by Natalia Zinets
KYIV (Reuters) – Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Friday its forces had full control of the Azovstal factory in Mariupol after the last Ukrainian fighters surrendered, as the Russian offensive intensifies in Donbass.
In a statement, the ministry said a final group of 531 fighters from the Azov Regiment, a pet peeve of Moscow and pro-Russian separatists since the 2014 conflict in eastern Ukraine, surrendered on Friday.
Earlier in the day, the commander of the Azov regiment in the Mariupol steelworks, Denis Prokopenko, confirmed that he had received the order from the Kyiv authorities to lay down their arms after nearly three months of siege and “heroic” resistance.
He added that all civilians and wounded soldiers had been evacuated from the tunnels of the gigantic metallurgical plant in which they had entrenched themselves.
Before the announcement of the “liberation” of the steelworks on Friday evening, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said that about 2,000 Ukrainian soldiers had become prisoners of war in recent days.
Kyiv did not confirm this figure, while Great Britain had advanced that of 1,700 soldiers.
The International Committee of the Red Cross, which oversees what Ukraine presents as “evacuations” from Azovstal, said it had registered several hundred prisoners of war, without further details.
Kyiv authorities say they want to exchange them for Russian soldiers, but Russian politicians have argued that some of them, including fighters from the Azov regiment, would be tried and even executed.
While the fighting has ended in Mariupol, it has intensified in the city of Sievierodonetsk, one of the last strongholds held by Ukrainian forces in the province of Luhansk, a priority target for Moscow in the Donbass with the neighboring province of Donetsk.
FLOUR OF FIRE ON SIEVIERODONETSK
According to the Ukrainian army general staff, the Russian army launched a major assault to try to conquer the city, but it was repelled after suffering heavy losses.
Russia has been trying, since it recorded the failure of its offensive against Kyiv in mid-April, to seize Sievierodonetsk and its twin sister, Lychchansk, on the other bank of the Siverskiy Donets river.
Taking the two cities would allow Moscow to claim full control of the province and place it under the authority of the “Luhansk People’s Republic”, proclaimed by pro-Russian separatists in 2014 and whose President Vladimir Putin has acknowledged. independence just before the start of its “special operation” in Ukraine.
“The Russian army has started a large-scale destruction of Sievierodonetsk. The intensity of the shelling has doubled, they (the Russians) are shelling the residential areas to destroy them house by house,” said the Ukrainian governor of Luhansk province , Serhiy Gaïdaï, on his Telegram account.
“We don’t know how many victims there are because it is simply impossible to go and check in every apartment,” he added.
The methodical destruction of cities, which aims to deprive their defenders of shelter until they are forced to withdraw, has been the tactic used by Russia since the beginning of the “battle of Donbass”.
In a televised address on Thursday evening, Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelensky said Donbass had become a “hell”.
In Moscow, Sergei Shoigu declared for his part that the complete “liberation” of the “people’s republic of Luhansk” was imminent. The conquest of this province and that of Donetsk could allow Vladimir Putin to claim the victory to which he aspires in Ukraine.
(Report by Natalia Zinets, Max Hunder and Tom Balmforth in Kyiv, French version Tangi Salaün)