According to a Ukrainian official the city of Mariupol “doesn’t exist anymore” after Russia declared the city is clear of Ukraine soldiers.
“The situation in Mariupol is both dire militarily and heartbreaking. The city doesn’t exist anymore. The remainder of the Ukrainian army and large group of civilians are basically encircled by the Russian forces,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said during an interview with CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
The Kremlin revealed on April 14th that there were no Ukrainian soldiers in the metropolitan location of Mariupol, a crucial battleground in the east of Ukraine.
“The entire urban territory of Mariupol is completely cleared of militants of the Nazist group ‘Azov,’ foreign mercenaries, and Ukrainian troops,” the Russian Defense Ministry wrote in a social media post.
About 2,500 Ukrainian soldiers are obstructed from leaving Azovstal, among Europe’s most significant metallurgical plants found in the east of Mariupol, by Russian soldiers who have actually surrounded the plant, the Russian Defense Ministry approximated.
Numerous Ukrainian authorities stated their soldiers are still having a hard time in Mariupol and have actually defied the due date used by Russian forces to give up.
The Russian Defense Ministry provided the Ukrainians at Mariupol’s huge Azovstal steel mill till 1 p.m. on April 17 to give up, stating that those who put down their weapons will be “guaranteed to keep their lives.”
Ukrainian soldiers declining to give up in the besieged port of Mariupol would be destroyed, the Russian military threatened.
“TWO MONTHS OF DARKNESS”: Officials are working to rescue hundreds of civilians from a Mariupol steel mill, who have remained underground for months as Russian forces attacked. https://t.co/hj52TTqTnI pic.twitter.com/GhEz6icLTv
— CBS Mornings (@CBSMornings) May 2, 2022
If the staying Ukrainian soldiers in Mariupol were removed, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy threatened to cut all talks with Russia.
“The more Borodianka-like cases appear, there will be no chance that negotiations will be held, actually,” he said during an interview with Ukrainian media. “The destruction of all our guys in Mariupol—what they are doing now—can put an end to any format of negotiations.”
Borodianka is an urban-style settlement about 37 miles northwest of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv from which the Russian forces just recently withdrew. Zelenskyy stated that more than 300 civilians were eliminated by Russian forces, with about 30 of them carried out.
Kuleba stated that Russia and Ukraine have actually had no contact for weeks at the diplomatic level.
“The only level of contact is the negotiating team that consists of representatives of various institutions and members of parliament,” he said.
He minimized the ceasefire talks and identified the efforts as “consultations at the expert level.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, which the Kremlin calls “a special military operation.”
The United Nations said that as of April 15, 1,982 civilians had been killed and 2,651 injured in Ukraine since Russia’s invasion, and more than 4.8 million people had fled the country.
Russian forces recently shifted focus to the south and east of Ukraine where the separatist or disputed territories are located. The Kremlin is apparently intending to occupy the corridor connecting Crimea and Donbas, with Mariupol being a key city along the corridor.
However, a ceasefire over this area seems elusive, with the two sides having taken on irreconcilable stances.
The gap between Russian and Ukrainian demands seems unbridgeable on the issue of Crimea and Donbas; both areas have been de facto occupied by Russia or pro-Russian separatists.
Putin clearly demanded that Ukraine recognize Crimea as part of Russia, and Donetsk and Luhansk as independent. Meanwhile, Zelenskyy has agreed to possibly set aside the disputes for those territories but also vowed to not give them up.
H/T The Epoch Times
