‘Battle of Donbas has begun’: Ukraine says Russia has launched new eastern offensive

Ukraine has called on Moscow to allow civilians to leave the besieged and devastated city of Mariupol, as Ukrainian officials said Russia had begun a new offensive to take control of the east of the country.

Russian forces launched a new offensive push along most of Ukraine’s eastern flank on Monday and the battle of the Donbas has now begun, Ukrainian president Volodymr Zelenskiy and senior officials said on Monday.

Ukraine’s army has been bracing for a new Russian assault on its eastern flank since Moscow withdrew its forces from near Kyiv and from Ukraine’s north late last month in order to focus on an assault in the eastern Ukrainian region of Donbas. “We can now say that Russian forces have started the battle of the Donbas, for which they have long prepared,” Mr Zelenskiy said in a video address.

Ukrainian troops in Mariupol ignored a Russian deadline to surrender on Sunday and have vowed to fight to the death from their last redoubt in the strategic port – the Azovstal steel plant, one of Europe's biggest metal works, which sprawls over more than 11sq km beside the Sea of Azov.

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City officials fear more than 20,000 residents may have died in the six-week siege of Mariupol, during which Ukraine says Russia has committed war crimes including the bombing of a maternity hospital and a theatre that served as a bomb shelter for hundreds of civilians; Moscow insists it has only hit military targets and all Kyiv’s allegations are false.

"We demand the opening of a humanitarian corridor from Mariupol . . . for civilians. Separately, we demand an urgent humanitarian corridor from the territory of the Azovstal plant for women, children and other civilians," Ukrainian deputy prime minister Iryna Vereshchuk said in a statement directed to Russia's "military-political leadership".

“Your refusal to open these humanitarian corridors will in the future be the basis for bringing all those involved to criminal liability for war crimes.”

Major Serhiy Volyna, the commander of a marine brigade in Mariupol, published an open letter to Pope Francis on Monday urging him to help secure the evacuation from the Avozstal plant of vulnerable civilians who he said were living in the factory with his troops.

“You have probably seen a lot in your life. But I am sure that you have never seen the things that are happening to Mariupol. Because this is what hell on Earth looks like,” he wrote.

“Women with children and babies are living in bunkers at the factory, they are hungry and cold. Every day they are living in the sights of enemy aircraft. The wounded die every day because there is no medicine, no water, no food . . . I am turning to you for help. Because the time has come when prayers are not enough. Help save them.”

Russia's military accuses Ukraine's forces of using civilians in Mariupol as "human shields" and "hostages", and it denies being a threat to the city's people. However, Kyiv says Moscow's troops have forced thousands of residents of Mariupol and other parts of eastern and southern Ukraine to evacuate to Russia, and alleges that Russian forces have tortured and executed people in areas they have occupied. Mariupol's mayor Vadym Boichenko on Monday told Ukrainian television: "We have verified through the municipal register that they have already deported over 40,000 people."

Captured

Two British men who were captured in Mariupol while fighting for the Ukrainian army, Shaun Pinner and Aiden Aslin, were shown on Russian television on Monday.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian television showed Viktor Medvedchuk, a pro-Kremlin politician, millionaire and friend of Russian president Vladimir Putin, who was recaptured by Kyiv security forces last week after fleeing house arrest at the start of the war.

It was not clear how freely any of the men were speaking, but they all called for a prisoner exchange that would secure their release.

“I’d like to appeal to the [British] government to send me back home, I’d like to see my wife again . . . We look to exchange myself and Aiden Aslin for Mr Medvedchuk. Obviously, I would really appreciate your help in this matter,” Mr Pinner said.

Mr Medvedchuk addressed Mr Putin and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy "with a request for the Ukrainian side to exchange me for defenders and residents of Mariupol who . . . have no chance to leave safely via humanitarian corridors".

Eastern push

Ukraine’s armed forces command said it believed that Russia had started a new push for control of the east, increasing the intensity of attacks.

“This morning, along almost the entire front line of Donetsk, Luhansk and Kharkiv regions, the occupiers attempted to break through our defences,” Ukrainian security council secretary Oleksiy Danilov said in televised comments. “They began their attempt to start the active phase this morning,” he said.

The regional governor of Kharkiv said that authorities were continuing the evacuation of people from two areas where they expect fighting to take place.

A man and a woman were killed in Kharkiv on Monday when shells hit a playground near a residential building, the prosecutor’s office said in a post on the Telegram messaging service.

The United States military expects to start training Ukrainians on using howitzer artillery in coming days, a senior US defence official said on Monday. – Additional reporting: Reuters