Ukrainian fighters in Mariupol told ‘their lives will be spared’ if they surrender
Maxar satellite imagery gives an overview of the Azovstal Iron and Steel Works in eastern Mariupol where Ukrainian fighters are believed to be holding out against a Russian takeover of the southern port city.
Maxar | Maxar | Getty Images
Russia says it has offered Ukrainian fighters left in Mariupol, the besieged southern port city that Russia claimed to have seized on Saturday, a last remaining window to surrender.
Russia said in a statement reported by state news agency Tass that it was giving Ukrainian “militants” and “foreign mercenaries” left in Mariupol a chance to lay down their arms from 6:00 a.m. Moscow time on Sunday (3:00 a.m. London time) and that if they did so “their lives will be spared.”
The statement was aimed at the remaining Ukrainian forces believed to be holding out in the massive Azovstal iron and steel works complex. Ukrainian forces have spent weeks resisting Russia’s takeover of the strategically-important port city Mariupol, which has faced relentless bombardment and now lies largely in ruins.
Russia said that if the offer was accepted, Ukrainian fighters should raise white flags around the perimeter of the steelworks.
There has been no indication that Ukrainian fighters plan to surrender, and the deadline has now passed.
— Holly Ellyatt
Russia continues to shift troops, bombard eastern Ukraine
Ukrainian military soldiers walk over debris caused by Russian shelling in Kharkiv on April 16, 2022.
Sopa Images | Lightrocket | Getty Images
Moscow is still redeploying forces to the eastern part of Ukraine and attacking defenders there with artillery as it gets ready to restart its offensive in that part of the country, the U.K. Ministry of Defence said on Sunday.
Russian combat and support units are shifting to Kharkiv as well as to Severdonetsk, in Ukraine’s Luhansk province, among other locations, the ministry said.
Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second biggest city, has been under intermittent bombardment since the war began in late February.
The redeployments include troops that had withdrawn to Belarus, the British ministry said.
“Though Russia’s operational focus has shifted to eastern Ukraine, Russia’s ultimate objective remains the same,” the ministry said on Twitter. “It is committed to compelling Ukraine to abandon its Euro-Atlantic orientation and asserting its own regional dominance.”
— Ted Kemp
Zelenskyy says Mariupol’s fate is key to peace talks
“Russian soldier, sowing campaign has already begun,” says a roadside sign in Dnipro, Ukraine. Photos of Ukrainian tractors hauling off abandoned Russian tanks have circulated widely since Russia invaded Ukraine.
Celestino Arce | Nurphoto | Getty Images
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told Ukrainian media that the continuing siege of Mariupol could scuttle any attempts to find a negotiated end to the war.
“The destruction of all our guys in Mariupol – what they are doing now – can put an end to any format of negotiations,” Zelenskyy said in an interview.
Zelenskyy also said he spoke with the leaders of Britain and Sweden about how best to help those defending Mariupol and the tens of thousands of civilians trapped there.
Mariupol’s fate can be decided either through battle or diplomacy, he said.
“Either our partners give Ukraine all of the necessary heavy weapons, the planes, and without exaggeration immediately, so we can reduce the pressure of the occupiers on Mariupol and break the blockade,” he said in his nightly video address to the nation. “Or we do so through negotiations, in which the role of our partners should be decisive.”
Zelenskyy said the situation in Mariupol remains “inhuman” and that Russia “is deliberately trying to destroy everyone who is there.”
The president’s office said the southern port city is holding out but the situation is critical. The battle for Mariupol has come at a horrific cost to trapped and starving civilians. Locals reported seeing Russian troops digging up bodies from residential courtyards and prohibiting new burials. It was unclear why.
Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said Saturday that Ukrainian forces have been driven out of most of the city and remain only in the huge Azovstal steel mill.
Mariupol’s capture would allow Russian forces from the Crimean Peninsula to fully link up with troops in the Donbas region, Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland.
— Associated Press
Russia says its forces take most of Mariupol
A view shows a street damaged during Ukraine-Russia conflict in the southern port city of Mariupol, Ukraine April 14, 2022.
Alexander Ermochenko | Reuters
Russia says it has seized the urban area of Mariupol and only a small contingent of Ukrainian fighters remain inside the steelworks in the besieged southern port, according to a report from Reuters. It would be the first major city to have fallen to Russian forces since the Feb. 24 invasion.
“The situation is very difficult” in Mariupol, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told the Ukrainska Pravda news portal. “Our soldiers are blocked, the wounded are blocked. There is a humanitarian crisis … Nevertheless, the guys are defending themselves.”
Mariupol is the main port of the Donbas, a region of two provinces in the southeast which Moscow demands be fully ceded to separatists.
Ukraine says it has so far held off Russian advances elsewhere in the Donbas regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, where at least one person was killed in shelling overnight.
— Sarah Whitten
