Mariupol, Ukraine has been hit hard in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Russian forces continued their siege of the city, cutting civilians off from water and electricity amidst food and medicine shortages. Temperatures are below freezing during the night time and it doesn’t get much water in the day. Civilians have been unable to evacuate.
The city’s mayor, Vadym Boichenko said Russian planes are flying over residential areas every half hour.
They are “killing civilians: old people, women, children,” he said in a video posted online.
Over 1,3000 people have died since Mariupol was sieged 10 days ago, according to Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk and bodies are being buried in mass graves.
“They have a clear order to hold Mariupol hostage, to mock it, to constantly bomb and shell it,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a daily address to the nation.
Earlier this week, the Western world condemned Russian forces for potentially breaking the understanding that civilians, medical workers, medical vehicles and hospitals should not be attacked in war after Russia targeted a maternity and children’s hospital in Mariupol, killing three including a young girl. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov insisted that the hospital was being used to house Ukrainian fighters and that there were no women or children inside the building. His claims have not been substantiated. Russia has attacked 24 Ukrainian health facilities since the invasion began late last month, according to the World Health Organization.
Zelensky warned Russian leaders that their actions will backfire.
“You will definitely be prosecuted for complicity in war crimes,” Zelensky said in a video address. “And then, it will definitely happen, you will be hated by Russian citizens — everyone whom you have been deceiving constantly, daily, for many years in a row, when they feel the consequences of your lies in their wallets, in their shrinking possibilities, in the stolen future of Russian children.”
