Mayor of Mariupol Vadym Boychenko announced that in recent weeks a large part of the Russian troops have withdrawn from the city after Ukrainian forces had shelled Russian ammunition depots and other facilities, in the city. Boychenko, who remains loyal to authorities in Kiyv claims that the Russian occupying forces no longer feel safe in Mariupol and they are moving their logistics bases outside the city.
“The occupants’ impression that they are located deeply back of the frontlines has been smashed. The city has become dangerous for them. They thought they were safe, but now it’s the frontline. The Russian troops did not expect this, so they moved further from Mariupol. Our forces are gearing up for a counteroffensive,” Boychenko said.
According to the mayor, the destruction of several Russian ammunition warehouses in Mariupol caused serious troubles on the battlefield.
“They cannot maintain the proper pace of combat operations or maintain firepower and move forward. Our army destroyed the warehouses and made it impossible to bring supplies from Mariupol. We stopped them and we made the conditions right for attack from our side,” said Boychenko.
He also brought up the systematic demolition of residential buildings in Mariupol, often containing dead bodies within them. According to the mayor and Ukrainian authorities, this is how Russians try to cover up their crimes.
“There were about 1,800 apartment blocks in the city. 934 of them are to be demolished. They work day and night, removing the evidence of war crimes. 400 such buildings have already been demolished,” Mariupol’s mayor said.
Petro Andryushchenko, an adviser to the city’s mayor, claims that during the demolition of a block of flats in occupied Mariupol in southeastern Ukraine, the Russians threw human body parts into the construction waste. It is estimated that a total of 130 victims’ remains have been gotten rid of in this way.
Andryushchenko wrote on Telegram that in let alone one of the demolished residential buildings some 200 residents had been killed in the basement after Russian shelling.
“Only about 70 bodies were recovered from the basement. Everything else went into the construction waste. Witnesses, however, remained. Evil must be punished,” – said the official.
Before the Russian invasion, the population of Mariupol had been about 430,000. According to the UN estimate, about 350,000 residents left the city. No exact data on casualties of the Russian occupation of the city is available, but Ukrainian authorities believe that tens of thousands of people may have been killed there since February 2022.
The residents who remain in Mariupol are suffering from lack of food, water, medicine, heating, and communications.
Source : TVPWorld