Following Russia’s inability to overrun the capital and the loss of its Black Sea flagship, the battered port city of Mariupol appeared on the verge of succumbing to Russian forces after seven weeks under siege, a development that would give Moscow a decisive victory in Ukraine.
The last pocket of resistance in Mariupol, according to the Russian military, was roughly 2,500 Ukrainian fighters stationed at a huge steel complex with a maze of underground pathways. Russia set a deadline for their surrender, promising that anyone who laid down their arms would be “assured to live,” but the Ukrainians refused.
“All those who continue to resist will be exterminated,” Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov stated. He claimed intercepted communications indicated that roughly 400 foreign mercenaries were present at the Azovstal steel factory alongside Ukrainian troops, a claim that could not be independently verified.
The capture of Mariupol would allow Russian forces to weaken and encircle Ukrainian soldiers in eastern Ukraine, where Russia has focused its war efforts for the time being and is deploying manpower and equipment removed from the north following a botched attempt to take Kyiv.
As Russian soldiers prepare for a full-scale invasion in Donbas, Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland, where Moscow-backed rebels already hold some area, Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar hailed Mariupol as a “shield shielding Ukraine.”
Russian forces launched fresh missile strikes in Kyiv and elsewhere on Sunday, indicating that no region of Ukraine is safe until the war ends. The strikes appear to be aimed at weakening Ukraine’s military might ahead of the expected assault in the east.
Following the devastating loss of its Black Sea Fleet flagship, Russia’s military command pledged on Friday to intensify missile assaults on the city.
The Russian military stated on Sunday that precision-guided missiles were used to assault an armaments complex near Kyiv overnight, the third such hit in as many days.
After blaming Ukrainian forces for bombings on Russian territory that injured seven people and damaged around 100 residential buildings in Bryansk, a region bordering Ukraine, Russia resumed its attacks on Kyiv. Officials from Ukraine have not verified that they have hit targets in Russia.
A Saturday hit on what Russia’s Defense Ministry identified as an armored vehicle plant, according to Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko, killed one person and injured numerous others. Residents who had fled the city early in the war were encouraged not to return.
In the east, near Sievierodonetsk, the Russian military claimed to have damaged Ukrainian air defense radars, as well as multiple munitions stores. Overnight, explosions were reported in Kramatorsk, an eastern city where missiles killed at least 57 people at a train station packed with residents attempting to flee before Russia’s expected invasion.
Officials estimate that Russians have murdered at least 21,000 people as a result of the protracted siege and unrelenting bombardment of Mariupol. Out of a prewar population of 450,000, only 120,000 people remain in the city.
The Russians have continued to target Mariupol with airstrikes, according to Malyar, the deputy defense minister, and maybe preparing for an amphibious landing to bolster their ground forces.
Capturing the city, which has a geographical area almost half that of Hong Kong would be Russia’s first tangible victory after two months of battle and would help comfort the Russian population amid the worsening economic crisis brought on by Western sanctions.
It would give Russia a land corridor to the Crimean Peninsula, which it annexed from Ukraine in 2014, while also depriving Ukraine of a key port and valuable economic assets.
The capture of Mariupol would also free up more forces for a new operation in the east, which, if successful, would give Russian President Vladimir Putin a strong position from which to press Ukraine for concessions.
So far, the defenders have been able to hide and resist until they run out of ammo in tunnels beneath the enormous Azovstal steel plant, which covers an area of more than 11 square kilometers (nearly 4.2 square miles).
While Russia seems on the verge of declaring victory, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned that the fall of the city could jeopardize any attempt at a diplomatic settlement.
In an interview with Ukrainian journalists, Zelensky said, “The destruction of all our soldiers in Mariupol — what they’re doing now — can put an end to any format of negotiations.”
In his evening speech to the people, Zelensky urged the West to deliver more heavy weapons as soon as possible if the city is to be saved, adding that Russia is “deliberately attempting to annihilate everyone.”
The first European leader to meet with Putin since the assault began on Feb. 24 was Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer, who stated the Russian president is “in his own war logic” on Ukraine.
Nehammer said in an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he believes Putin feels he is winning the fight, and that “we have to look in his eyes and confront him with that, what we see in Ukraine.”
Ukraine’s prolonged resistance to Russia’s invasion has been dubbed “heroic” by Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi, depriving Russia of what it had expected to be a quick win.
“What awaits us is a war of resistance, a lengthy period of violence and damage that will continue,” Draghi said in an interview published Sunday in the Italian daily Corriere Della Sera. “There is no indication that the people of Ukraine will accept a Russian occupation.”
The northeastern city of Kharkiv, like Mariupol, has been a target of Russian aggression since the beginning of the invasion, and the situation has deteriorated ahead of the eastern operation.
According to reporters who were present, multiple rockets slammed the downtown of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, on Sunday. At least two individuals were killed, with four more injured, while the severity of the attack indicated that the death toll could grow.
The barrage blasted into apartment buildings, scattering broken glass, debris, and a rocket fragment on the street. Several apartments caught fire, as firefighters and occupants hurried to put out the flames.
Three people were killed and 34 others were injured after a missile-related explosion occurred near an outdoor market on Saturday, according to Mayor Ihor Terekhov. On Friday, ten people were killed in rocket assaults on Kharkiv’s residential districts, according to local officials.
A walkout in Kharkiv injured four workers, according to Nate Mook, a member of the World Central Kitchen NGO, which is operated by renowned chef José Andrés. Staff members were unnerved but safe, according to Andrés.
According to Zelensky, 2,500 to 3,000 Ukrainian forces have perished and 10,000 have been wounded in the conflict. At least 200 children have been killed and more than 360 have been injured, according to the prosecutor general’s office in Ukraine.
Despite the fact that the war is still continuing, Zelensky spoke about Ukraine’s plans for a memorial to remember the fallen and the sacrifices of the Ukrainian people in his nightly speech.
One suggestion is to convey the narrative of the damaged bridge near the capital that people used to flee, “to remind all generations of our people of the violent and pointless attack Ukraine was able to repel,” he said.
On Easter Sunday, Pope Francis issued a heartfelt appeal for peace in Ukraine’s “senseless” conflict.
“May there be peace for war-torn Ukraine, which has been painfully tested by the bloodshed and destruction of this cruel and senseless conflict into which it has been pulled,” Francis said, without referencing Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine on February 24.
