Ukraine has lost contact with the last defenders of the city of Mariupol, refugees in the Azovstal steel plant for weeks under siege by Russian troops, the city's mayor said Wednesday and NBC News reported.
Russia halted the attacks to allow civilians to leave the last bastion of Ukrainian resistance in this crucial southeastern city, which is already under Russian control, but resumed its assault this week.
“Sadly, heavy fighting continues in our fortress.
But there are still hundreds of civilians.
There are more than 30 children waiting to be rescued,” said the mayor, Vadym Boichenko.
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Mariupol has been under siege for months, with swathes of the city reduced to rubble while the remaining residents suffer without help.
Ukrainian forces have barricaded themselves in the sprawling steel plant alongside civilians sheltering from Russian bombardment.
"Unfortunately, today there is no connection with them, there is no way to reach them to understand what is happening, if they are safe or not," said the mayor.
“We pray for our heroic defenders and thank them for their heroic actions.
They have slowed down the enemy and given us more time to prepare,” he added.
Debris litters the interior of the Donetsk Regional Academic Theater following a March 16, 2022 bombing in Mariupol, Ukraine, Monday, April 4, 2022.Alexei Alexandrov/AP
Russia denied it was attacking the plant, according to the state news agency, RIA.
The Ukrainian Defense Ministry said however that Russian troops are trying to increase the pace of their offensive in the east, where the fall of Mariupol may be a symbolic moment for Vladimir Putin's regime.
A few days ago, two Ukrainian women whose husbands defend the steel plant called for the evacuation of civilians to include soldiers, fearing they will be tortured and killed if left behind.
600 dead in the assault on the Mariupol theater
The Associated Press news agency published a journalistic investigation on Wednesday that concludes that
600 people were killed in the Russian attack on a theater in Mariupol in March.
The Russian bombing of the Donetsk Academic Regional Theater on March 16 is
the deadliest known attack on civilians to date
, according to the investigation, which found evidence that twice as many people were killed than previously estimated.
Many survivors consider the number to be even higher.
About 100 people sheltering at Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol evacuated
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The investigation recreated what happened in the theater that day from the accounts of 23 survivors, rescuers and other witnesses.
It was also based on two sets of plans of the theater, photos and videos taken inside before, during and after that day.
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The government initially estimated that 300 people were killed and opened a war crimes investigation, according to the agency.
His journalists arrived at a much higher number thanks to the reconstruction of a three-dimensional model of the building, repeatedly reviewed by direct witnesses, most of them from inside the theater, who described in detail where people took refuge.
All said that at least 100 people were in a field kitchen just outside, and that none survived.
They also said rooms and hallways inside the building were overcrowded, with one person for every 30 square feet (three square meters) of free space.
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Many survivors estimated that there were about 1,000 people inside at the time of the airstrike, but the most seen escaping, including rescuers, was about 200.
"They did not come to capture the city, they came to destroy it," Maria Kutnyakova said in the city of Lviv during a memorial event at the Mariupol theater, "they are trying to hide how many people really died in Mariupol, to hide their crimes."
James Gow, a professor of international security at King's College London, said documenting what happened is essential to establishing a pattern of crimes against humanity in Ukraine.
“This strong witness testimony will be important in establishing that the [illegal Russian] conduct was widespread,” said Gow, who served as an expert at the UN International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.
Mariupol has taken on extraordinary importance as a symbol of the devastation inflicted by Russian forces and of the Ukrainian resistance.
Local authorities say some 20,000 civilians have been killed during the Russian siege.
Russian troops want to seize the city for its strategic value as a port and link between the southern and eastern territories held by pro-Russian forces.
Vladimir Putin's regime has declared victory, but Ukraine refuses to acknowledge it.
