Azovstal owner: "Catastrophe"; Operation in the Black Sea zone; "Blackmailing Europe"

Azovstal owner: "Catastrophe"; Operation in the Black Sea zone; "Blackmailing Europe"

The fiercest battles are being fought in Mariupol around the "Azovstal" iron and steel works. The UN is preparing to evacuate civilians from the ironworks.

The UN has formed a team for the evacuation of civilians from Mariupol, said the deputy official representative of the UN Secretary General, Farhan Haq. As he stated, the conditions for evacuation from "Azovstal" have not been provided yet.

Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that all decisions have been made on Moscow's reaction in the event of a threat to Russia's strategic security.

The Russian leader said that the plans, as he said, of Russian opponents to destroy the country with sanctions, had failed.

Guterres in Ukraine

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres is in Ukraine, a meeting with Zelensky is expected.

The day before, he was in Moscow and talked with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and described the meeting as "very useful".

The owner of the Azovstal steel plant announced himself

Hundreds, and maybe even thousands of Ukrainians find refuge in the underground tunnels of the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol. It is considered to be the final stronghold of the Ukrainian resistance in the city.

The executive director of Metinvest Holding, which owns the steel plant, said those trapped in the complex are likely to be left without food and water. Yuriy Ryzhenkov told Sky News that the prepared food and water supplies were supposed to last three weeks, but that civilians and soldiers have now been captured for almost two months. He said that he does not know how many employees are still in the factory, but it seems that it is a "humanitarian catastrophe".

- They tried to evacuate civilians, but whenever people tried to get out, Russian troops shot at them - said Ryzhenkov, who described the situation as a "real tragedy".

Britain: Russia has operational capacities in the Black Sea

Russia's Black Sea Fleet still has the ability to hit Ukrainian targets at sea and on land, despite the losses of the landing ship Saratov and the warship Moscow, the British Ministry of Defense announced today.

About 20 ships of the Russian Navy, including submarines, are in the operational zone of the Black Sea, the ministry announced on Twitter, Reuters reports.

"The Bosphorus Sea is still closed to all warships that do not belong to Turkey, and for that reason Russia is not able to replace the lost cruiser Moscow in the Black Sea," the regular report of the British Ministry states.