted but one place where there is almost certain to be a crowd is the rebel-held city’s ornate Stalin-era railway station.
As the boom of mortar fire rocks the mining hub of one million daily, ever more residents are packing up and fleeing a tightening government blockade.
“They are bombing-that’s why we are getting far away from here,” said Lyubov, a grey-eyed woman with her hair in a bun, who fled her home in a nearby town.
“We left everything and ran away,” she said, adding that she was headed for the government-held city of Dnipropetrovsk, some 200 kilometres (124 miles) to the west, where her son and sister are.
Nearby families huddled around piles of bags and even a canary in a cage as they waited anxiously to make their escape.
“Our house burnt down and our neighbour’s too. The whole street was bombed. We are going to Moscow, to my daughter’s place,” said Yury, a tired-looking moustachioed man, who had arrived with family and neighbours from the town of Shakhtarsk.
Once a favoured spot for teenage lovers or family strolls, the manicured avenues in the city centre are now eerily quiet despite the baking hot summer weather.
Many shops and flats have “X”s of tape on the windows to prevent the glass from shattering in case of an explosion, and notices hang on the doors of apartment buildings with instructions on how to reach the nearest bomb shelter.
Stores, shopping malls and libraries are almost all closed and shuttered.
