Ukraine, Putin visits Mariupol – World

Russian President Vladimir Putin made a ‘working visit’ to the occupied Ukrainian city of Mariupol after making a surprise trip to Crimea yesterday. It is the first time that the Russian president has been to Donbass since the beginning of the war and after the arrest warrant issued by the Court in The Hague.

Putin paid “a working visit” to the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, the Kremlin’s press service announced, quoted by the Russian Tass news agency. The visit took place on Saturday evening and in the night between Saturday and Sunday. “It was late. Yesterday’s late hour and last night”: said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, answering those who asked him when Putin’s visit to Mariupol took place. Peskov added that not all of Putin’s travel was planned, stressing that his movements in the city were partially spontaneous. “The president went to Mariupol. Initially, the plan was only to visit a residential complex and, of course, neither conversations with citizens, nor a visit (to the apartment of a local family who invited him, ed.) – this was not foreseen. All this was absolutely spontaneous,” Peskov said. And the president also looked at the stele, the monument to the heroes of the Great Patriotic War, and the park overlooking the yacht club “in an absolutely spontaneous way”.

According to Ria Novosti, President Vladimir Putin also visited the Philharmonic during his visit to the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, captured in May. The theater was used by the Russian administration to process Ukrainian fighters taken prisoner at the Azovstal Steel Plant, a huge industrial complex where Ukrainian troops held out for weeks before surrendering. In August the UN had expressed concern about the setting up of cages on stage for Ukrainian prisoners and had warned Moscow that they were about to commit a war crime: “There are images of cages being built at the Mariupol Philharmonic where the convicts will be held : it is unacceptable and humiliating”, said the spokeswoman for the UN human rights office, Ravina Shamdasani.

Putin “inspected a number of places in the city and spoke with local residents”, Moscow explains, adding that the Russian president “went to Mariupol by helicopter; he drove a vehicle along the streets of the city, stopping at various locations”. Just a few days ago, the Russian military administration had inaugurated a helicopter platform on the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, a stronghold of the Ukrainian defense for months until the surrender last May. According to the Kremlin again, Putin also held a meeting in the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don with military leaders at the command post of the “special military operation” underway in Ukraine.

The Ukrainian presidency criticizes Vladimir Putin’s visit to Mariupol underlining his “cynicism” and “lack of remorse”. “As befits a thief, Putin visited Ukraine’s Mariupol, under cover of night. First, it’s safer. Also, darkness allows him to highlight what he wants to show, and keep prying eyes away from prying eyes. city ​​completely destroyed by its army and its few surviving inhabitants”. This was written by the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense on its Twitter account. ‘The criminal always returns to the scene of the crime. While the civilized world announces the arrest of the ‘war director’ (Putin) if he crosses its borders, the murderer of thousands of Mariupol families has come to admire the ruins of the city and the tombs. Cynicism and lack of remorse,” Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhaylo Podolyak wrote on Twitter.

The Russian president has promised that Moscow will build more residential districts in Mariupol, in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic. During his visit to the eastern Ukrainian city, Putin spoke with a local resident, who described the place as “a little corner of paradise”, Tass news agency reported. And the Russian president said: “We will expand it.”

I residents of Mariupol who left the city during the fighting are returning of their own accord and the city’s census population is growing, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin said when speaking with President Vladimir Putin during their visit to the occupied Ukrainian martyr city annexed last spring by the Federation Russian. Tass writes it. “People started coming back spontaneously when they saw that the reconstruction is underway, and the census population is growing,” Khusnullin said speaking to Putin in a video reported by the Russian news agency Tass. The Russian deputy premier added that in Mariupol “jobs are being created” and that “every company in the city is classified on the basis of: how much and who invests, which source, who is in charge and how many jobs are created”. he says, quoted by Tass.

The airport of Mariupol is already used for military purposes and its reconstruction is scheduled for 2025, when it will be open to commercial flights: the Russian Deputy Prime Minister, Marat Khusnullin, reported this to President Vladimir Putin, on a visit to the city annexed to Russia. Khusnullin also said the city’s port is in good condition and is being used as a transshipment base, Tass news agency reported. The airport building “will be reconstructed at the end of 2023. It is planned to be a full-fledged airport, with the possibility of flying to all Russian cities and abroad, (this) is planned for 2025. Now l “The nearest airport is in Rostov and Taganrog, 150 km away. So far it is used for military purposes,” the deputy premier explained in a video of Putin’s visit to the city.

Countermove by the Kremlin Russian investigators “accurately record all crimes in Kiev, the files will provide the basis for a court in the future”. The Kremlin affirms it, as announced by Tass.

Russia didn’t have hypersonic weapons in 2014, but now it has them: Vladimir Putin said, as reported by Tass. The Russian president also stressed that in 2014 Moscow could not turn its back on Crimeans who were being confronted by nationalists. Interviewed on Rossiya 1 TV, Putin also underlined that Russia does not use hypersonic weapons during a special operation. “And finally, we, yes, we have a lot to do, for example, for the development of the ground forces, but we didn’t have hypersonic weapons then, but now we do – said the Russian president speaking of Donbass -. Yes, actually we don’t we use them, but they exist. You see? Like other modern systems, and in 2014 there was nothing like it.”