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‘Even if Mariupol falls…’: UN chief Antonio Guterres on besieged Ukrainian city
Russia-Ukraine war: Why are Russian troops relentlessly bombing, shelling and attacking the city, the secretary-general questioned in a statement.
The Ukrainian people are enduring a ‘living hell,’ United Nations secretary-general Antonio Guterres has said, taking particular note of the situation in the seaport city of Mariupol which the Russian troops have surrounded and, in recent days, subjected to intense shelling.
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“For more than two weeks, Mariupol has been encircled by the Russian army and relentlessly bombed, shelled and attacked. For what?” Guterres asked in a statement on Tuesday, adding that even if the city of 400,000 falls, the east European nation cannot be conquered ‘city by city, street by street, house by house.’
The ongoing conflict will only result in more suffering, destruction and horror, the former Portuguese Prime Minister noted further.
“The reverberations of the Ukraine situation are being felt worldwide with skyrocketing food, energy and fertiliser prices threatening to spiral into a global hunger crisis,” Guterres said.
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The UN chief’s statement came on a day when Russian forces dropped two ‘super powerful bombs’ in this south eastern Ukrainian city. “There is nothing left there, only ruins,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukraine’s President told Italian Parliament in a video address, which coincided with Russia’s latest attack on Mariupol.
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Ukrainian authorities have also accused Russian soldiers of firing ‘indiscriminately’ at civilians in Mariupol.
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Meanwhile, Irina Vereshchuk, Ukraine’s deputy Prime Minister said that on March 23, as many as 1,200 people were evacuated from the city.
On Monday, the Ukrainian government told Moscow there will be no surrender of Mariupol, turning down latter’s ‘offer’ in this regard.
Russia began the invasion of its neighbour on February 24.
