How Putin’s troops managed to conquer the city

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In the spring of 2022, a city like no other embodies the terrible suffering and catastrophic devastation of war in Ukraine: the port city of Mariupol. During the three-month siege, large parts of the city on the Sea of ​​Azov were razed to the ground. Here are the main stages of the battle for Mariupol.

Already at the outbreak of war on February 24, 2022, Mariupol came under fire and the residents had to seek refuge in cellars. The attacks destroy the power grid and water supply. Residents cannot bury their dead because of the constant shelling. Within a week, Russian troops and pro-Russian fighters surrounded the city.

On March 9, the Russian Air Force bombed a maternity ward and a children’s hospital. Five people were killed, including a heavily pregnant woman. A photo of the initially only injured woman on a stretcher causes outrage worldwide. Russia claims members of the Ukrainian Azov regiment were in the building.

After several failed evacuation attempts, a first convoy of 160 vehicles left the city through a humanitarian corridor on March 14. About 20,000 people manage to escape over the course of two days, but hundreds of thousands are trapped.

On March 16, a theater in the center of Mariupol was bombed, where hundreds of people – mainly women and children – had taken refuge. Local authorities speak of 300 dead. In a June 2022 report, Amnesty International estimates that “at least a dozen people” were killed, “probably considerably more”. It was a “clear war crime”. Russia denies responsibility for this.

On April 4, the mayor of Mariupol said that 90 percent of the city has been destroyed. The streets are littered with corpses. At least 20,000 people were killed in the siege, according to the Ukrainian government. A week later, Ukrainian troops announced they were preparing for a “final battle” for the sprawling Azovstal steel mill. Over the course of the next week, Russia issues several ultimatums to the soldiers entrenched there, but they refuse to give up. On April 21, Russian President Putin announced the “liberation” of Mariupol and ordered the siege of the steel mill.

At the beginning of May 2022, hundreds of women, children and the elderly will be able to leave the steel mill where they found refuge. On May 17, Ukraine announced that more than 260 Ukrainian soldiers, some seriously wounded, had surrendered. More will follow in the coming days. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (45) praises the troops as “heroes”. The priority now is to save their lives. On May 20, the Russian army announced that the last of the 2,439 Ukrainian soldiers had surrendered. They are taken to prisons in the Donetsk region. (AFP)

Source: Blick