Ukrainian authorities find 200 bodies in Mariupol ruins

Authorities in Mariupol said workers discovered 200 bodies in the basement of a ruined apartment building, as more horrors emerge in a city where hundreds have been killed in the three-month-old war.

A mayor's adviser, Petro Andryushchenko, said there was a strong stench in the neighborhood because the bodies were decomposing. He did not say when they were discovered, but the sheer number of victims makes it one of the deadliest known attacks of the war.

According to the regional governor, Russian shelling killed 12 people in the Donetsk region of the Donbas. Moreover, the governor of the Luhansk region of the Donbas said the area is experiencing its "most difficult time" since separatist fighting began there eight years ago.

Moscow's forces are intent on capturing the eastern industrial heartland of Donbas, where heavy clashes are reported.

Russian troops took over an industrial town that hosts a thermal power station, and intensified efforts to encircle and capture Sievierodonetsk and other cities.

25 May 2022