The United Nations has continued to try to mediate the evacuation of civilians from the increasingly infernal ruins of Mariupol, a southern port city that Russia has sought to seize since invading Ukraine more than nine weeks ago. Citizens “beg to be saved” from a steel plant that has become the last stronghold of Mariupol, Mayor Vadym Boichenko said on Friday. “It’s not a matter of days. It’s a matter of hours. ” It is estimated that 2,000 fighters were hiding in the factory with about 1,000 civilians. Two Ukrainians whose husbands are members of Ukraine’s Azov National Guard regiment have said they fear soldiers will be tortured and killed if left behind and captured by the Russians. They called for a Dunkirk-type mission to evacuate the fighters, a reference to the World War II operation launched to rescue the besieged Allied troops in northern France. “We can do this mining operation… that will save our soldiers, our citizens, our children,” Katerina Prokopenko, 27, told the Associated Press. “We have to do this now, because people – every hour, every second – are dying.” In other developments: – Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in an interview that Russian and Ukrainian negotiators talk “almost every day.” However, he told China’s state-run Xinhua news agency that “progress has not been easy.” A former U.S. Marine was killed while fighting alongside Ukrainian forces, his family said, in what would be the first known American death in the war. The United States has not confirmed the report. – The mayor of the city of Popasna in eastern Ukraine, Nikolai Hanatov, says that two buses heading there to evacuate residents were shot and that contact with drivers has been lost. – Russian air defense forces located a Ukrainian military plane over the Bryansk region of Russia and tried to repel the aircraft. Two shells hit a village, said regional governor Alexander Bogomaz. No one was injured, but one oil terminal was damaged, Bogomaz said. It was difficult to get a complete picture of the unfolding battle in the east, because air raids and artillery barricades have made the movement of journalists extremely dangerous. Both Ukraine and Moscow-backed rebels fighting in the east have also imposed severe restrictions on reports from the battle zone. Numerically, Russia’s military manpower far exceeds that of Ukraine. In the days before the start of the war, Western intelligence estimated that Russia had deployed up to 190,000 troops near the border. Ukraine’s permanent army is about 200,000, spread across the country. So far, however, Russian troops and separatist forces appear to have made only small gains in Donbas a month since Moscow said it would focus its military presence in eastern Ukraine. Partly due to the persistence of the Ukrainian resistance, the US believes that the Russians are “at least several days behind where they wanted to be” as they try to encircle Ukrainian troops in the east, said a senior US defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity. to discuss the US military assessment. The British Defense Department offered a similar assessment in its daily assessment of the war, saying it believed Russian forces in Ukraine were likely to suffer from “weakened morale”, along with a lack of unit-level skills and “inconsistent air support”. He did not say on what basis he made the assessment. Despite the nature of the small village struggle to gain ground in Donbas, Russia’s promised attack could materialize. In total, the Russian army has about 900,000 active-duty personnel. Russia also has a much larger air force and navy than Ukraine and has regular nuclear weapons. In Mariupol, about 100,000 people are believed to still be in the city with little food, water or medicine. UN spokesman Farhan Haq said the organization was negotiating with authorities in Moscow and Kyiv to create the conditions for safe passage. Ukraine has blamed the failure of several previous evacuation attempts on the ongoing Russian bombing. For those at the Soviet-era Azovstal steel plant, a vast underground network of tunnels and warehouses has ensured air raid safety. However, the situation has become more dire after the Russians dropped “bunker busters” and other bombs on the factory, the mayor said. Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, told Saudi television network Al-Arabiya that the real problem was that “humanitarian corridors are being ignored by Ukrainian supranationals.” Moscow has repeatedly claimed that right-wing Ukrainians were obstructing evacuation efforts and using civilians as human shields. The allegations have not been verified. Azov’s constitution, which helps defend the steel plant, has its roots in the Azov Order, which was formed in 2014 by far-right activists at the start of the separatist conflict in eastern Ukraine. In further comments released by Xinhua on Saturday, Lavrov said Russia had evacuated more than 1 million people from Ukraine since the start of the war, including more than 300 Chinese civilians. The Foreign Minister did not provide any evidence to support his claim in the interview. Ukraine has accused Moscow of forcibly sending Ukrainians out of the country. Lavrov also blamed in part the lack of progress in talks to end the war on “the war rhetoric and arson of Western supporters of the Kiev regime.” On Russian state television tonight, guests suggest Moscow use nuclear weapons in the conflict. In a video overnight, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Russia of trying to destroy Donbas and everyone living there. The constant attacks “show that Russia wants to empty this territory of all people,” he said. “If the Russian invaders are able to carry out their plans, even in part, then they have enough artillery and aircraft to turn the whole of Donbass into stones, as they did in Mariupol,” Zelensky said. In a neighborhood on the outskirts of Kharkiv that is regularly bombed by Russian forces, some residents have remained in their apartments even though the buildings have charred holes. There is no running water or electricity, so they gather outside to cook on an open flame. Ukrainian reservists staying in a neighborhood cellar said the Russians hit the buildings with rockets, artillery and tanks. “A battle tank can come a short distance and launch all its ammunition into residential areas. It does not matter where. “And it is impossible to know where he will fire,” said Vladislav, who, like others in the unit, would only give his first name. Another reserve, nicknamed Malysh, expressed his frustration that he could not do more to stop the Russian advance. “I took the weapons, but unfortunately I can not catch flying missiles with my bare hands and throw them back,” he said. In the nearby village of Ruska Lozava, hundreds of people were evacuated after Ukrainian forces recaptured the city from the Russian occupiers, according to the regional governor. Those who took refuge in Kharkov spoke of miserable conditions under the Russians, with little water or food and no electricity. “We hid in the basement. It was horror. The basement was shaking from the explosions. “We were screaming, crying and praying to God,” said resident Ludmila Bocharnikova.
Associated Press reporters Jon Gambrell and Yuras Karmanau in Lviv, Mstyslav Chernov in Kharkiv, Yesica Fisch in Sloviansk, Lolita C. Baldor in Washington and AP staff around the world contributed to this report.
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