Russia BOMBS Mariupol school where 400 civilians including women and children were hiding
Russian troops bombed an art school housing 400 civilians, including women and children, in their latest attack on Mariupol. The G12 art school in Mariupol’s Left Bank district was reportedly hit by thermobaric TOS-1A rockets, capable of melting human organs. Rescuers said that many people remain trapped but the number of casualties is unclear.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said that the port's citizens were being killed in what would become an unspeakable war crime in history. "To do this to a peaceful city is a terror that will be remembered for centuries to come," he said.
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Just days ago, Russian troops bombed a theater said to be sheltering up to 1,200 people, with the word 'children' written outside the building. The Mariupol Drama Theatre was being used to house people and shelter them from shelling, with meals being provided. Satellite images reportedly showed that the word 'children' was written in visibly large white letters in Russian outside both the front and back of the building.
"The theatre building served as shelter for hundreds of Mariupol residents who had lost their homes as a result of Russian armed forces bombing and shelling the city," Ukraine's foreign ministry said in a statement. "The bomb strike demolished the central part of the theatre building, causing large numbers of people to be buried under the debris. The assessment of the exact number of persons affected is currently impossible due to ongoing shelling. By delivering a purposeful bomb attack to the place of mass gathering of civilians Russia has committed another war crime. Putin’s regime has long since crossed the line of humanity."
Mariupol has been under relentless attack as Russia bombed a maternity and children's hospital in the city as part of an airstrike earlier. Zelenskyy called the attack a war crime, where at least three people were killed. Zelenskyy even posted a footage of the wreckage caused by the strike. "Mariupol. Direct strike of Russian troops at the maternity hospital. People, children are under the wreckage. Atrocity! How much longer will the world be an accomplice ignoring terror? Close the sky right now! Stop the killings! You have power but you seem to be losing humanity," he captioned the video.
Mariupol has witnessed constant shelling, leading to around 20,000 Ukrainians fleeing. Reportedly, at least 2,300 citizens have been killed in the area. Mariupol has been under fire for over two weeks now. Entire neighborhoods are in tatters. Thousands of people have reportedly died and 2,50,000 are trapped without power or water.
“Over the past week, several thousand Mariupol residents were deported on to the Russian territory,” the Mariupol city council said in a statement on its Telegram channel late on Saturday, March 19. “The occupiers illegally took people from the Livoberezhniy district and from the shelter in the sports club building, where more than a thousand people [mostly women and children] were hiding from the constant bombing.” The claims have not been independently verified, but the council’s statement is one of several reports about Mariupol residents being taken to Russia, reports the Irish Times.