Between rebels and government forces hit several places in Donetsk, including a cafe.
The evacuation unfolded ahead of talks in Moscow between German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande and Russian President Vladimir Putin. A day earlier, Merkel and Hollande had visited Kiev to discuss ways to achieve peace in the separatist region with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
Russia has acknowledged that some of its citizens are fighting among the rebels, but rejects Ukrainian and Western charges that it's backing the insurgency with troops and weapons. Yet NATO's top commander, U.S. Air Force Gen. Philip Breedlove, says Russia continues to supply the separatists with heavy state-of-the-art weapons, air defenses and fighters.
The fighting has killed more than 5,300 people since April and displaced over 900,000, according to the U.N.
With Merkel's first trip to Moscow since the conflict broke out, France and Germany were hoping they could come up with a peace deal acceptable both to Ukraine and Russia - but locals in Ukraine were skeptical.
Speaking in Debaltseve, Zorian Shkiryak, an adviser to Ukraine's interior minister, said he had little confidence that a lasting settlement could be reached for eastern Ukraine.
"For that to happen, Putin has to remove his army and soldiers and allow the Ukrainian authorities and the Ukrainian people to resolve matters on their own territory," he told the AP. "But I have little hopes in this respect."
