After Russia demanded Mariupol surrender, a condition denied by the Ukrainian government, the Ukrainian government described the situation in the municipality as “very difficult”. The country also reported that it had failed to establish a new safe corridor to evacuate civilians from the besieged city.
The Russian military ordered Ukrainians inside the southeastern city to surrender at 5 am (10 am GMT), saying that those who did would be allowed out through safe corridors. “Of course, we reject these proposals,” said Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk.
Vereshchuk said an agreement was reached with Russia to create eight humanitarian corridors to evacuate civilians from occupied municipalities, but Mariupol was not among them. Meanwhile, efforts to reach Mariupol with humanitarian supplies continue to fail. “The situation there is very difficult,” he added.
Mariupol was a port city with around 400,000 inhabitants before the war. Since the early days of the Russian invasion, it has been under siege and bombardment, without food, medicine, energy or clean water.
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