Russian forces control access to the Sea of ​​Azov in Ukraine

Ap, Afp, Europa Press and Reuters

Newspaper La Jornada
Sunday March 20, 2022, p. two

Lviv. Russian forces seized Ukraine’s access to the Sea of ​​Azov, kyiv admitted. Moscow troops entered the besieged and battered port of Mariupol, where heavy fighting shut down a major steel plant and local authorities appealed to the West for more help.

The fall of Mariupol could mark a major battlefield breakthrough for the Russians, who surround major Ukrainian cities more than three weeks into the biggest ground offensive in Europe since World War II. In the past 24 hours, Russian forces have attacked eight cities and towns in the Donietsk region with aircraft, missiles and heavy artillery. At least 37 residential buildings and facilities were damaged, and dozens of civilians were killed or injured, kyiv police said.

Children and old people die. The city is destroyed and was removed from the earthMariupol police officer Michael Vershnin said from a rubble-strewn street in a video address to Western leaders.

Russian forces have already blockaded the Azov Sea city, and its fall could unite Crimea, which the Russians annexed in 2014, with Moscow-backed separatist-controlled territories in the east. This would mark a rare breakthrough in the face of stiff Ukrainian resistance that has dashed Russia’s hopes of a quick victory and emboldened the West.

Russian and Ukrainian forces are fighting over the steel plant in Mariupol, said Vadym Denysenko, adviser to the interior minister. One of the largest metallurgical plants in Europe is being destroyedDenysenko affirmed in declarations emitted yesterday by television.

The Russian army assured the day before yesterday that it managed to enter and fight in the center of the city together with militias from the republic pro-Russian separatist from Donietsk.

Oleksiy Arestovych, adviser to the Ukrainian president, indicated that the closest forces that could assist the defenders of Mariupol were already fighting against the overwhelming force of the enemy at least 100 kilometers.

There is currently no military solution for Mariupol. It’s not just my opinion, it’s the opinion of the armyhe indicated.

Russian forces carried out an airstrike in the southern city of Mikolaiv yesterday, killing dozens of young Ukrainian officers at their brigade headquarters, regional governor Vitali Klim said.

No less than 200 soldiers slept in the barracks at the time of the attack. At least 50 bodies have been recovered, but we don’t know how many are in the rubble.indicated a Ukrainian soldier on the ground, Maxim, 22, to the AFP agency.

The Russian army fired on eight cities: Mariupol, Avdivka, Kramatorsk, Pokrovsk, Novoselydivka, Verkhnotoretske, Krymka and Stepne.

civilian targets

Among the civilian targets destroyed by Moscow are multi-storey and private homes, a school, a kindergarten, a museum, a shopping center and administrative buildings.detailed a note on Telegram from the Ukrainian national police.

The suburbs of Bucha, Hostomel, Irpin and Moshchun, northwest of the capital kyiv, were attacked. The regional government indicated that the city of Slavutich, north of kyiv, was completely isolated and that Russian military equipment was detected northeast and east of the capital.

The head of the Sumy regional military administration, Dimitro Zhivitskii, denounced that Russian soldiers fired on the Trostianets hospital on a new day in which anti-aircraft alarms sounded again in other parts of the country, such as Yitomir and Chernigov. About 4,500 people were able to leave the combat zone in the Sumy regionhe indicated.

The governor of the Zaporizhia region, Oleksandr Starukh, announced a 38-hour curfew in the city of the same name in the south of the country, from 4 p.m. on Saturday to 6 a.m. on Monday. For your safety, do not go out into the street or other public placesStarukh said in a message on Telegram.

Two missiles that fell in the suburbs of the city the day before left nine dead and 22 wounded, reported Iván Arefiev, spokesman for the regional government.

The Russian Defense Ministry reported the destruction of radio and intelligence centers on the outskirts of Odessa, in Velikodolinske and Veliki Dalnik.

At least 14,000 people were evacuated through humanitarian corridors: one in Mariupol, several in the kyiv region and others in the Lugansk region, authorities reported.

Germany has received more than 200,000 Ukrainian refugees since the start of the Russian offensive, the country’s federal police said.

Pope Francis visited some Ukrainian minors who escaped the Russian offensive and are currently being treated at the Vatican pediatric hospital in Rome.