Meanwhile in Mariupol
Russian dictator Vladimir Putin is counting on Europe and the U.S. to have short attention spans regarding his imperial designs on Ukraine and other former Soviet republics. He is fighting a war of attrition.
Mariupol fell after Russian forces reduced the city to rubble. There are about 90,000 Ukrainians trying to live in that rubble under Russian occupation (The Guardian):
“It was worse than hell there. There are no words to describe it,” said 55-year-old Vladimir Korchma, who had lived all of his life in Mariupol where he worked as a machinist at a local factory.
“We had no gas or electricity. Only the lucky ones had water,” said Korchma, who left the city at the end of May.
Korchma, a sturdy man with piercing blue eyes, spoke outside the help centre in Kyiv for people fleeing Mariupol. The centre, which provides food and organises housing, is the first port of call for many who had left the city.
Korchma proceeded to open his phone to show images of a destroyed apartment block, as did many of his fellow ex-Mariupol residents, all desperate to show the impact of Russia’s invasion on their lives.
“This was our home,” said Korchma, pointing to the screen. “Now it is in ruins. I would never have believed that I would be homeless at 55.”
Russian propagandists are still peddling the fixtion that the invasion’s goal was “de-Nazification.” The results are dire.
“Residents of the destroyed Mariupol are cooking broth from pigeons on bonfires in their courtyard,” Russia’s state-owned NTV reported from the city late in May.
One man suffering with intense tooth pain from an infection found the dentists had run out of anaesthetics.
“His tooth infection was spreading so they had to do something. They took his tooth out without anaesthesia. He screamed and screamed,” Oleh said.
There are now fears that cholera and other deadly diseases could kill many more people, as corpses lie uncollected and the summer brings warmer weather. “The smell in the city was just so intense wherever you went,” said Katerina.
Videos posted on the Telegram сhannel “Mariupol Now” – which was set up by a Ukrainian volunteer to get information out of the city – show disturbing scenes. In one particularly gruesome picture, which the channel said was taken a few days ago, dozens of bodies are seen lying in a parking lot.
European leaders from Germany, France and Italy met with Ukraininan President Volodomyr Zelensky today and pledged continued support while Dmitri A. Medvedev of Putin’s Security Council disparaged them as “European connoisseurs of frogs, liverwurst and pasta” (New York Times):
Ukraine’s plea for more weapons has grown more urgent in recent weeks as Russian forces extend their grip over the eastern Donbas region. But the war has raised far broader questions for the European Union as it debates how best to support a nation facing the biggest invasion on the continent since World War II.
[…]
At the same time, European leaders have been forced to deal with the far-ranging consequences of the invasion — rising energy prices and inflation, a brewing global food crisis tied to Russia’s blockade of Ukraine’s grain exports and the exodus of millions of Ukrainian refugees to neighboring nations.
U.S. President Joe Biden pledged another $1 billion in military aid, to include “18 howitzers, 36,000 rounds of howitzer ammunition and two Harpoon coastal defense systems.” But that aid may take months to arrive.
With gas and food prices spiking in the U.S., Americans’ low tolerance for spending on Ukraine while they feel the pinch is the stuff of Putin’s dreams. Too many, with a push from Putin, have already shown themselves unwilling to defend democracy at home.
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