Status: 05/17/2022 07:53 a.m
More than 260 Ukrainian defenders of the Azov steel plant have been taken prisoner by the Russians. According to the military leadership, their fight in Mariupol bought Ukraine important time. Now is the time to save their lives.
After weeks of siege, around 260 Ukrainian soldiers have left the Azov steelworks in Mariupol. Among them were 53 seriously injured, said the Ukrainian general staff. The other 211 Ukrainian fighters were taken to a town occupied by Russian troops. They were later to be released in a prisoner exchange with Russian soldiers, it said. The evacuation of the other defenders of the Azowstal steelworks is still being worked on.
“Thanks to the Mariupol defenders, we got critically important time to form reserves, redeploy forces and receive help from our partners,” said Deputy Defense Minister of Ukraine Hanna Malyar. All tasks to defend Mariupol have been completed. It was not possible for Azowstal to fight free. The most important thing now is to protect the defenders of Mariupol. The General Staff of the Ukrainian Army said the commanders had orders to save the lives of the remaining soldiers.
Injured taken to separatist areas
The seriously injured were taken to the pro-Russian separatist-controlled city of Novoazovsk for medical treatment, it said. The other soldiers would come to the town of Olenivka. The Russian Defense Ministry had previously spoken of a ceasefire for the evacuation.
Several hundred soldiers are said to still be in the steelworks. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy emphasized in his daily video address that Ukraine needs its heroes alive. In addition to Ukrainian authorities, the International Red Cross and the United Nations were also involved in the evacuation of the soldiers from the steelworks.
Topic overview
war in Ukraine
Steelworks last retreat in Mariupol
The port city of Mariupol was surrounded shortly after the Russian invasion in February. Russia repeatedly attacked the strategically important city with bombs and rockets. Ukrainian authorities assume thousands of civilian deaths.
Russian troops gradually took control after the siege. The city’s last Ukrainian defenders, however, holed up in the huge steelworks with several underground floors. The Russian troops did not risk an attempt at storming, but sealed off all entrances. “Block this industrial zone so that not even a fly comes out,” Kremlin boss Vladimir Putin instructed his military in front of the camera.
conflicting parties as a source
In the current situation, information on the course of the war, shelling and casualties provided by official bodies of the Russian and Ukrainian conflict parties cannot be directly checked by an independent body.
Civilians apparently all rescued
The area is repeatedly bombed. Hundreds of civilians who also fled to the steelworks from advancing Russian troops had already been evacuated from the factory premises in the past few days. There were long negotiations about the withdrawal of the soldiers, some of whom were seriously injured, and who had hardly any supplies or water left.
In Ukraine, there were also accusations against the government in Kyiv that it had abandoned the last defenders of Mariupol. The authorities repeatedly emphasized that they were unable to solve the blockade by Russian troops.