“The enemy is still blockading Mariupol,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Friday evening. “Russian troops prevented our aid from entering the city,” he added, promising to try again to get food, water and medicine there “tomorrow,” on Saturday. “Sieges are a medieval practice that is prohibited by the modern laws of war,” said Stephen Cornish, head of MSF in Switzerland and one of the NGO coordinators in Ukraine.
Kyiv, “symbol of resistance”
“Besieged Mariupol is now the worst humanitarian disaster on the planet. 1,582 civilians killed in 12 days buried in mass graves like this one,” Ukrainian diplomat Dmitry Kuleba blamed on Friday in a tweet accompanied by a picture of a trench. Yulia and her husband are among the few who managed to escape from Mariupol since the beginning of the blockade, passing through Russian checkpoints in fear. “On the way, we saw burnt-out civilian cars, sometimes turned over on their side. We realized that the Russians were shooting at them,” she says.
According to the Ukrainian army, in addition to Mariupol, the Russians are concentrating their efforts on the cities of Krivoy Rog, Kremenchug, Nikopol and Zaporozhye. But their main goal remains Kyiv, which they are trying to surround. Being in the suburbs of the capital, they seek to eliminate the defense in several settlements to the west and north of the city in order to “block” it, the Ukrainian General Staff said. “Kyiv is a symbol of resistance” that is preparing for “merciless defense,” Mikhail Podolyak, an adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky, proclaimed in a video message.
The humanitarian crisis is spreading: more than 2.5 million people have fled Ukraine, 116,000 of whom are third-country nationals, since the start of the Russian invasion on Feb. 24, according to figures released Friday by the UN. In addition, there are about two million internally displaced people, said the head of the UN refugee agency, Philippe Grandi. Most of the refugees are heading to Poland, which, according to border guards, has crossed the border of 1.5 million people since February 24. These refugees “do not feel like visitors. You accepted them into your families with tenderness, brotherly kindness,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy thanked in a long video message praising the Poles.
Appeal to Russian mothers
The Western camp continues to increase economic pressure on Moscow, paving the way for punitive tariffs and reducing trade with that country. The European Union and the G7 have joined Washington in lifting Moscow’s so-called “most favored nation” status, which promotes free trade in goods and services. Washington also attacked luxury goods, Joe Biden announced a ban on imports of “key sectors of the Russian economy, in particular seafood, vodka and diamonds.” “If (Russian President Vladimir) Putin steps up the bombing, puts Kyiv under siege, if he further escalates hostilities, we know that we will have to impose massive sanctions again,” French President Emmanuel Macron told AFP two days later. meetings.