Moscow said today that 1,730 Ukrainian fighters have surrendered in Mariupol within three days, including 771 in the last 24 hours, claiming a surrender on a much larger scale than that admitted by Kyiv, after ordering its guard to leave.
The final outcome of Europe’s bloodiest battle in decades remains open to the public, with no confirmation of what happened to hundreds of Ukrainian soldiers resisting a massive steel plant at the end of a nearly three-month siege.
Ukraine, which says its purpose is to secure an exchange of prisoners, refuses to say how many were inside the factory or comment on what will become of the rest, after confirming that a few over 250 surrendered in the first hours after ordering them to lay down their arms.
The leader of the pro-Russian separatists, who control the area, said almost half of the fighters remained inside the steel industry, where underground shelters and galleries protected them from weeks of Russian bombing.
“More than half have already left, more than half have surrendered their weapons,” Dennis Pushilin told Solovyov Live. “Let them surrender, let them live, let them honestly face the burden of all their crimes,” he said.
The injured received medical treatment, while those who were in good health were taken to a convict colony and treated well, he said.
Ukrainian officials say they can not speak publicly about what happened to the fighters, as negotiations are under way in the background for their rescue.
“The state is making every effort to rescue our armed forces personnel,” said an army spokesman. Oleksandr Motuzyanik at a press conference. “Any information to the public would jeopardize this process.”
Russia denies agreeing to an exchange of prisoners. Many of Azofstal’s defenders belong to a far-right Ukrainian unit, the Azov Battalion, which Moscow calls Nazi and says should be prosecuted for crimes. Ukraine calls them national heroes.
Control of the Azov Sea
The end of the fighting in Mariupol, the largest city occupied by Russia so far, allows Russian President Vladimir Putin to claim a rare victory in the invasion that began on February 24. It gives Russia full control of the Sea of ​​Azov and an unbroken area of ​​land along eastern and southern Ukraine.
Ukraine says tens of thousands of civilians have died in nearly three months of Russian siege and bombing that have left the city in ruins. The Red Cross and the United Nations say the true toll is innumerable, but at least in the thousands, making it the bloodiest battle in Europe since at least the wars in Chechnya and the Balkans in the 1990s.
Moscow denies targeting civilians in its “special military operation” to disarm and “de-Nazify” the neighboring country. Ukraine and the West say Russian forces have killed thousands of civilians in an unprovoked offensive war.
Russian forces were driven out of northern Ukraine and the area around the capital in late March and pushed back from the second largest city, Kharkiv, this month.
Russia, however, continues its main offensive using massive artillery and armor, seeking to seize more territory in eastern Donbass, including the separatist Donetsk and Luhansk regions claimed by Moscow.
Ukraine’s general staff said today that Russia’s attacks were focused on Donetsk. Russian forces “suffered heavy losses” around Slovyansk north of Donetsk.
Police said today in the Telegram application that two children were killed in the city of Lyman, Donetsk. Serhiy Gaidai, governor of the neighboring Luhansk region, said four people had been killed and three wounded in the bombing of the town of Severodonetsk on the front line.
In Russia, the governor of the Kursk border region accused Ukrainian forces of bombing a village on the border, killing at least one civilian. The two sides have been blaming each other for bombings on both sides of the border for weeks. Reuters was unable to confirm the reports.
Follow Skai.gr on Google News
and be the first to know all the news
