Femi Ashekun/
The strategic city of Mariupol was on the brink of falling to Russia yesterday night in a major victory for the Kremlin, after around 1,000 Ukrainian marines reportedly surrendered and Russia’s ministry of defence claimed it had taken control of the city’s port.
Footage broadcast on Russian state television purportedly showed Ukrainian troops giving themselves up after holding out in the key besieged port city since the outbreak of war on February 24.
Soldiers emerging from a bunker at a steelworks were filmed walking with their hands up while one man helping to carry a comrade on a stretcher could be seen waving a white cloth.
Russia said 1,026 Ukrainian marines holed up at Ilyich iron and steelworks in the city’s industrial district had been forced to surrender, including 162 officers, after putting up a last stand.
Ukraine has, however, dismissed the Russian claim.
Unverified posts from the Kremlin’s defence ministry added that members of Ukraine’s 36th Marine Brigade had “voluntarily laid down arms”. Russia’s defence ministry also claimed last night that it had taken control of Mariupol’s port.
The city has been surrounded for the vast majority of the seven-week invasion and large areas have been reduced to rubble, with images from the city reminiscent of those seen in Allepo, Syria and Grozny, Chechnya – also razed by Russian forces.
The city’s mayor has said a total of about 21,000 civilians have been killed during the fighting and seemingly indiscriminate shelling of the city.
However, the Ukrainian resistance, including men who stayed to fight when their families fled, had managed to cling on to control of the city, trying to protect an estimated 100,000 civilians left behind.
Petro Andriuschenko, an adviser to the mayor, said Ukraine still held several areas of the city including a separate steelworks at Azovstal – one of Europe’s largest – and the harbour.
Capturing its Azovstal industrial district, where the marines have been holed up, would give the Russians full control of Ukraine’s main Sea of Azov port, reinforce a southern land corridor and expand its occupation of the country’s East.
Ukraine’s general staff said Russian forces were attacking Azovstal and the port, but a defence ministry spokesman said he had no information about any surrender.
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