Kyiv : Rescuers searched for survivors on Thursday in the ruins of a theatre that Ukraine said was sheltering hundreds of civilians, including children, and was blown up by a Russian airstrike in the city of Mariupol, even as scores of Ukrainians across the country were killed in yet another brutal day of a war that entered its fourth week.
Through Thursday, as news of the attack on the theatre led to outrage across the world, the Russian foreign ministry said that the incident was a “lie” and that the truth would emerge despite what it called attempts to frame Moscow.
Based on initial reports, civilians had been taking shelter in the grand, columned theatre in Mariupol after their homes were destroyed in three weeks of fighting in the southern port city of 430,000.
“The heart is breaking from what Russia does to our people, our Mariupol, and our Donetsk region,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a late night address on Wednesday, after referring to the theatre attack.
Officials posted a photo of the theatre building, whose middle section was completely destroyed, with thick white smoke rising from the rubble.
Satellite imagery on Monday showed huge white letters painted on the pavement in front of and behind the theatre spelling out “CHILDREN” in Russian — “DETI” — to alert warplanes to those inside.
Ukraine said a bomb was dropped on the building from a plane.
As night fell, local authorities said they were still trying to establish the number of casualties, but their efforts were being hampered by the fact that residential neighborhoods were being shelled. “It is impossible to find words to describe the level of cynicism and cruelty, with which Russian invaders are destroying peaceful residents of a Ukrainian city by the sea,” an official statement from the Ukrainian side read.
Russia has repeatedly denied targeting civilians in the war.
In Moscow, the defence ministry said its forces had not struck the building and instead accused a far-right Ukrainian militia of blowing it up, RIA news agency said. Moscow did not give any evidence to back up the claim. Russia had previously accused the militia of preventing civilians from leaving Mariupol, which has come under heavy bombardment.
A day earlier, Zelensky had gone before the US Congress via video and, invoking Pearl Harbour and the September 11, 2001 terror attacks, had asked America for more weapons and tougher sanctions against Russia. Hours later, US President Joe Biden announced that the US is sending an additional $800 million in military aid to Ukraine, including more anti-aircraft and anti-tank weapons and drones.
On Thursday, Zelensky addressed the German parliament, drawing on a 1987 speech in Berlin by then US president Ronald Reagan: “Dear Mr Scholz, tear down this wall,” he implored German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. “It’s not a Berlin Wall — it is a wall in central Europe between freedom and bondage and this wall is growing bigger with every bomb,” he said.
International pressure against the Kremlin mounted and its isolation deepened as the International Court of Justice ordered Russia to stop attacking Ukraine.
