On Thursday, a Russian bombing on a maternity hospital in Mariupol that killed three people sparked anger, with Ukrainian and Western officials calling it a war crime. Following the failure of talks to reach a wide cease-fire, emergency personnel redoubled their attempts to get crucial food and medical supplies into besieged communities, as well as traumatized civilians out.
Ukrainian authorities say a kid was among the dead in Wednesday’s bombing on the key southern port of Mariupol. Another 17 individuals were injured, including pregnant women, doctors, and toddlers who were buried in the wreckage.
In many countries, images of pregnant women covered in dust and blood dominated news reports, bringing a new wave of horror to the two-week-old war sparked by Russia’s invasion, which has killed thousands of soldiers and civilians, displaced more than 2 million people, and shook the foundations of European security.
Millions more people have been forced to flee the country. Vitali Klitschko, the mayor of Kyiv, stated on Thursday that around 2 million people — half the population of the capital’s metropolitan region — have fled the city, which has turned into a fortress.
In broadcast remarks, he claimed, “Every street, every house… is being fortified.” “Even persons who never meant to change their attire in their lives are suddenly in uniform with machine guns in their hands.”
Two hospitals in a city west of Kyiv were also bombed on Wednesday, according to the mayor. Since the Russian invasion began two weeks ago, the World Health Organization has recorded 18 strikes on medical facilities.
Russian forces have made little progress on the ground in recent days, according to Western officials as the war enters its third week. They have, however, increased the shelling of Mariupol and other cities, trapping hundreds of thousands of civilians who are running out of food and water.
Temporary cease-fires intended to allow for evacuations and humanitarian aid have frequently broken down, with Ukraine accusing Russia of continuing to shell the country. However, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky claimed that 35,000 people were able to flee besieged areas on Wednesday and that more efforts were continuing on Thursday from towns and cities in eastern and southern Ukraine, including Mariupol, as well as Kyiv suburbs.
Despite several days of thwarted attempts to reach Mariupol, the city council posted a video on Thursday showing buses driving down a highway with a note saying that a convoy bringing food and medicine was on its way.
“Everyone is working to support the Mariupol residents. And it will arrive,” stated Vadym Boychenko, the mayor of Kyiv.
Images from the city, where hundreds of people perished and workers rushed to bury some of them in a mass grave, have sparked outrage throughout the world. For food and water, the living has resorted to breaking into stores or melting snow. The city has been without heat for days as temperatures drop below freezing at night and hover barely above freezing during the day.
The earth shook more than a mile away as a succession of bombs hit Mariupol’s children’s and maternity hospital. Explosions blew out windows and tore the front of one structure apart. Police and troops rushed to the site to help casualties, carrying a bleeding woman on a stretcher past flaming and wrecked vehicles. Another mother sobbed as she hugged her child in her arms.
Whether the hospital was hit by “indiscriminate” firing into a crowded location or planned targeting, Britain’s Armed Forces Minister, James Heappey, called it a “war crime.”
On a visit to Ukraine’s neighbor Poland, US Vice President Kamala Harris backed calls for an international war crimes probe into the invasion, saying that “the eyes of the world are on this war and what Russia has done in terms of aggression and horrors.”
“It is apparent to us that Russians are committing war crimes in Ukraine,” said Polish President Andrzej Duda, who described the hospital strike as an “act of barbarity.”
Standing in the debris, regional Ukrainian police officer Volodymir Nikulin branded the Mariupol attack “a war crime without any justification.”
Concerns about civilian casualties were dismissed by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov as “pathetic shrieks” from Russia’s adversaries. Despite the fact that images from the aftermath show pregnant ladies and children at the location, he claimed without presenting evidence that the Mariupol hospital had been captured by far-right radical militants who were using it as a base.
Several rounds of talks have failed to stop the fighting, and a meeting between Lavrov and his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba in a Turkish Mediterranean resort failed to yield much common ground.
The two sides discussed a 24-hour cease-fire in their highest-level negotiations since the war began, but Kuleba said they did not make headway. He stated that Russia was still looking for Ukraine’s “surrender.”
“This is not what they will receive,” he added, adding that he was open to continuing the conversation.
In a phone discussion with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz asked for an “immediate cease-fire.”
Lavrov also stated that Russia was open to future talks, but he did not appear to be lowering Moscow’s demands. Putin may meet with Zelensky, he added, but only after more talks about Russia’s larger grievances.
Russia has claimed that the western-looking, US-backed Ukraine is a security concern, but Western diplomats believe Putin wants to install a pro-Russian administration in Kyiv as part of his ambitions to reintegrate the ex-Soviet state.
Russia’s military is currently in a precarious position, facing greater than expected Ukrainian resistance and heavier soldier losses. However, as it approaches critical cities, Putin’s invasion force of more than 150,000 men holds potentially insurmountable firepower advantages.
Despite frequent shelling of populous areas, American military officials reported little change on the ground in the preceding 24 hours, with the exception of Russian progress in an intense battle against the cities of Kharkiv in the east and Mykolaiv in the south.
Western countries have attempted to speed the end of the war by putting harsh sanctions on Russia, and a slew of major corporations have abandoned the country, effectively isolating its economy.
On Thursday, Britain added more oligarchs to its sanctions list, including Roman Abramovich, the wealthy owner of Chelsea FC in the Premier League. According to the government, Abramovich’s assets, including Chelsea, have been frozen, and he has been prevented from dealing with British individuals and enterprises.
The war has raised the specter of a nuclear calamity on several occasions. On Wednesday, it knocked out the electricity to the shuttered Chernobyl nuclear reactor, increasing concerns about the spent radioactive fuel that must be kept cold. However, the United Nations nuclear watchdog agency stated that there was “no critical impact on safety.”
Iryna Vereshchuk, Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister, pleaded with the Russian military on Thursday to allow repair personnel access to the plant and to repair a ruptured gas pipeline in the south that has left Mariupol and other towns without heat.
