View of Mariupol in the direction of the Azovstal metallurgical plantMARIUPOL, Apr 18High ranks of mercenaries from NATO countries may be located on the territory of the Azovstal plant in Mariupol, this may cause active resistance of Ukrainian militants, the commander of the unit of the Donetsk People's Republic with the call sign Khokhol told RIA Novosti. «There are foreign mercenaries. Enough. Poland. Britain «Even neutral Switzerland. They go like instructors. They are seriously trained — those who come as instructors … There is an opinion that now there are just a lot of them at Azov. Namely foreign ones. And big ranks. Why are they butting here. Because «They are trying to save them. If these people fall into our hands, there will be a great sorrow for those who started all this (the conflict in Donbass — ed.) in 2014. But God forbid! God is with us! We will do everything,» he said. agency interlocutor.
Ukrainian militants tried twice to break out of the encirclement in Mariupol At the time of the proclamation of the DPR in 2014, Mariupol, with a population of about 450,000 people, was the second largest city in the republic after Donetsk. However, in June of the same year, the Ukrainian security forces regained control of Mariupol. On March 7, 2022, Alexander Semyonov, deputy commander of the Vostok battalion of the DPR, said that the city was surrounded, and a cleansing of some of its districts had begun. Currently, the allied forces of the DPR and Russia are fighting for the final liberation of the city. Among other Ukrainian units, they are resisted by the nationalist Azov regiment, against whose militants a criminal case has been initiated in the Russian Federation. Russia launched a military operation in Ukraine on February 24. President Vladimir Putin called its goal «the protection of people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years.» To this end, according to him, it is planned to carry out «demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine» bloody crimes against civilians» of Donbass. According to the Russian Ministry of Defense, the Armed Forces strike only at military infrastructure and Ukrainian troops, and on March 25 they completed the main tasks of the first stage — they significantly reduced the combat potential of Ukraine. The main goal in the Russian military department was called the liberation of Donbass.
