The Azovstal steel mill, which served as the last stronghold for Ukrainian forces in Mariupol, is under siege by Russian troops. Russian forces have had Mariupol surrounded since March 1 and gave Ukraine a deadline of April 17 to surrender the city. That demand was rejected.
Battles continued over the city, and the Azovstal steel mill remained the last area controlled by Ukrainian forces. On April 21, Russian President Vladimir Putin postponed an operation designed to take the plant by force, fearing casualty numbers would be too high.
Instead, Russia began a blockade of the Ukrainian forces hiding in the plant, which features 4 square miles of underground bunkers and tunnels. The underground segment was built during the Cold War and designed to be able to withstand attacks from the West.
The exact number of Ukrainian forces in the plant is unknown, but is claimed by Russia to be 2,000 soldiers, with 500 of those being wounded.
On Sunday, Russia agreed to a ceasefire in the city, allowing over 100 women, children, and elderly Ukrainians to come above ground for the first time in two months. The evacuees were taken to the Ukrainian-controlled city of Zaporizhzhia, about 140 miles northwest of Mariupol, in a convoy of buses and ambulances.
The request to evacuate the civilians came from French President Emmanuel Macron. In a phone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Macron urged the Russian leader to allow the civilians to escape and to continue negotiating a diplomatic solution.
In response, President Putin accused Western governments of ignoring Ukrainian war crimes, suggested that Ukraine was not taking negotiations seriously, and demanded the end of military aid supplied to Ukraine from countries around the world.
For those that stayed behind in the plant, the news is grim. On Tuesday morning, Russian forces made it clear that the ceasefire had ended and began an assault on the steel mill. Along with Ukrainian soldiers, a few hundred civilians also stayed behind, according to Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk. More than 100,000 civilians are still in the city of Mariupol, according to Mayor Vadym Boichenko.
Deputy Commander Sviatoslav Palamar of the Ukrainian National Guard’s Azov Regiment said on Telegram that the Russians were using armored vehicles and tanks to attack the plant while troops arrived from boats and on foot.
“We’ll do everything that’s possible to repel the assault, but we’re calling for urgent measures to evacuate the civilians that remain inside the plant and to bring them safely,” Palamar said.
According to the Russian State Media outlet RT, the ceasefire ended on Tuesday because the “Donetsk People’s Republic accused the Ukrainian military and members of the neo-Nazi Azov regiment holed up at the industrial facility of taking advantage of the evacuation ceasefire and using the lull in the fighting to change positions.”