Ukraine on Monday rejected a Russian offer to open two safe corridors out of Mariupol in exchange for the city’s surrender as the relentless missile strikes on the battered seaport city stretched deeper into a fourth week.
The Russian news agency TASS reported the offer, citing Colonel-General Mikhail Mizintsev, head of the Russian National Defense Control Center. Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk rejected the idea outright.
“There can be no talk of any surrender, laying down of arms. We have already informed the Russian side about this,” she told the news outlet Ukrainian Pravda. “I wrote: ‘Instead of wasting time on eight pages of letters, just open the corridor.'”
The city, crucial for its access to the Sea of Azov, has been pounded by Russian artillery since the war began more than three weeks ago. Russian forces have been accused of bombing civilian shelters, and hundreds of thousands have recently fled the city.
Ukrainian Parliament Member Dmytro Gurin said Russia is trying to starve Mariupol to strengthen their positions in negotiations.
“Russians don’t open humanitarian corridors, they don’t let humanitarian convoys enter the city, and we clearly see now that the goal of the Russians is to start to (create) hunger (in the city) to enforce their position in the diplomatic process,” he said.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell is accusing Russia of committing war crimes for the “indiscriminate” killings in Mariupol. Other cities also have felt Russia’s wrath, and about a quarter of Ukraine’s population has been displaced less than a month into Russia’s invasion, according to the United Nations. Ukraine’s population has already been declining for years, dropping from over 50 million in the 1990s to 43 million in 2022.
