In embattled Mariupol, glimpses of devastation and misery emerge

In the more than two weeks that it has been cut off from the outside world, Mariupol, the southern Ukrainian port city, has become synonymous with the horror of the Russian invasion. It is a place of overflowing morgues, newly dug mass graves and bodies in some cases buried under rubble or left in the streets where they fell. Hundreds of people fled Mariupol for the second straight day via a humanitarian corridor on Tuesday, but Ukrainian officials told Reuters that those who escaped were a small fraction of the 200,000 trapped in the city and in need of urgent assistance. Russian forces have continued to block a much-needed aid convoy from getting in, Ukrainian officials said. As conditions in the city have grown more dire and the death count has surged, word of the humanitarian catastrophe has leaked out through intermittent phone calls, shakily shot videos, Associated Press journalists and testimony from the handful of aid groups still working in the city.

“People in Mariupol have endured a weeks-long life-and-death nightmare,” said Peter Maurer, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, whose staff was trapped in the city. ICRC officials warned that time was running out for the civilians who remain there. Some of the most harrowing images from the city have been captured by average citizens with cellphones. “In the city center, it’s a real meat grinder: This land is soaked in blood, bitterness and despair,” one Mariupol citizen said in a video posted online Sunday. The video showed empty streets, blocks of broken windows and stores stripped of food by starving citizens. It lingered over men cooking their dinner over a campfire in a city that has endured subzero temperatures and nearly two weeks without heat or water. “The world doesn’t know what’s happening here,” the narrator said as he navigated past blown out buildings. “It’s terrible.”