The Ukrainian military has ordered the remaining fighters of the Azov regiment in Mariupol’s Azov-Steel industrial complex to abandon the city’s defenses, according to its commander.
The military leadership gave the order “to save the lives of the soldiers of our garrison and to stop defending the city,” Azov commander Denys Prokopenko said in a video released on Friday.
Work is now being done to bring the fallen soldiers out of the facility. All the wounded were evacuated and only the “killed heroes” remained, the commander said.
On Thursday, Ukrainian media circulated a video showing the deputy commander of the Azov regiment, Svyatoslav Palamar. Accordingly, the commanders of the last military resistance in Mariupol, according to their own statements, were still in the Azovstal steel plant.
“Me and the command are at the Azovstal factory site. There is a certain operation going on, the details of which I will not say. We thank the whole world, thank Ukraine,” said Palamar. The authenticity of the video could not be checked immediately, and it was widely discussed in the Ukrainian media.
According to Russian information, since the beginning of the week in 1908, Ukrainian gunmen have surrendered, hiding in the branched bunkers under the steelworks. They were taken prisoner of war.
Russian troops attacked the port city of Mariupol in early March and conquered it in weeks of fighting – except for Azovstal. The city on the Sea of ​​Azov was almost completely destroyed.
