Five Ukrainian soldiers laid down their arms and left the Azovstal plant in Mariupol, the people’s militia of the DPR said on Wednesday.
“Taking advantage of an offer from the People’s Militia of the DPR and the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, five servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine laid down their arms and voluntarily left the territory of the Azovstal plant,” the ministry’s Telegram channel said.
The People’s Militia of the DPR noted that the Ukrainian security forces learned about the proposal to voluntarily lay down their arms from special leaflets that had previously been dropped on the territory of the industrial zone of Mariupol.
At the time of the proclamation of the DPR in 2014, Mariupol, with a population of about 450 thousand people, was the second city of the republic after Donetsk, but in June of the same year, Ukrainian security forces regained control of Mariupol. On March 7, 12 days after the start of the Russian special operation to demilitarize Ukraine, the deputy commander of the Vostok battalion, Alexander Semyonov, announced that the city was surrounded, and a cleansing of its individual districts had begun.
Currently, the allied forces of the DPR and Russia are fighting for the final liberation of the city. The official representative of the Russian Defense Ministry, Igor Konashenkov, said on April 16 that the entire city territory had been cleared of the Ukrainian army, foreign mercenaries and neo-Nazis from the Azov regiment (against whose militants a criminal case was initiated in Russia). The remnants of the Ukrainian group are blocked at the Azovstal metallurgical plant.
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 genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years.” For this, according to him, it is planned to carry out “demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine.” According to the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, as of March 25, the main tasks of the first stage were completed – they significantly reduced the combat potential of Ukraine. The main goal in the Russian military department was called the liberation of Donbass. On April 19, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced the start of the next phase of the special operation.
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