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Ladimir Putin’s forces have launched a “insane” attack on the Donbas, Ukrainian officials said on Wednesday.
Strong fighting was reported in the eastern industrial heart of Ukraine that Moscow intends to seize.
Russian troops have intensified efforts to encircle and capture cities and have continued to relentlessly bombard the city of Sievierodonetsk in the Lugansk area.
Serhiy Haidai, the governor of the Luhansk region, said the area is facing its “most difficult time” in the eight years since separatist fighting broke out.
“The Russians are moving in all directions at the same time,” he said. “They brought a crazy number of fighters and equipment.
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“The invaders are killing our cities, destroying everything around them.”
Haidai added that Luhansk is becoming “like Mariupol”.
Workers cleaning debris in the destroyed port city of Mariupol were reportedly uncovering the bodies of 200 people in the basement of an apartment building. The bodies were decaying, said Petro Andryushchenko, the city’s deputy mayor.
He did not say when the mass grave was discovered, but the death toll makes it one of the deadliest attacks known in the three months since the war began.
Mariupol was hit non-stop during a siege that ended last week when some 2,500 Ukrainian fighters left the vast steel plant where they had been hiding.
At least 21,000 people have been killed in fighting for Mariupol, according to Ukrainian authorities.
Russia has been accused of trying to cover up the horrors by introducing mobile cremation equipment and burying the dead in mass graves.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called the situation in the Donbass “extremely difficult” as he called for more weapons.
In his nightly speech, he said: “I insist again and again, the longer this war lasts, the greater the price of protecting freedom not only for Ukraine but also for the free world.
“Therefore, the supply of heavy weapons to Ukraine (MLRS, tanks, anti-ship weapons and others) is the best investment to maintain stability in the world and prevent many serious crises that Russia is still planning or has already provoked.”
It comes as British defense chiefs warned today that Putin’s blockade on Odessa and other Ukrainian ports will push up food prices even further.
Since the beginning of the invasion on February 24, they have highlighted that there have been no “significant” movements of merchant ships through Odessa, a large port on the Black Sea.
His warning came just hours after Ukraine’s ambassador to London appeared to reveal that his country and the United Kingdom had discussed the deployment of Royal Navy ships to create a safe corridor across the Black Sea. for cargo ships.
At its latest intelligence briefing, the Defense Ministry said: “Ukraine’s land export mechanisms are very unlikely to replace this deficit in shipping capacity caused by the Russian blockade.
“As a result, a significant supply of grain from Ukraine is stored without being able to be exported.”