A regional governor in Ukraine on Tuesday accused Russian troops of firing indiscriminately at residential areas and military targets in the city of Mariupol. Speaking on national television, Donetsk Governor Pavlo Kyrylenko said civilians were coming under Russian fire as well as troops of Ukraine's Azov military unit.
Russia, however, denied targeting civilians. Russian forces continued their siege of Mariupol after the southern port city's defenders refused demands to surrender, with fleeing civilians describing relentless bombardments and corpses lying in the streets.
Mariupol council said the pounding was turning Mariupol into the "ashes of a dead land". Russia's RIA news agency said Russian forces and units of Russian-backed separatists had taken about half of the city, citing a separatist leader.
The plight of civilians in Mariupol, home to 400,000 people before the war, grew ever more desperate. Hundreds of thousands are believed to be trapped inside buildings, with no access to food, water, power or heat.
Meanwhile, reports suggest that Russian forces dropped two "super powerful bombs" in Mariupol as local authorities made a fresh attempt to rescue civilians from the besieged Ukrainian port city that has suffered relentless shelling since Moscow’s invasion began about a month ago.
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.
{{/usCountry}}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.
{{/usCountry}}"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.
Early on Tuesday, Ukrainian troops drove Russian forces out of the Kyiv suburb of Makariv after a fierce battle, Ukraine's Defense Ministry said. The regained territory allowed Ukrainian forces to retake control of a key highway and block Russian troops from surrounding Kyiv from the northwest.
Still, the defence ministry said Russian forces were able to partially take other northwest suburbs, Bucha, Hostomel and Irpin, some of which had been under attack almost since Russia's military invaded almost a month ago.
Russia's invasion has driven more than 10 million people from their homes, almost a quarter of Ukraine's pre-war population, according to the United Nations. The UN has confirmed 953 civilian deaths while saying the real toll is probably much higher.
Estimates of Russian military casualties in the grinding war have been hard to come by and vary, but even conservative figures by Western officials are in the low thousands.
(With inputs from agencies)