Proponents of Mariupol criticize the Ukrainian government for failing to protect the city / Article

Proponents of Mariupol criticized the government for failing to protect the city

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Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, the world has paid increased attention to the seaport city of Mariupol in Azov, which was brutally bombed and fired by Russian troops. It is a city with a population of almost half a million before the war and is now effectively wiped off the face of the earth.

The last defenders of the Mariupol battalion “Azov” are still in the vast territory of the metallurgical plant “Azovstal”. They are determined to continue to defend themselves, said Ia Samoilenko, Azov’s intelligence officer.

Samoilenko said that he should not give up, because if Ukraine falls into the hands of the occupiers from Russia, Poland and the Baltic states will follow.

An Azov intelligence officer accused the Ukrainian government of failing to prepare Mariupol for defense, so Russian troops could so easily surround the city. Nevertheless, Azov has proven its effectiveness in fighting the rival opponents, Samoilenko said.

“According to my estimates and the estimates of the units here, between February 24 and April 15, we destroyed nearly two and a half thousand enemy soldiers and wounded more than five thousand. They account for about 15% of the total damage to the enemy in Ukraine. We also destroyed about 60 tanks and destroyed another 30. These are more than 10% of the total losses of Russian tanks throughout Ukraine. The situation is almost the same with infantry fighting vehicles and artillery systems – we destroyed more than 10%. And only one unit here in Mariupol caused damage to the opponent. And there were days when more than half of all Russian airstrikes were aimed at Mariupol.

And we did not receive any support. We were actually abandoned alone. You know, we’ve been alone for the last eight years, “said Samoilenko.

Proponents of Mariupol also called on the world to give up Russia’s energy resources and supply even more weapons to Ukraine so that it could win the war.

Although women, children and the elderly have been evacuated from the besieged Azovstal, soldiers are still trapped there. Many of them are injured.

“Thanks to the great efforts of our battle medical hospital, 95% of the people who were evacuated from the battlefield to our field hospital survived. But people are currently suffering and are essentially dying because they are unable to recover. You see, emergency medical care, emergency surgery does not mean that people will recover well. They need this recovery, they deserve it. If you live in a bunker, an improvised hospital and you are still bombarded with bombs, there is dust everywhere, it is dirty everywhere – care and recovery cannot be provided. People get additional illnesses like pneumonia from the dust in the hospital. “These people, a few hundred of them, deserve to be evacuated to the safe territory of Ukraine or elsewhere,” said Samoyalenko.

He also said that about 25,000 people had been killed in Russia’s attacks on Mariupol.

The General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces has reported that nearly 25.5 thousand Russian troops have fallen in Ukraine since February 24. During the past day, Ukrainian defenders have killed another 400 invaders. Russia has not given up its soldiers for several weeks.

CONTEXT:

In Mariupol, several dozen people hid in Russian artillery and aviation bombs for two months on the site of the Azovstal plant. This week it became known that the factory managed to evacuate women, children and the elderly.

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