Russian forces continued on Wednesday to brutally shell several key cities in Ukraine, which had been surrounded or even fallen into enemy hands hours before the talks were to take place this morning.
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Bodies strewn in the streets, lack of food, power outages; Ukraine’s first major city, Kherson, fell under Russian control in the south of the country on Wednesday after untold carnage.
As many as 300 people, including civilians and soldiers defending the territory, may have been killed, Mayor Igor Kolykhaev said, calling the whole thing a humanitarian disaster.
“I called for volunteers to help collect the bodies and we are burying them immediately, as many were blown up,” he said. If we can take a picture, we try to identify them, but if not, we put them in bags and bury them that way. »
Kyiv still pounded
In the Ukrainian capital, explosions sounded on Wednesday evening near the Dorohozhychi metro station, which had been transformed into an air-raid shelter.
In the heart of the resort, a stone’s throw from where shelling damaged a TV tower the day before, dozens of families huddled together, lying on sheets and towels.
Several localities northwest of the capital, including Bucha and Gostomel, were also prey to explosions, according to regional authorities.
In Zhitomir, further west, citizens searched the rubble of a small market after the passage of Russian planes.
The situation was deteriorating hour by hour in Mariupol, a city coveted by Russia for its strategic position, where the city center and residential areas were targeted.
In the southwest in Odessa, men were preparing for a major attack by barricading the city with old steel rails in the image of a hedgehog, to stop Russian tanks. Because a confrontation seems inevitable to the inhabitants of this great port city, crucial for the economic survival of the country.
At least 2000 dead
In total, Ukraine estimates that it has lost at least 2,000 civilians since the invasion began a week ago.
The Russian army has invited civilians to leave by announcing the establishment of humanitarian corridors in the Ukrainian cities most exposed to the Russian offensive.
At the same time, the two opposing countries announced on Wednesday that they would begin negotiations for a ceasefire on Thursday morning.
Massive majority
The UN passed a resolution demanding ‘Russia immediately stop using force against Ukraine’, in a vote overwhelmingly approved by 141 out of 193 countries. Only five opposed and 35 abstained.
The Russian army provided first figures on its losses. A total of 498 Russian servicemen died and 1,597 were injured, Russian military spokesman Igor Konashenkov said.
That said, the Ukrainian president assured that nearly 9,000 Russian soldiers have been killed so far.
One million refugees have fled Ukraine to neighboring countries since the Russian invasion began a week ago, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said on Wednesday.
–With AFP