Besieged Ukrainian port defies Russian order to drop arms

A Ukranian serviceman walks between debris inside the Retroville shopping mall after a Russian attack on the northwest of the capital Kyiv yesterday. The 10-storey building was hit by a powerful blast that pulverised vehicles in its car park and left a crater several metres wide. (AFP)

• Hundreds of thousands of civilian trapped in Mariupol • Shelling wrecks Kyiv shopping centre, at least eight dead • EU begins talks on possible energy embargo against Russia Ukraine defied Moscow’s demand for its soldiers to lay down arms before dawn yesterday in besieged Mariupol where hundreds of thousands of civilians are cowering from Russian bombardments laying waste to their city. Russia’s military had ordered residents of the southeastern port to surrender by 5am, saying those who did so could leave, while those who stayed would be handed to tribunals run by Moscow-backed separatists. President Volodymyr Zelensky’s government responded that it would never bow to ultimatums and cities such as the capital Kyiv, Mariupol and Kharkhiv would always defy occupation. “There can be no question of any surrender” in Mariupol, responded Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk. Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov praised the city’s “heroic defenders”, saying their holdout had helped thwart Russia elsewhere. “By virtue of their dedication and superhuman courage, tens of thousands of lives throughout Ukraine were saved. Today, Mariupol is saving Kyiv, Dnipro and Odesa.” In Kyiv, six bodies were laid on the pavement by a shopping mall struck overnight by Russian shelling. Emergency services combed wreckage to the sound of distant artillery fire. Firefighters put out small blazes around the building, hunting survivors. Ukraine said at least eight people died. “It is hard for me to speak because my child worked here. She was at work just yesterday,” said tearful onlooker Valentina Timofeyevna. Russia said the centre was being used as a weapons store. Ukraine said there were no strategic military objects in the area. Neither report could be independently verified. Officials imposed a day-and-a-half curfew in the capital from yesterday night, citing the likelihood of more shelling. Britain said there was heavy fighting to the north but that Ukrainian forces had fought off an advance and most Russian forces were more than 25km from the city centre. Ukrainian officials hope that Moscow, having failed to secure a quick victory, will cut its losses and negotiate a withdrawal. Both sides hinted last week at progress in talks on a formula which would include some kind of “neutrality” for Ukraine, though details were scarce. Talks resumed yesterday, starting with a 90-minute video conference. Apart from Mariupol, the eastern cities of Kharkiv, Sumy and Chernihiv have been hardest hit by Russia’s tactic of pounding urban areas with artillery as its troops have done before in Syria and Chechnya. Kharkiv Mayor Igor Terekhov said hundreds of buildings, many residential, had been destroyed in Ukraine’s second largest city. “Kharkiv will survive,” he said. “It is impossible to say that the worst days are behind us, we are constantly being bombed.” Western sanctions have cut Russia off from the global financial system to an unprecedented degree for a big economy. But the European Union, Russia’s main customer for energy, has so far made an exception for exports of oil and gas. EU foreign ministers disagreed on whether and how to include energy in sanctions, with Germany saying the bloc was too dependent on Russian oil to declare an embargo.