Mariupol 'heroes' evacuated as last stronghold falls

KYIV/MOSCOW • Ukraine hailed the defenders of the strategic city of Mariupol yesterday as heroes who changed the course of the war with Russia by keeping Russian forces at bay for 82 days of siege and bombardment.

More than 250 fighters, some of them seriously wounded, have been evacuated after spending weeks in bunkers and tunnels below the sprawling Azovstal steel works in Mariupol where they had little food, water, medicine or other supplies.

"Because Mariupol drew in the Russian Federation's forces for 82 days, the operation to seize the east and south (of Ukraine) was held up. It changed the course of the war," presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said.

Mariupol's complete capture is Russia's biggest victory of the war, giving Moscow total control of the coast of the Sea of Azov and an unbroken stretch of eastern and southern Ukraine. Russia now commands an overland route linking the Crimea peninsula, which Moscow seized in 2014, with mainland Russia.

Ukraine said yesterday that the evacuees will be subject to a potential prisoner exchange with Russia.

But the speaker of Russia's Parliament, Mr Vyacheslav Volodin, said yesterday that it will consider banning the exchange of Russian prisoners of war for captured members of Ukraine's Azov Regiment, the last Ukrainian defenders of the Azovstal steel works.

Moscow has depicted the regiment as a main perpetrator of the alleged radical anti-Russian nationalism or even Nazism from which it says it needs to protect Ukraine's Russian-speakers.

Meanwhile, Russia's Foreign Ministry said on Monday that attempts by the West and the Group of Seven nations in particular to isolate Moscow have worsened global food shortages.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said he will not allow Sweden and Finland to join Nato because of their stances on Kurdish militants, throwing a wrench into plans to strengthen the western military alliance.

REUTERS, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE