Mariupol under siege: Art school sheltering 400 Ukrainians is bombed as Russian troops fire more 'lung-busting' thermobaric rockets - and Zelensky condemns 'terror that will be remembered for centuries'
- The city council in the besieged city of Mariupol claimed an art school sheltering 400 people was bombed
- Ukraine president Zelensky said Russia's siege was a 'terror that would be remembered for centuries'
- Local authorities said Russian troops forcefully deported thousands of people from Mariupol last week
- More than 1,300 are still feared trapped in the bombed ruins of a theatre in the besieged city of Mariupol
- Russia claimed it has used a second 'unstoppable' hypersonic missile on a fuel depot in southern Ukraine
- Mykolaiv's governor also branded Russia 'cowardly' for killing at least 50 recruits with a missile as they slept
- President Volodymyr Zelensky last night vowed to continue the rescue mission after the 'outright terror'
- Zelensky will reportedly meet Russian tyrant Vladimir Putin 'at some point' in the future for peace talks
- The losses across Ukraine sparked a poignant protest in Lviv with 109 prams arranged for the child victims
By STEPHEN WYNN-DAVIES and CHRIS MATTHEWS FOR MAILONLINE
PUBLISHED: 19:05 AEDT, 20 March 2022 | UPDATED: 01:45 AEDT, 21 March 2022
Authorities in the besieged Ukrainian port city of Mariupol say that the Russian military has bombed an art school where about 400 people had taken refuge.
Local authorities said Sunday that the school building was destroyed and people could remain under the rubble, but there was no immediate word on casualties.
Terrifying footage has emerged apparently showing Russia firing deadly thermobaric TOS-1A rockets, which can allegedly melt human organs.
Moscow defence sources claimed: 'The TOS-1A Solntsepek was used against Ukrainian nationalists by the people's militia of the Donetsk People's Republic with the support of the Russian army during a special operation in Ukraine.'
Meanwhile, authorities in Ukraine's eastern city of Kharkiv say at least five civilians, including a nine-year-old boy, have been killed in the latest Russian shelling.
Earlier Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia's siege of the port city was 'a terror that will be remembered for centuries to come'.
His comments came after local authorities said Russian troops had forcefully deported several thousand people from the besieged city last week, after Russia had spoken of 'refugees' arriving from the strategic port.
'Over the past week, several thousand Mariupol residents were deported onto the Russian territory,' the city council said in a statement on its Telegram channel late on Saturday.
'The occupiers illegally took people from the Livoberezhniy district and from the shelter in the sports club building, where more than a thousand people (mostly women and children) were hiding from the constant bombing.'
Zelensky said the siege of Mariupol would 'go down in history of responsibility for war crimes'.
'To do this to a peaceful city... is a terror that will be remembered for centuries to come.'
An evacuation of civilians from secure corridors pictured in Mariupol, Ukraine on March 18
Service members of pro-Russian troops drive an armoured vehicle in Mariupol, Ukraine on Saturday
A discarded pram pictured as an evacuation of civilians from secure corridors took place in Mariupol, Ukraine on March 18
Zelensky also said peace talks with Russia were needed although they were 'not easy and pleasant'. He said he discussed the course of the talks with French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday.
'Ukraine has always sought a peaceful solution. Moreover, we are interested in peace now,' he said.
Vladimir Putin has reportedly 'finally agreed' to meet in person with Zelensky for peace talks.
So far the negotiations have been between middle men on neutral ground but the war has continued into its fourth week.
The Russian tyrant will allegedly meet President Zelensky 'at some point', the Express reported.
The two leaders have let their diplomatic teams conduct peace talks on the neutral ground since shortly after the start of the conflict on February 24, but a BBC correspondent has confirmed the two will meet in person.
Putin has come to terms with fact he will have to lead the negotiations at some time in the future, the BBC's Lysa Doucet said.
She said: 'The diplomats are talking, the negotiators are talking. We understand President Putin has finally agreed that he will meet, at some point, President Zelensky who has been asking for a meeting since January.
'He hasn't said it in public, he says quite the opposite in public.'
She added: 'The Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennet is very busy, the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is very busy.
'They've said privately their understanding is that President Putin will meet President Zelensky when the time is right. But the time is not right now.'
Meanwhile, Russia's military isn't even recovering the bodies of its soldiers in some places, Zelensky said.
'In places where there were especially fierce battles, the bodies of Russian soldiers simply pile up along our line of defense. And no one is collecting these bodies,' he said. He described a battle near Chornobayivka in the south, where Ukrainian forces held their positions and six times beat back the Russians, who just kept 'sending their people to slaughter'.
Russian news agencies, citing the country's defence ministry, have said buses carrying several hundred people - which Moscow calls refugees - have been arriving in Russia from Mariupol in recent days.
The Russian TASS news agency reported on Saturday that 13 busses were moving to Russia, carrying more than 350 people, about 50 of whom were to be sent by rail to the Yaroslavl region and the rest to temporary transition centres in Taganrog, a port city in Russia's Rostov region.
Russia's Defence Ministry said this month that Russia had prepared 200 busses to 'evacuate' citizens of Mariupol.
RIA Novosti agency, citing emergency services, reported last week that nearly 300,000 people, including some 60,000 children, have arrived in Russia from the Luhansk and Donbas regions, including from Mariupol, in recent weeks.
Russia's Defence Ministry said this month that more than 2.6 million people in Ukraine have asked to be evacuated.
Earlier on Sunday Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia's siege of the port city of Mariupol was 'a terror that will be remembered for centuries to come'
Service members of pro-Russian troops in uniforms without insignia drive an armoured vehicle during Russia's invasion of Mariupol
The city council in the Azov Sea port city said Sunday that 39,426 residents, almost ten per cent of the 430,000 who live there, have safely evacuated from Mariupol in their own vehicles. It said the evacuees used more than 8,000 vehicles to leave via a humanitarian corridor via Berdyansk to Zaporizhzhia.
Air raid sirens sounded across major Ukrainian cities early on Sunday but there were no immediate reports of fresh attacks.
Hundreds of thousands of people have been trapped in Mariupol for more than two weeks, sheltering from heavy bombardment that has severed central supplies of electricity, heating, food and water supplies, and killed at least 2,300 people, some of whom had to be buried in mass graves, according to local authorities.
The governor of the northeastern Sumy region, Dmytro Zhyvytskyy, said Sunday that 71 infants have been safely evacuated via a humanitarian corridor.
Zhyvytskyy said on Facebook that the orphans will be taken to an unspecified foreign country. He said most of them require constant medical attention. Like many other Ukrainian cities, Sumy has been besieged by Russian troops and faced repeated shelling.
Meanwhile, the Russian military says it has carried out a new series of strikes on Ukrainian military facilities with long-range hypersonic and cruise missiles.
A man helps Ukrainian soldiers searching for bodies in the debris at a military school hit by Russian rockets, in Mykolaiv, southern Ukraine
Saved: A Ukrainian recruit was rescued after 30 hours from debris of the military school hit by Russian rockets, in Mykolaiv, southern Ukraine, on March 19
A Russian attack on a barracks for young Ukrainian recruits in the middle of the night that killed at least 50 young Ukrainian recruits was branded as 'cowardly'.
Russian rockets struck the military school in Mykolaiv, southern Ukraine, on Friday, killing dozens of young Ukrainian ensigns at their brigade headquarters.
Ukrainian soldier Maxim, 22, who was at the barracks, said 'no fewer than 200 soldiers were sleeping in the barracks' at the time of the strike.
'At least 50 bodies have been recovered, but we do not know how many others are in the rubble,' he said.
Vitaly Kim, the governor of Mykolaiv, said Russia 'hit our sleeping soldiers with a rocket in a cowardly manner.'
Meanwhile Olga Malarchuk, a military official, said: 'We aren't allowed to say anything because the rescue operation isn't over and the families haven't all been informed.
'We are not yet able to announce a toll and I cannot tell you how many soldiers were present'.
Russia also said it had fired a second 'unstoppable' hypersonic Kinzhal missile at a fuel depot in Kostyantynivka, in the southern region of Mykolaiv.
A MiG-31K jet fired the aeroballistic missile at the warehouse as it was flying over Crimea.
Major General Igor Konashenkov, from the Russian Defence Ministry, said the target was the main supply of fuel for Ukrainian armoured cars in the south of the country.
He claimed the missile had destroyed the depot. It is the second time Russia says it has used the missile in Ukraine, after a weapons storage site was destroyed in Deliatyn, in the Carpathian Mountains in western Ukraine, on Friday.
NATO deem the weapon so powerful it has been nicknamed The Sizzler.
At least 200 soldiers were sleeping at the time of the attack, which was branded 'cowardly' by the governor of Mykolaiv
Russian forces carried out a large-scale air strike on Mykolaiv, killing at least 50 Ukrainian soldiers at their brigade headquarters
Ukrainian soldiers search for bodies in the debris at the military school hit by Russian rockets the day before, in Mykolaiv, southern Ukraine, on March 19
Russia has never before admitted using the high-precision weapon in combat.
Moscow claims the 'Kinzhal'- or Dagger - is 'unstoppable' by current Western weapons. The missile, which has a range of 2,000 kilometer (1,250 miles), is nuclear capable.
However, both hypersonic strikes so far have not been nuclear.
'The Kinzhal aviation missile system with hypersonic aeroballistic missiles destroyed a large underground warehouse containing missiles and aviation ammunition in the village of Deliatyn in the Ivano-Frankivsk region', the Russian defence ministry said Saturday.
Russian Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov also said that the Russian forces used the anti-ship missile system Bastion to strike Ukrainian military facilities near the Black Sea port of Odessa.
Aerial footage released by the Russian military claimed to show the missile strike. Large, long buildings are shown in the footage in a snowy region, before one is obliterated by a huge explosion - sending flames, earth and debris high into the air. People can be seen on the ground fleeing as smoke pours from the site.
Ukrainian air force spokesman Yuri Ignat confirmed that a storage site had been targeted, but added that Kyiv had no information regarding the type of missile that was used.
Hypersonic missiles differ from ballistic ones in that they travel closer to the earth and as such can largely avoid radar detection
A man helps Ukrainian soldiers searching for bodies in the debris at a military school hit by Russian rockets, in Mykolaiv, southern Ukraine
Saved: A Ukrainian recruit was rescued after 30 hours from debris of the military school hit by Russian rockets, in Mykolaiv, southern Ukraine, on March 19
A Russian attack on a barracks for young Ukrainian recruits in the middle of the night that killed at least 50 young Ukrainian recruits was branded as 'cowardly'.
Russian rockets struck the military school in Mykolaiv, southern Ukraine, on Friday, killing dozens of young Ukrainian ensigns at their brigade headquarters.
Ukrainian soldier Maxim, 22, who was at the barracks, said 'no fewer than 200 soldiers were sleeping in the barracks' at the time of the strike.
'At least 50 bodies have been recovered, but we do not know how many others are in the rubble,' he said.
Vitaly Kim, the governor of Mykolaiv, said Russia 'hit our sleeping soldiers with a rocket in a cowardly manner.'
Meanwhile Olga Malarchuk, a military official, said: 'We aren't allowed to say anything because the rescue operation isn't over and the families haven't all been informed.
'We are not yet able to announce a toll and I cannot tell you how many soldiers were present'.
Russia also said it had fired a second 'unstoppable' hypersonic Kinzhal missile at a fuel depot in Kostyantynivka, in the southern region of Mykolaiv.
A MiG-31K jet fired the aeroballistic missile at the warehouse as it was flying over Crimea.
Major General Igor Konashenkov, from the Russian Defence Ministry, said the target was the main supply of fuel for Ukrainian armoured cars in the south of the country.
He claimed the missile had destroyed the depot. It is the second time Russia says it has used the missile in Ukraine, after a weapons storage site was destroyed in Deliatyn, in the Carpathian Mountains in western Ukraine, on Friday.
NATO deem the weapon so powerful it has been nicknamed The Sizzler.
At least 200 soldiers were sleeping at the time of the attack, which was branded 'cowardly' by the governor of Mykolaiv
Russian forces carried out a large-scale air strike on Mykolaiv, killing at least 50 Ukrainian soldiers at their brigade headquarters
Ukrainian soldiers search for bodies in the debris at the military school hit by Russian rockets the day before, in Mykolaiv, southern Ukraine, on March 19
Russia has never before admitted using the high-precision weapon in combat.
Moscow claims the 'Kinzhal'- or Dagger - is 'unstoppable' by current Western weapons. The missile, which has a range of 2,000 kilometer (1,250 miles), is nuclear capable.
However, both hypersonic strikes so far have not been nuclear.
'The Kinzhal aviation missile system with hypersonic aeroballistic missiles destroyed a large underground warehouse containing missiles and aviation ammunition in the village of Deliatyn in the Ivano-Frankivsk region', the Russian defence ministry said Saturday.
Russian Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov also said that the Russian forces used the anti-ship missile system Bastion to strike Ukrainian military facilities near the Black Sea port of Odessa.
Aerial footage released by the Russian military claimed to show the missile strike. Large, long buildings are shown in the footage in a snowy region, before one is obliterated by a huge explosion - sending flames, earth and debris high into the air. People can be seen on the ground fleeing as smoke pours from the site.
Ukrainian air force spokesman Yuri Ignat confirmed that a storage site had been targeted, but added that Kyiv had no information regarding the type of missile that was used.
Hypersonic missiles differ from ballistic ones in that they travel closer to the earth and as such can largely avoid radar detection
'The enemy targeted our depots' but 'we have no information of the type of missile,' he said. 'There has been damage, destruction and the detonation of munitions. They are using all the missiles in their arsenal against us.'
Russia reportedly first used the weapon during its military campaign in Syria in 2016 to support the Assad regime, although it was unclear if this was the same model. Some of the most intense bombing came in 2016 during the battle for Aleppo, resulting in hundreds of civilian deaths.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has termed the missile 'an ideal weapon' that flies at 10 times the speed of sound, which is 7672.69 miles per hour, and can overcome air-defence systems.
Russia also said it had fired a second 'unstoppable' hypersonic Kinzhal missile at a fuel depot in Kostyantynivka, in the southern region of Mykolaiv. The MiG-31K jet (pictured as it took off) fired the aeroballistic missile at the warehouse as it was flying over Crimea
Major General Igor Konashenkov, from the Russian Defence Ministry, said the target was the main supply of fuel for Ukrainian armoured cars in the south of the country. He claimed the missile had destroyed the depot. Pictured: The Russian pilot flying the fighter jet
Deliatyn, a picturesque village in the foothills of the picturesque Carpathian mountains, is located outside the city of Ivano-Frankivsk. The region of Ivano-Frankivsk shares a 30-mile long border with NATO member Romania.
Konashenkov noted that the Kalibr cruise missiles launched by Russian warships from the Caspian Sea were also involved in the strike on the fuel depot in Kostiantynivka. He said Kalibr missiles launched from the Black Sea were used to destroy an armor repair plant in Nizhyn in the Chernihiv region in northern Ukraine.
Konashenkov added that another strike by air-launched missiles hit a Ukrainian facility in Ovruch in the northern Zhytomyr region where foreign fighters and Ukrainian special forces were based.
The British defense ministry said the Ukrainian Air Force and air defense forces are 'continuing to effectively defend Ukrainian airspace'.
'Russia has failed to gain control of the air and is largely relying on stand-off weapons launched from the relative safety of Russian airspace to strike targets within Ukraine', the ministry said on Twitter.
'Gaining control of the air was one of Russia's principal objectives for the opening days of the conflict and their continued failure to do so has significantly blunted their operational progress.'
A Ukrainian military official meanwhile confirmed to a Ukrainian newspaper that Russian forces carried out a missile strike Friday on a missile and ammunition warehouse in the Delyatyn settlement of the Ivano-Frankivsk region in western Ukraine.
But Ukraine's Air Forces spokesman Yurii Ihnat told Ukrainskaya Pravda on Saturday that it has not been confirmed that the missile was indeed a hypersonic Kinzhal.
Mariupol, a key connection to the Black Sea, has been a target since the start of the war on February 24, when Russian President Vladimir Putin launched what he calls a 'special military operation' to demilitarise and 'denazify' Ukraine. Ukraine and the West say Putin launched an unprovoked war of aggression.
As Russia has sought to seize most of Ukraine's southern coast, Mariupol has assumed great importance, lying between the Russian-annexed peninsula of Crimea to the west and the Donetsk region to the east, which is partially controlled by pro-Russian separatists.
The U.N. human rights office said at least 847 civilians had been killed and 1,399 wounded in Ukraine as of Friday. The Ukrainian prosecutor general's office said 112 children have been killed.
Rescue workers on Sunday were still searching for survivors in a Mariupol theatre that local authorities say was flattened by Russian air strikes on Wednesday. Russia denies hitting the theatre or targeting civilians.
Satellite images, released on Saturday, showed the collapsed remains of the building which was sheltering hundreds of children and their families before being levelled in a Russian airstrike.
More than 1,300 people, including women and babies, are still feared trapped in the bombed ruins of the theatre in the besieged city of Mariupol as rescue efforts are hampered by constant Russian shelling.
Their prospects of survival are growing bleaker by the day, with no supplies and Russian troops firing at rescuers trying to dig through the rubble.
This satellite image illustrates what the Mariupol theatre looked like before it was reduced to rubble by Russian shelling
New satellite images show the collapsed remains of Mariupol theatre which was sheltering hundreds of children and their families before being levelled in a Russian airstrike
Last night a local MP said those inside were forced to dig from within the wreckage because rescue attempts had been thwarted by ongoing airstrikes.
But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who branded Russia's attack as 'outright terror', last night vowed to continue the rescue mission.
'Hundreds of Mariupol residents are still under the debris. Despite the shelling, despite all the difficulties, we will continue the rescue work,' he said.
Russian troops have now reached the city centre and civilians remain hiding in bunkers while fighters battle on the streets.
Mariupol Mayor Vadym Boichenko said: 'Tanks and machine gun battles continue. There's no city centre left. There isn't a small piece of land in the city that doesn't have signs of war.'
The devastating losses across Ukraine have sparked a poignant protest in Lviv, where 109 empty prams were arranged in solemn rows to mark the number of children killed since Russia invaded.
Local authorities said more than 130 survivors have emerged from the rubble of the Mariupol theatre which was being used as the ravaged port city's biggest civilian bomb shelter.
But they said that those saved represented just one tenth of the civilians still trapped within the refuge which miraculously withstood the blast.
Ukraine's human rights commissioner Lyudmyla Denisova said: 'According to our data there are still more than 1,300 people there who are in these basements, in that bomb shelter. We pray that they will be alive but so far there is no information about them.'
More than 1,300 people including women and babies are still feared trapped in the bombed ruins of a theatre in the besieged city of Mariupol (pictured)
The helpless casualties were yesterday forced to spend a third night entombed in the basement of the destroyed Drama Theatre which was hit by Vladimir Putin's forces on Wednesday
Residents are seen on the street after emerging from bomb shelters, gathering their belongings as they prepare to flee the city
109 empty baby carriages on display in Lviv city center for the 109 babies killed so far during Russia's invasion of Ukraine
Mariupol Mayor Vadym Boichenko said: 'Tanks and machine gun battles continue. There's no city centre left. There isn't a small piece of land in the city that doesn't have signs of war.'
The devastating losses across Ukraine have sparked a poignant protest in Lviv, where 109 empty prams were arranged in solemn rows to mark the number of children killed since Russia invaded.
Local authorities said more than 130 survivors have emerged from the rubble of the Mariupol theatre which was being used as the ravaged port city's biggest civilian bomb shelter.
But they said that those saved represented just one tenth of the civilians still trapped within the refuge which miraculously withstood the blast.
Ukraine's human rights commissioner Lyudmyla Denisova said: 'According to our data there are still more than 1,300 people there who are in these basements, in that bomb shelter. We pray that they will be alive but so far there is no information about them.'
More than 1,300 people including women and babies are still feared trapped in the bombed ruins of a theatre in the besieged city of Mariupol (pictured)
elpless casualties were yesterday forced to spend a third night entombed in the basement of the destroyed Drama Theatre which was hit by Vladimir Putin's forces on Wednesday
Residents are seen on the street after emerging from bomb shelters, gathering their belongings as they prepare to flee the city
109 empty baby carriages on display in Lviv city center for the 109 babies killed so far during Russia's invasion of Ukraine
Former governor MP Serhiy Taruta said he fears many survivors will die because the city's emergency services have been destroyed by Russian troops.
'Services that are supposed to help are demolished, rescue and utility services are physically destroyed. This means that all the survivors of the bombing will either die under the ruins of the theatre, or have already died,' he wrote on Facebook.
He said those trapped had been left to dig their way out of the collapsed three-storey building.
'People are doing everything themselves. My friends went to help but due to constant shelling it was not safe.'
However Mariupol MP Dmytro Gurin insisted that while the rescue mission had been hampered by constant Russian attacks, efforts were still under way.
One woman said the strike had taken place while those sheltering beneath the theatre were cooking and only around 100 had time to flee.
Nick Osychenko, the CEO of a Mariupol TV station, said as he fled the city with six members of his family, aged between 4 and 61, he saw dead bodies on nearly every block.
'We were careful and didn't want the children to see the bodies, so we tried to shield their eyes,' he said. 'We were nervous the whole journey. It was frightening, just frightening.'
Russia has denied responsibility for the devastating strike which was branded a 'war crime' and sparked global outrage.
After an agonising first night of uncertainty following the bombing, Ukrainian officials revealed on Thursday that they were hopeful that the majority within had survived.
Rescuers said that while the entrance to the basement had caved in, the relatively modern shelter had remained intact.
But Miss Denisova said that while some had survived, the situation remained unclear.
She said there was 'currently no information about the dead or wounded under the rubble' and called the attack 'an act of genocide and a terrible crime against humanity'.
Ukraine's Minister of Defence Oleksii Reznikov branded the Russian pilot behind the bombing a 'monster'.
But the Kremlin's UN ambassador Vasily Nebenzya yesterday denied that Russia had targeted the shelter.
Pictured: The aftermath of a theatre in the encircled Ukrainian port city of Mariupol where hundreds of civilians were sheltering on Wednesday March 16
A woman and her baby are pictured fleeing the city of Mariupol along a humanitarian corridor that was opened on Thursday, though previous attempts have failed after Russians shelled the routes
Local residents seeking refuge in the basement of a building are seen in the besieged southern port city of Mariupol
Kyiv and Moscow reported some progress in talks last week toward a political formula that would guarantee Ukraine's security, while keeping it outside NATO, though each sides accused the other of dragging things out.
Zelensky has said Ukraine could accept international security guarantees that stopped short of its longstanding aim to join NATO. That prospect has been one of Russia's primary stated concerns.
The Ukrainian president, who makes frequent impassioned appeals to foreign audiences for help, told an anti-war protest in Bern on Saturday that Swiss banks were where the 'money of the people who unleashed this war' lay and their accounts should be frozen.
Ukrainian cities 'are being destroyed on the orders of people who live in European, in beautiful Swiss towns, who enjoy property in your cities. It would really be good to strip them of this privilege', he said in an audio address.
Neutral Switzerland, which is not a member of the European Union, has fully adopted EU sanctions against Russian individuals and entities, including orders to freeze their wealth in Swiss banks.
The EU measures are part of a wider sanctions effort by Western nations aimed at squeezing Russia's economy and starving its war machine.
U.S. President Joe Biden warned his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, on Friday of 'consequences' if Beijing gave material support to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
On Saturday, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said China stood on the right side of history over the Ukraine crisis.
'China's position is objective and fair, and is in line with the wishes of most countries. Time will prove that China's claims are on the right side of history', Wang told reporters, according to a statement published by his ministry on Sunday.
Feared Chechen special forces are fighting house-to-house in besieged Mariupol while 'hundreds' of women and children remain trapped in the rubble of a city theatre destroyed by Russian invaders
The propaganda video then cuts before showing some of the Chechen fighters emerging from the building with children in their arms while supposedly 'liberating' civilians
Video released by pro-Putin Chechen warlord Ramzan Kadyrov shows heavily armed fighters from the region pounding a high-rise building in the bombed-out city during a fierce gunfight with Ukrainian soldiers
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Russian troops fire more 'lung-busting' thermobaric rockets in Ukraine as Zelensky