A Ukrainian naval commander in the besieged Russian city of Mariupol on Wednesday released a video message saying his men had just hours to live.
Major Serhiy Volyna is in the last stronghold of the Ukrainian resistance in the city and sent the video to the BBC and other media.
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“We may be living our last days, our last hours,” says a Ukrainian soldier
Volyna said his troops would not surrender but called for international aid for the 500 wounded soldiers and the hundreds of women and children he said were taking refuge with them in a steel industry the 10km² iron and steel factory from Azovstal.
“This is our final message to the world. It could be our last message. We may only have a few days or hours to live,” Major Volyna said.
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“We are asking for help from world leaders,” he added. “We ask them to organize an extraction and take us to another country.”
“Enemy units outnumber us ten to one, they have air dominance, artillery, ground forces and tanks,” repeated Volyna, the commander of the 36th Marine Brigade.
He didn’t say how many Ukrainian soldiers remain at the factory, but said they had “good fighting spirit”.
However, the situation of the injured is “very serious”. “They’re in the basement, they’re rotting there,” said the Major.
While the commander stressed that his men would not surrender, Russia said last week 1,026 soldiers from that unit, including 162 officers, had surrendered.
There is another combat unit in the Steelworks. It is the Azov Brigade, named after the Sea of Azov that connects Mariupol to the rest of the Black Sea.
2 of 2 members of Ukraine’s National Guard “Azov” and activists take part in a protest in Kyiv, Ukraine, against local elections in proRussian rebelcontrolled areas in the east of the country (Photo: Gleb Garanich/Reuters)
Members of Ukraine’s Azov National Guard and activists take part in a protest in Kyiv, Ukraine, against local elections in areas controlled by proRussian rebels in the east of the country.
The Azovs are a militia linked to farright nationalists who later joined the Ukrainian National Guard. They are estimated at around 900 soldiers.
The naval unit joined Azov in Mariupol last week. It is unclear how many joint Ukrainian troops remain at the factory.
On Tuesday, the Azovs published a message on Telegram: “We will fight, we will use all the cartridges we have left, but we ask the Motherland to save the civilians, save the wounded and remove the corpses.”
And the humanitarian corridors?
Mariupol has been Russia’s strategic target since its forces invaded Ukraine in February.
Russia’s Defense Ministry issued another ultimatum to Ukrainian forces holed up at the Azovstal factory to lay down their arms and surrender on Wednesday morning, but the deadline passed with no sign of surrender.
Not a single Ukrainian soldier accepted the offer made on Tuesday, the ministry said.
However, Ukraine appears to have reached a preliminary agreement with Russia on the evacuation of civilians, announced Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk.
Vereshchuk said this would involve opening a humanitarian corridor for women, children and the elderly. Mariupol Mayor Vadim Boychenko previously announced that evacuation corridors between Mariupol and Zaporizhia would be opened.
Boychenko reported on social media that residents on Taganrogskaya Street could board buses that would also stop at the Azovstal factory.
“During those terribly long and difficult days, they survived in inhumane conditions,” Boychenko said. “There was an information vacuum, they had no access to information.”
However, agreements to open humanitarian corridors have been difficult to implement. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that “the situation in Mariupol remains as serious as possible”.
Last week, Zelenskyi told the BBC he believed the Russian bombardment of the city killed up to 20,000 people and brought an unknown number of civilians into Russian territory.