Russian forces claim to have taken the port of Mariupol while Ukraine prepares for the "final battle"

Mariupol maybe the Stalingrad of the modern times

By Edward Era Barbacena

Ukrainian forces said on Monday they fear the fall of Mariupol, a strategic port city in the country's southeast that has been besieged by the Russian army for more than 40 days, while continuing to strengthen positions in the east in the face of an imminent Moscow offensive. The head of the pro-Russian separatists of the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine assured for his part on Monday that his forces had completely conquered the city's port.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Monday he believes there are "tens of thousands" dead in the country's beleaguered southern port of Mariupol, in a statement to the South Korean parliament calling for help. military.

In a video appearance, Zelensky claimed that Russia "completely destroyed" the city. "The Russians totally destroyed Mariupol and burned it to the ground.

At least tens of thousands of Mariupol citizens must have died," the Ukrainian leader told South Korean lawmakers. "As for the port of Mariupol, it is already under our control," Denis Pushilin was quoted as saying by the Russian news agency RIA Novosti.

On the diplomatic front, Austrian Foreign Minister Karl Nehammer, the first European leader to visit Moscow since the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine on February 24, began a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday to try to obtain humanitarian corridors, according to a Austrian government spokesman.

Nehammer's visit should serve "to put an end to the humanitarian hell in Ukraine," Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg said ahead of a meeting with his European Union counterparts in Luxembourg.

The Russians have been besieging Mariupol for weeks , the capture of which would allow them to consolidate their territorial gains in the coastal strip along the Sea of ​​Azov, thus connecting the Donbas regions with the Crimean peninsula, annexed by Moscow in 2014.

"Today is probably going to be the final battle [in Mariupol] as our ammunition runs out," the 36th Marine Brigade, which is part of Ukraine's armed forces, wrote on Facebook on Monday. "This means death for some of us and captivity for others (...) We don't know what will happen, but we ask you to remember [us] with a kind word," the brigade asked "Ukrainians." “For more than a month we have been fighting without ammunition , without food, without water”, doing “the possible and the impossible”, the unit said, explaining that approximately “half” of its members are wounded.

For his part, Oleksii Arestovich, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, admitted on YouTube on Sunday that "it is now militarily impossible" to liberate Mariupol. Zelensky said in a video message to the South Korean National Assembly on Monday that Russia had "completely destroyed" the city and that he feared "tens of thousands of people" had perished there. “It was a city of half a million inhabitants. The occupants besieged her and did not even allow her to take food and water. The Russians totally destroyed Mariupol and burned it to ashes," he said.

Assault in the east

Ukrainian forces continued this weekend to strengthen their positions in the east, around Donbas, a region that since 2014 has been partly controlled by pro-Russian separatists.

“According to our information, the enemy has almost finished its preparation for an assault in the east. The attack will start very soon," Ukrainian Defense Ministry spokesman Oleksandr Motuzyanyk said on Monday. After revising its plans and withdrawing its troops from the kyiv region and northern Ukraine, Moscow is now aiming for total conquest of Donbas.

Analysts believe that Putin, faced with fierce Ukrainian resistance, wants to secure a victory in this region before the May 9 military parade in Red Square, which marks the Soviet victory over the Nazis.

"The battle for Donbas will last several days, and during these days our cities could be completely destroyed," Sergei Gaidai, governor of the Lugansk region in Donbas, predicted on Facebook, once again calling on civilians to leave the battle. zone. According to him, «the Mariupol scenario can be repeated in the Lugansk region».

On Friday, a Russian missile attack outside the Kramatorsk station in the east killed 57 people , including at least five children. While the population tries to flee this region, air strikes and bombings continue elsewhere, such as those on Sunday in Kharkiv (east), Ukraine's second largest city, and its suburbs, which left at least 11 dead, including a 7-year-old boy, and 14 injured, according to regional authorities.

Austrian Chancellor Nehammer said on Sunday that he intended to speak in the Kremlin about "war crimes" in Bucha, a town northwest of kyiv that has become a symbol of atrocities committed in Ukraine.

About 300 people were buried there in mass graves, according to the Ukrainian authorities, who accuse the Russians of massacres, which Moscow denies, denouncing "manipulation." In several towns near kyiv, which were occupied for weeks by the Russian army, the search for bodies continues.

"To date, we have 1,222 people killed in the kyiv region alone," Ukraine's Prosecutor General Irina Venediktova told Britain's Sky News channel on Sunday, though she did not specify whether the bodies were only civilians. She also reported that there are 5,600 open investigations for alleged war crimes since the start of the Russian invasion, including the deaths in Bucha.

Volodymyr Zelensky called on Westerners to "follow the example of the United Kingdom ," whose Prime Minister Boris Johnson paid a surprise visit to Ukraine on Saturday, calling on them to impose "a total embargo on Russian hydrocarbons."

Meeting in Luxembourg, the foreign ministers of the European Union (EU) studied on Monday a sixth package of sanctions against Moscow, which, however, will not affect purchases of oil and gas. The exodus of Western companies from Russia continues. This Monday, the French bank Societe Generale joined the list of companies that announced the cessation of their activities in the country since the invasion of Ukraine.

A few hours later, the Swedish telecommunications equipment manufacturer Ericsson announced that it was suspending its activities in Russia , where it supplies two of the main mobile phone operators. Russia and Ukraine represent less than 2% of its turnover.