19 Apr Russia is flattening Mariupol, says Ukrainian MP
THE besieged eastern Ukrainian city of Mariupol is being flattened by Russian forces, a Ukrainian MP has warned.
Oleksiy Goncharenko said residents of the city continue to endure heavy bombardment, but insisted Ukrainian forces are putting up a “heroic” fight.
In an interview with GB News he said: “We see that Russians continue the war and continue to terrorise people by missile attacks, by bombings and it’s an especially difficult situation.
“The worst situation is in Mariupol, where Ukrainian fighters are continuing to fight and they refuse to surrender, and that is absolutely heroic.
“The problem that many civilians in the city have is that they don’t have a possibility to leave the city to save their lives to come to safety.
“Russia is just destroying, flattening the city and razing it into ruins, to the ground.”
Mr Goncharenko was speaking live from Odessa in Ukraine during To The Point on GB News today.
Asked if it was true that Russian troops were allowing people to leave, he said: “They announced yesterday that they propose to Ukrainian fighters to lay down their weapons.
“But first of all, they don’t want to – they’re fighting, they want to continue to fight for our citizens and land and that’s something that I admire.
He said that a similar offer had been made previously but Russian forces broke the agreement and attacked people leaving the city.
“The Russian army proposed to them a corridor to leave,” he said. “They agreed to leave but after this they were shot at.
“They shelled this corridor and a large number of Ukrainian soldiers and officers were killed by this absolutely barbarian act.
“There is no faith in Russian words and that is also the key, one of the reasons why there are no changes in Mariupol.
“I think that the best option is that the world, by sanctions, will make Russia stop their operations in Ukraine, and also in Mariupol – that will save thousands lives and that is the best solution.”
Mr Goncharenko confirmed that Russian troops were regrouping in the east of Ukraine.
“They’re regrouping, they’re concentrating forces in south-eastern Ukraine and planning to continue the attack and planning to continue this war – and continue destroying infrastructure and bombing the cities, trying to cause more humanitarian catastrophes.
“For example, in Mykolaiv, which I visited yesterday, for five or six days there has been no water because Russia destroyed the centralised water supply system of Mykolaiv…it was a big city of half million people before the invasion.
“Now there are probably 300,000 or 400,000 people. They have to queue in lines to get some water.
“It’s a humanitarian catastrophe there and that is Russian style of war, humanitarian catastrophe, war crimes, devastation, terrorising civilians.”
