The Ukrainians do not intend to give up their weapons despite the repeated Russian air attacks on the "mother of battles".At least 1,000 civilians are hiding in underground shelters under the vast Azovstal steelworks in Mariupol,[/B] according to the city's city council.
The city council in its statement claims that the Russians are shelling this factory, still controlled by the Ukrainians, in the besieged port city.
The civilians are "mainly women with children and elderly," the city council said in a Telegram post.
Street battles have been taking place in Mariupol all last week as Russian forces try to bring it under their full control.
The Battle of Azovstal
Mariupol and the last-ditch effort by heroic Ukrainian soldiers to hold the city before it falls into the hands of powerful Russian forces is now the focus of the war in Ukraine. It is a strategically important city for the Russians, as its port connects territory held by pro-Russian separatists in the east with the Crimean region
Barricaded in the Azovstal metallurgical plant, the last Ukrainian soldiers in Mariupol are fighting a battle against a vastly superior opponent, with Kiev effectively accepting their predestined end and asking Moscow to open humanitarian corridors[/B] to remove the remaining residents - among them women and children - from the city and from Azovstal. Residents, the vast majority of whom lack water, electricity, food and medicine.
According to authoritative military analysts quoted by the BBC, the number of defenders in Mariupol is between 500 and 800. Just a few hundred, that is, without ammunition and heavy weapons, against thousands of fully armed Russian marines. Russian troops have created a suffocating encirclement around the Azov port city, though they have not yet taken possession of the entire city.
And the British Ministry of Defence comments that "Russian commanders will be concerned about the time it is taking to subdue Mariupol."
And the British Ministry of Defence comments that "Russian commanders will be concerned about the time it is taking to subdue Mariupol. It also adds that coordinated Ukrainian resistance has severely tested Russian forces, delaying the advance of Putin's forces into other parts of Ukraine.
"Targeting populated areas within Mariupol is in line with Russia's approach in Chechnya in 1999 and Syria in 2016. This is despite claims by Russia's defence ministry on 24 February 2022 that Russia would neither strike cities nor threaten the Ukrainian population," London observes."
According to Mariupol police official Mikhailo Vershinin, about 100 remain in the city.000 people, when before the war it numbered around 400,000.
At the same time, authorities in the city of Lviv reported that a rocket attack earlier today killed seven people and wounded 11 others. The Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement that it destroyed 16 Ukrainian military facilities in Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhya, Donetsk, Dnipropetrovsk and the port of Mikolaiv in the south and east of the country.
He added that the Russian air force had launched strikes against 108 areas where Ukrainian forces were concentrated and Russian artillery hit 315 Ukrainian military targets during last night.
"We will continue to fight the Russians in Mariupol" Kiev stresses
Despite the repeated shelling of Mariupol, the Ukrainian authorities make it clear at every tone that they will continue the resistance.
"Ukrainian forces in the besieged city of Mariupol continue to fight against the Russian army," Anton Cherashenko, an adviser to the Interior Minister, specifically told state television.
"Empty city, 40,000 forcibly displaced in Russia," says mayor
The mayor of besieged Mariupol claimed that about 40.000 civilians were forcibly displaced to Russia or Russian-controlled areas of Ukraine.
"Unfortunately, I have to state that as of today they are forcibly displacing" residents, Vadim Boychenko said, speaking on Ukrainian television. "We have verified through the municipal registry office that they have already displaced more than 40,000 people," he added."
Putin speaks of a "self-goal" by the West
Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin attempted to embellish the situation in his country, which has been trying to subjugate Ukraine for almost two months now.
Speaking to top officials in his government, he claimed that Western countries had scored an "own goal" by imposing sanctions against Russia, stressing that these have led to "the deterioration of the economy in the West". He also said that in Russia inflation is stabilizing and retail demand has normalized.
Source: Proto Thema
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