The mayor of the Ukrainian port of Mariupol said on Monday that his city was “in the hands of the occupiers” after a week-long siege by Russian forces razed the city, leaving an unknown number of civilians dead and forcing hundreds of thousands to flee their homes. their. houses. “Not everything is in our hands,” Vadim Boitshenko, the pro-government mayor of Mariupol, said in a live television interview. “Unfortunately today we are in the hands of the conquerors.” Bojchenko called for a “complete evacuation” of the remaining population of Mariupol, which had a population of more than 400,000, before Russia began its invasion of Ukraine on February 24. “According to our estimates, about 160,000 people are currently in the besieged city of Mariupol, where it is impossible to live because there is no water, electricity, heat, connection,” he said. “And it’s really scary.” It was not clear if there were still active fighting inside the city. Ukrainian officials have claimed that Russian forces prevented humanitarian convoys from approaching or leaving the city safely. A pro-Russian separatist leader said on Sunday that about 1,700 Mariupol residents were being “evacuated” daily from the city and its environs, but Ukrainian officials said the Russians were in fact carrying out what they described as the violent deportation of thousands to Russia. “We need a complete evacuation from Mariupol,” Boychenko said. “Our most important mission today is to save every life … And there are hopes that we will succeed. For example, there are 26 buses that have to go to Mariupol to evacuate, but unfortunately, they have not been allowed to move. And this game is played every day. A cynical game like “Yes, we are ready”. You can drive there, but it doesn’t really work. Our heroic guides under the fire are trying to reach the places where the inhabitants of Mariupol can be missed and they are waiting in the hope that they will have such an opportunity. “But the Russian Federation has been playing with us since day one.” Statistics released by Ukrainian officials on Sunday show a bleak picture of weeks of bombing and civil war in Mariupol. According to these data, 90% of the residential buildings in the city were damaged, of which 60% were immediately hit and 40% were destroyed. Destruction on the streets of Mariupol, Ukraine, on March 23. (Maximilian Clarke / SOPA Images / LightRocket / Getty Images) Seven of the city’s hospitals – 90% of the city’s hospital capacity – were damaged, three of which were destroyed. Three maternity hospitals (with one damaged), seven higher education institutions (with three damaged) and 57 schools and 70 kindergartens, with 23 and 28 damaged, respectively. Many factories were damaged and the city’s port was damaged. According to official statistics, up to 140,000 people fled the city before the siege and about 150,000 managed to flee during the blockade. During the siege, about 170,000 people remained in the city, and Ukrainian officials say 30,000 people were deported from Mariupol to Russia.
