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WASHINGTON — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday that the country was seeking to break Russia's siege of Mariupol as Russia continued to assault the southern city and threatened to increase its missile strikes on the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv. In his nightly address to the nation, Zelenskyy said he met with the country's military leaders to discuss the situation in Mariupol, where fighting raged around the city's Illich Steel and Iron Works plant. "The details cannot be made public now, but we are doing everything we can to save our people," Zelenskyy said. "The successes of our military on...

LVIV, Ukraine -- Under relentless bombardment and a Russian blockade, the key port of Mariupol is holding out, but weapons and supplies shortages could weaken the resistance that has thwarted the Kremlin's invasion plans. More than six weeks after the Russian siege began, Ukrainian troops are continuing to fight the vastly superior Russian forces in ferocious battles amid the ruins of what once was a bustling city on the Sea of Azov. The mayor says an estimated 120,000 people remain in the city, out of Mariupol’s prewar population of about 450,000. The Ukrainians' fight has scuttled Moscow's designs, tying up...

Battle Raging On The Azov Sea In Mariupol (Special Report Under Fire)

Russian troops aimed to take control of the city of Mariupol on Tuesday, part of an anticipated massive onslaught across eastern Ukraine, as defending forces tried desperately to hold them back. Russia is believed to be trying to connect occupied Crimea with Moscow-backed separatist territories Donetsk and Lugansk in Donbas, and has laid siege to the strategically located city, once home to more than 400,000 people. "It is likely that in the future the enemy will try to take control of the city of Mariupol, capture Popasna and launch an offensive in the direction of Kurakhove in order to reach...

Ukrainian Marines trying to defend the city of Mariupol from the onslaught of the Russian army says they've been fighting for more than a month without resupply of ammunition, food and water – but now the "mountain of wounded makes up almost half of the crew." The dire warning from the 36th Navy Brigade, which was posted to Facebook on Sunday, suggests cracks are starting to form in Ukraine’s fierce defense of Mariupol. "From the beginning... we have been defending Mariupol for 47 days," the Marines wrote. "We were bombed from airplanes, we were shot from artillery, tanks and other...

Ukrainian forces in Mariupol have been forced to surrender to Russian soldiers as they are run out of ammunition and have been fighting without sufficient food and water for more than a month, according to an Independent report. A British man who volunteered to fight against Russian soldiers in Ukraine is also among these soldiers who have surrendered after defending Mariupol for weeks. PBS correspondant Simon Ostrovsky posted a picture of the British volunteer and confirmed that he had surrendered to Russian troops, according to a former squad member.

The NATO narrative is that Azovstal – one of Europe’s biggest iron and steel works – was nearly destroyed by the Russian Army and its allied Donetsk forces who “lay siege” to Mariupol. The true story is that the neo-Nazi Azov batallion took scores of Mariupol civilians as human shields since the start of the Russian military operation in Ukraine, and retreated to Azovstal as a last stand. After an ultimatum delivered last week, they are now being completely exterminated by the Russian and Donetsk forces and Chechen Spetsnaz. Azovstal, part of the Metinvest group controlled by Ukraine’s wealthiest oligarch,...

Defense Department Press Secretary John Kirby said the Pentagon was closely monitoring reports Monday evening of a possible Russian chemical weapons attack on the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol. If Russia is to be found to have used chemical weapons in the strategic holdout city it would represent a major escalation of the conflict, and present a direct challenge to NATO to act. “We are aware of social media reports which claim Russian forces deployed a potential chemical munition in Mariupol, Ukraine,” Kirby said Monday. “We cannot confirm at this time and will continue to monitor the situation closely.”

Russia has 'unleashed chemical weapons on Mariupol' with Ukrainian troops reporting they are suffering breathing issues and dizziness - as the besieged port city's mayor reveals more than 10,000 civilians have died in the conflict so far. The unidentified agent is said to have been dropped on the city from a Russian drone, according to unverified reports from the city's Azov regiment. Details of the assault, via the Telegram messaging app, say a 'poisonous substance of unknown origin' has led to the city's defenders suffering from symptoms including breathing issues, 'respiratory failure' and 'vestibulo-atactic syndrome'. The alleged attack came just...

Fwiw Under the Azovstal industrial zone, owned by oligarch Rinat Akhmetov, allegedly the illegitimate son of former Ukrainian President Kuchma, there are 24 km of tunnels at a depth of up to 30 meters. There is also a secret NATO facility PIT-404- and a secret NATO bio-laboratory with biological weapons. At the PIT-404 facility, NATO officers are blocked. The tunnels are equipped with a bunker system with armor protection. Inside are about 240 foreigners, including officers from NATO and the French Foreign Legion, as well as personnel from the biolab. Their guards, financed by Akhmetov, number up to 3,000 people....

The Missing Of Mariupol Special Report (The Search Is On)

Moscow said Saturday Russian troops had opened fire on a Ukrainian vessel trying to evacuate commanders of the Azov battalion from the besieged city of Mariupol. "The Kyiv regime is not abandoning attempts to evacuate the leaders of the nationalist Azov regiment and foreign mercenaries from Mariupol," the Russian defence ministry said in a statement. On Friday night, Russian forces opened artillery fire on a Ukrainian cargo vessel when it suddenly changed course and tried to break through the blockade of the port of Mariupol. As a result of the strike the Maltese-flagged vessel, the Apache, caught fire and said...

"NOW CONFIRMED: U.S Major General Roger L. Cloutier was captured by Russia while trying to flee Mariupol after giving military direction to Ukrainian and mercenary forces."

Mariupol's mayor said that according to preliminary estimates, Russian troops have killed approximately 5,000 local residents - 210 of them ...

The governor of Ukraine's northwestern Rivne region said Russian forces had carried out a rocket strike on an oil depot in the region on Monday. In a short video address posted online, governor Vitaliy Koval said emergency services were at the scene, but did not give further details. Earlier on Monday, Ukrainian forces had seized back full control of Irpin, a town near capital Kyiv, which has been one of the main hotspots of fighting with Russian troops, the mayor said on Monday. The United States assessed that Ukrainian forces have also retaken the town of Trostyanets, south of Sumy,...

ATHENS — The considerable fanfare surrounding a fresh round of peace talks between Russia and Ukraine at Istanbul yesterday risks fizzling fast — and if you are among the thousands still trapped in the besieged Ukrainian city (at least for the moment) of Mariupol, it probably already has. That is because the real power broker in this mess, Vladimir Putin, has shot down an incipient humanitarian aid mission to the city that forces under his command have largely destroyed. The idea for said mission started with a Greek proposal, to which France glommed on and Turkey too, but Mr. Putin...

Ukrainian troops in Mariupol are taking ammunition off of Russian troops and smuggling in weapons to resupply and hold out against the Russian assault. Western officials in a briefing to reporters Tuesday said there is evidence of Ukrainian troops in Mariupol smuggling weapons into encircled areas for reinforcement as additional Russian troops close in. "Ukrainian forces, though remarkably adept at smuggling weapons into areas which are encircled, they are also largely being able to resupply their fighters by taking weapons, ammunition, off Russian soldiers in the city itself," Western officials told reporters in a briefing.

Ukraine-Russia war: Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said there was "nothing left" of the strategic post city of Mariupol amid Kyiv’s appeal to Moscow to allow the evacuation of at least 1,00,000 people who want to leave.Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said there was "nothing left" of the strategic city amid Kyiv’s appeal to Moscow to allow the evacuation of at least 1,00,000 people who want to leave."There is nothing left there. Only ruins," Zelenskyy said of Mariupol, which has a peacetime population of 4,00,000, in a video address to the Italian parliament.As he was speaking, the city council said Russian forces...

Vladimir Putin has been accused of deporting Ukrainians to 'filtration' centres before forcibly taking them to remote Siberian towns after confiscating their phones and documents. 'Several thousand' people have so-far been taken, Mariupol city council claimed, before being processed through 'filtration camps' and sent to 'remote cities' in Russia where they will be obliged to stay for years and work for free. -snip- Russian news agencies have reported that buses carrying hundreds of refugees from the besieged southeastern port city Mariupol had arrived in Russia in recent days. Moscow officials also said a trainload of over 280 Ukrainians were being...

The picture in Eastern Ukraine is becoming clearer as the residents begin being able to talk openly about the key battleground in Mariupol. Keep in mind, the western narrative about the battles in Eastern Ukraine are all framed around calling the Ukrainian military, spearheaded by the Azov battalions and the ultranationalists, as the good guys. Nothing could be further from the truth. According to increasingly obvious reports, coming from ordinary citizens in/around Mariupol, the Ukrainian army has been using them as human shields and keeping them from evacuating. There is a lot of war fog surrounding the conflict, however, it...