In a message posted on his Telegram account, the mayor Vadim Boichenko warned that “murderers cover their tracks,” reported the Europa Press agency.
“After the widespread genocide, Russia’s top leaders have ordered the destruction of any evidence of crimes committed by their army in Mariupol,” he said, in an apparent reference to what happened in Bucha, where kyiv claims the Russians killed hundreds of civilians, some shot in the back of the head or with their hands tied.
According Boichenko, “Cautious estimates” from a week ago put some 5,000 dead in Mariupol, but “given the size of the city, the catastrophic destruction, the duration of the blockade and the fierce resistance”, the figure could be “tens of thousands of civilians”.
“That is why Russia is in no hurry to give the green light to initiatives to save and completely evacuate Mariupol,” explained the mayor, who revealed that “all potential witnesses” to the alleged atrocities “are being identified (…) and destroyed. “.
“They collect and burn the bodies of Mariupol residents killed as a result of the invasion,” he denounced, accusing self-proclaimed mayor Kostiantin Ivashchenko of “coordinating” the operation.
He also regretted that “the world has not seen the scale of the tragedy in Mariupol since the Nazi concentration camps”, and judged that the city “is no longer Chechnya or Aleppo, but the new Auschwitz”, in a comparison between the territory now in the hands of Russia, the Syrian city and the concentration camp set up by the Nazis on Polish territory.
In this framework, a caravan of seven groups and some 40 private vehicles under the protection of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), arrived today from the southeast of Ukraine to the city of Zaporizhia with citizens who had escaped from Mariupol, although in the city There are still some 100,000 people left in the port.
“Our team took a convoy of buses and private vehicles with about 500 people to Zaporozhye,” said the ICRC’s official Twitter account, which specified that its staff sought to reach Mariupol, but that “security conditions made it impossible”.
“Those who were part of the convoy had managed to flee Mariupol,” explained the organization, one of whose teams tasked with helping to evacuate civilians had been “held” on Monday by police in a Russian-controlled town and later forced to Go backwards.
Mariupol, located in Donetsk province, was the largest city in eastern Ukraine that escaped the control of pro-Russian separatists in the region until the start of the Russian invasion on February 24.
Now it is besieged, “90%” destroyed, and “40% of its infrastructure” is “unrecoverable,” Boichenko said on Monday.
An equally tragic picture was drawn by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), which warned that the humanitarian situation continues to worsen and more than 100,000 people are barely holding on in extreme conditions, without the most basic supplies.
Several agreements to support humanitarian corridors allowed the departure of some 125,000 people, according to OCHA.
However, inside there would still be more than 100,000 citizens “on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe”, as Boichenko warned two days ago.
The British Ministry of Defense, which prepares its own reports on the evolution of the conflict in Ukraine, warned that there are 160,000 people who “have no electricity, communication, medicine, heating and water.”
The Russians would be preventing the access of the aid, “probably” to seek that the Ukrainian forces “surrender”, considered London.
The Ukrainian forces reported today, according to the Europa Press agency, of the continuity of the attacks on Mariupol, without for now having a precise balance of victims.
Control of the area is key to Russia’s interests in consolidating a land corridor between the Crimean peninsula and the areas of Donbass, controlled by the separatist rebels.
Source: Ambito
David William is a talented author who has made a name for himself in the world of writing. He is a professional author who writes on a wide range of topics, from general interest to opinion news. David is currently working as a writer at 24 hours worlds where he brings his unique perspective and in-depth research to his articles, making them both informative and engaging.
