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Ukraine offers to send negotiators to Mariupol to ‘save our guys’
“One on one. Two on two. To save our guys, Azov, military, civilians, children the living & the wounded,” Podolyak wrote on Twitter late Wednesday, referring to the Azov Battalion, a far-right nationalist militia that has been key to the Ukrainian resistance.
“Everyone. Because they are ours. Because they are in my heart. Forever,” he wrote.
Davyd Arakhamia, a lawmaker from Zelensky’s party, said he and Podolyak were “ready to arrive for such negotiations at any time as soon as we receive confirmation from the Russian side.”
The offer has so far been rebuffed by Moscow, according to Zelensky. It comes after Ukrainian troops have refused multiple Russian-imposed deadlines to surrender in Mariupol.
Efforts to evacuate civilians from Mariupol on Wednesday were unsuccessful, with Kyiv and Moscow blaming each other for the breakdown. A plan had been hatched to open a “humanitarian corridor” but Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said it fell apart after Russia did not provide a cease-fire, alleging that Russia lacks control of its troops.
“Due to the inherent disorganization and negligence of the occupiers, we were unable to provide timely transportation of people to the point where dozens of our buses and ambulances were waiting,” she said.
Russia said that it had created a path to safety for civilians at the steel plant but that no one had used the route.
Ukraine has in recent days floated the idea of exchanging Russian military prisoners for the release of its civilians in Mariupol. Zelensky on Wednesday said that “we are ready to exchange our people for military prisoners. We are ready for any formats for exchange.”
This week, Ukraine’s intelligence service released footage of pro-Kremlin politician Viktor Medvedchuk, who was recaptured last week by Ukrainian forces, requesting that Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin exchange him for civilians and the “defenders of Mariupol.” It was unclear whether Medvedchuk, who faces treason charges and is a good friend of Putin, was speaking freely. Russia has said that because Medvedchuk is not a Russian citizen, he is unappealing to them as a bargaining chip.
But after Medvedchuk was captured, Dmitry Medvedev, the deputy chairman of Russia’s security council and the former president of Russia, released a fiery and threatening statement, saying that the Ukrainian officials responsible for Medvedchuk’s capture — he called them “freaks” — should “stay on guard, looking around all the time, and keep the door locked well for the night, if they do not want to find themselves among those to be exchanged.”
The commander of the soldiers making a last stand at the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol said in audio messages to The Washington Post on Wednesday that people were languishing in the plant, which he said was being bombed heavily and “torn up by artillery.”
“They’re dying underground — the wounded and the living there,” Maj. Serhiy Volyna of the 36th Separate Marine Brigade said of his troops.
Lateshia Beachum and Paulina Villegas contributed to this report.