Tonight (Monday), the office of the mayor of Mariupol, Vadim Boychenko, updated that close to 5,000 people had been killed in the outbreak of the war. For weeks now, Russian forces have been besieging the city and it is constantly being bombed. It should be noted that a spokesman for the mayor who updated that the death toll stands at 5,000 did not say based on what this figure was determined.
For several weeks now the Russians have been marking Mariupol as a very important strategic target. This is because conquest of the city will help the Russians take control of a continuous strip in southern Ukraine and cut off access to the Ukrainian army to the sea.
According to the authorities, about 90% of the houses in the city have already been damaged by these attacks and about 40% have been completely destroyed, after four weeks of shelling of the city by the Russians. Throughout most of these weeks residents are forced to survive without electricity and heating, although at night the temperature drops below zero, and their food and water are also running out.
According to the Ukrainians, a real humanitarian catastrophe is taking place in Mariupol, while evacuation from the city through “humanitarian corridors” is also lazy. Since the beginning of the fighting, only a few tens of thousands of residents have managed to escape from it. It is estimated that more than 100,000 residents are trapped in Mariupol.
Two very serious attacks have taken place in the last two weeks in Mariupol. In one bombing an art school was bombed where residents hid and in another bombing a theater was bombed in which about 1,000 people hid from the terror of shells and bombs. This theater was bombed, and about 300 people were killed inside it, according to authorities.
Simultaneously with what happened in Mariupol, the mayor of Irpin Alexander Markushin, announced tonight that Ukrainian forces have managed to regain control of the city on the outskirts of Kyiv. It is one of the most difficult fighting hotspots in the capital area since the beginning of the war. If the mayor’s words are true, this is a significant and important achievement of the Ukrainian side. The mayor warned: “We understand that there will be further attacks on our city, and we will defend it with courage.”
Meanwhile, Western intelligence sources have updated that even in the last day the Russian army continues to be stuck in its positions and on no front is it advancing. At the weekend, Moscow announced that it had completed the “first phase” of its operation in Ukraine, and that it would now focus its efforts on expanding the pro-Russian rebel-held areas of Luhansk and Donetsk in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. In the West, some interpreted this statement as a Russian admission of the failure of the effort to achieve the original goal of the operation – the occupation of significant areas deep in Ukraine.
The head of Russia’s Security Council, Nikolai Petrushev, declared this afternoon that claims in the West that Russia is seeking to replace the Ukrainian government with another government and that this is Moscow’s main goal are untrue.
In recent weeks, the Kremlin has repeatedly stated that its goal is to carry out a “de-Nazification” of Ukraine, which is what has led the West to the thought that Russia intends to oust Ukrainian President Zalansky and place a Russian puppet regime in his place.
Meanwhile, a spokesman for the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense said there were no signs that the Russians had given up their plan to besiege Kyiv, and perhaps even occupy it, even though they were not advancing. In addition, despite the resumption of negotiations between Russia and Ukraine in Turkey, a senior U.S. State Department official said tonight that it does not appear that Russian President Putin is now ready to make compromises and bring an end to the fighting.
U.S. President Biden said tonight that he did not apologize or back down from his statement that Putin “can not stay in power.” Putin can hurt diplomatic contacts and escalate – “no one thinks we’re going to overthrow Putin,” he said.