Resistance falters

RUSSIAN forces yesterday began what appeared to be their final assault on the besieged steel plant in Mariupol, while UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson pledged more support for Ukraine.

Defenders of the plant said Russian troops had started to storm the last pocket of resistance, almost two weeks after Russian president Vladimir Putin ordered his military to instead block off the factory

The deputy commander of the Azov Regiment that is holed up in the Azovstal steel plant, confirmed that Russian forces had started to storm the plant yesterday.

Asked about reports in Ukrainian media that the facility was being stormed, Sviatoslav Palamar said: “It is true.”

The reports come after some civilians escaped the plant over the weekend in a UN-assisted evacuation effort.

Deputy prime minister Iryna Vereshchuk told reporters a few hundred civilians remained at the plant.

Meanwhile, aid workers were busy preparing hot food, wheelchairs and toys for civilians slowly making their way to relative safety from the pulverised remnants of the plant, besieged for months by Russian forces.

The plant is the last holdout of Ukrainian resistance in a city that is otherwise controlled by Moscow’s forces and key to their campaign in Ukraine’s east.

Earlier yesterday Boris Johnson confirmed the UK will send a package of support worth £300 million to Ukraine in coming weeks, as he addressed the country’s parliament.

The prime minister also echoed the words of Winston Churchill in the videolink address to the Verkhovna Rada, describing Ukraine’s resistance against Vladimir Putin’s invasion as its “finest hour”.