The battle for Mariupol intensified Tuesday as thousands of people remained trapped and low on heat, food, and water as Russian forces continued their near-constant bombardment of the coastal city.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the once-vibrant area had been “reduced to ashes” while the European Union’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell described the Russian blitz as “a massive war crime.”
Civilians fleeing the conflict have shared stories about escalating violence as Russian and Ukrainian forces fought street by street through the downtown core. Russian airstrikes and artillery have gutted entire neighborhoods and turned Mariupol into something out of a horror show, residents said, adding that the attacks are getting heavier by the day.
Local officials told the Wall Street Journal that Russia has dropped 100 bombs on the city every day since Feb. 24 and destroyed up to 90% of Mariupol. Russian forces demolished a maternity hospital, a theater, and an art school. They’ve targeted civilians standing in line for food and blocked ways out. Despite demands to surrender, Ukrainians have said no.
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Dr. Eduard Zarubin told the New York Times that water is so scarce that people are melting snow. They are also chopping trees for firewood to fuel outdoor cooking stoves that are shared by neighbors. In order to get from one street to another, people are forced to pass corpses or shallow makeshift graves dug in the park or grassy medians. Some have friends in them, others, family members.
Russian strike in Mariupol
“If the war ends and we win and get rid of them, then I think that there will be excursions in Mariupol, just like there are to Chernobyl so that people can understand what kind of apocalyptic things can occur,” he said.
On Tuesday, Ukrainian military officials said those defending Mariupol had been able to destroy a patrol boat operating close to the city, as well as a radio complex.
Capturing Mariupol has been a priority for Moscow because it would link Russian-controlled parts of eastern Ukraine with a swath of territory Vladimir Putin’s forces have captured in the south.
Russian forces have faced aggressive counteroffensive attacks, buoyed by public defiance and Ukrainians who have used their knowledge of local battlefields to hit Moscow’s military on main roads, as well as disrupting their supply shipments.
In Chernobyl, wildfires broke out in the radioactive forest surrounding the nuclear power plant, which is now controlled by the Russian army. There are fears that radiation from the forest could spread quickly and widely in the smoke if the fires remain unchecked.
“Probably the fire was caused by the armed aggression of the Russian Federation, namely the shelling or arson,” the Ukrainian parliament said in a statement, though it did not provide any evidence of its claims.
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From a secret location in Kyiv, Zelensky spoke with Pope Francis on Tuesday about the escalating situation in Ukraine. In a tweet, Zelensky said the two talked about the “difficult humanitarian situation” and “the blocking of rescue corridors by Russian troops.”
He added that the “mediating role of the Holy See in ending human suffering would be appreciated.”
The pope has repeatedly expressed his concern about the Putin-ordered conflict and called it “a sacrilege without justification” in Vatican News.
After his talk with the pope, Zelensky urged Italian lawmakers to strengthen its sanctions against Russia and seize more assets from Putin and his allies as a way of pressuring Moscow into negotiating an end to the invasion. He added that the consequences of the war were already being felt in other nations and warned that “the most terrible thing will be the famine that is approaching for some countries.”
“Ukraine has always been one of the largest food exporters, but how can we sow [crops] under the strikes of Russian artillery?” he said.
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Countries such as Egypt, Lebanon, and Yemen have relied heavily on Ukrainian wheat in recent years.
Zelensky has spoken to the legislative bodies of multiple nations. He addressed U.S. lawmakers last week.
Elsewhere, Victoria Nuland, the undersecretary for political affairs, met with India’s foreign secretary Harsh Shringla as part of a U.S. delegation visit to India, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka, three countries that abstained from condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Nuland, in an interview with India’s NDTV, said U.S. officials were hoping India would change its stance on Russia.
“We understand India’s historic ties with Russia, but times have changed now,” she said. “The U.S. is a defense and security partner of India.”
Russian journalist Dmitry Muratov said he wanted to auction off his 2021 Nobel Peace Prize medal to raise funds for Ukrainian refugees. Muratov, the editor of the Novaya Gazeta newspaper, implored others to share their money with “refugees, the wounded, and children who need urgent treatment what is dear to you and have a value for others.”
He is currently asking auction houses about the possibility of organizing a sale.
Last year, he said he was giving away his share of the Nobel money to causes including independent media, a Moscow hospice, and care for children with spinal problems, the AP reported.
Authorities in Gibraltar have detained a superyacht linked to Russian tycoon Dmitrievich Pumpyansky, the chairman of the board of directors of PJSC, a main steel pipe supplier for Russia’s oil and gas industry. Pumpyansky was added to a growing list of oligarchs sanctioned by the European Union.
Superyachts owned or linked to Russian oligarchs are among the first assets seized or frozen by Western governments in response to the invasion of Ukraine.
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Chelsea soccer club owner Roman Abramovich has finally found a temporary home for his superyacht, called the Eclipse. The 533-foot long vessel docked in the Turkish tourist resort of Marmaris on Tuesday. The Eclipse arrived in the coastal city after cruising southeast of the Greek islands of Crete and Rhodes.
Eclipse, the luxury yacht of Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich, is seen in the bay of Villefranche sur Mer near Nice, France, in 2013. The yacht is some 160 meters long, is equipped with a missile detection system, a helicopter pad, a miniature submarine, and a luxury spa.
Turkey has not imposed economic sanctions on Russia or Putin, even though it is a NATO country. It has criticized Russia’s invasion but has also positioned itself as a neutral party.
