Mariupol picks up the pieces

Mariupol – The carcasses of charred buildings stand amid the lush greenery in what remains of the once bustling Ukrainian port city of Mariupol.

After weeks of siege and strikes much of the city on the coast of the Sea of Azov has been reduced to a wasteland. As the last Ukrainian troops in the town surrendered to the Russians at the bombed-out Azovstal steel plant, passers-by mourned their fate.

Angela Kopytsa, a 52-year-old with bleached hair, said she saw no future for herself in Mariupol.

“There is no work, no food, no water,” she said.

The city has lived without electricity since early March.

Kopytsa breaks into tears as she recounts how during the hostilities she had to share morsels of food with her children and grandson and how “children at maternity wards were dying of hunger”.

Three months of fighting in Mariupol have sent hundreds of thousands of people running for their lives and caused untold suffering and death.

Russia has pledged to rebuild the southeastern city and turn it into a seaside resort.

AFP journalists travelled to Mariupol as part of a press tour organised by the Russian army but members of the media were not allowed to approach the huge Azovstal steel plant, which has become a symbol of fierce Ukrainian resistance. –