New Delhi: Russian troops bomb an art school in the port city of Mariupol where 400 people were taking refuge according to Ukrainian authorities, AP reported. Local authorities said the school's building was destroyed and people could remain under the rubble.
According to the report, there was no immediate word on casualties. Russian forces on Wednesday also bombed a theatre in Mariupol where civilians were sheltering, authorities have said.
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During his nightly address to the nation, President Zelenskyy said, "to do this to a peaceful city, what the occupiers did, is a terror that will be remembered for centuries to come".
Mariupol, a strategic port on the Azov Sea, has been under bombardment for at least three weeks and become a symbol of the horror of Russia's war in Ukraine. According to the report, local authorities have said the siege has cut off food, water and energy supplies, and killed at least 2,300 people, some of whom had to be buried in mass graves.
Russian forces have surrounded the battered city and continue to push deeper into it in recent days. A major steel plant shut down due to the heavy fighting and local authorities continue to plead for Western help on Saturday.
One of Europe's biggest iron and steelworks, Azovstal, was badly damaged as Russian forces lay siege to the besieged and battered port city, officials said Sunday, as reported by news agency AFP.
"One of the biggest metallurgic plants in Europe destroyed. The economic losses for Ukraine are huge. The environment is devastated," Ukrainian lawmaker Lesia Vasylenko tweeted.
Children, elderly people are dying. The city is destroyed and it is wiped off the face of the earth, Mariupol police officer Michail Vershnin said from a rubble-strewn street in a video addressed to Western leaders that were authenticated by AP.