Ukraine war: Putin makes surprise visit to Mariupol

Russian President Vladimir Putin has made a surprise visit to Mariupol in what would be his first trip to the Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine’s Donbas region since the start of the war.

The visit came after Putin travelled to Crimea on Saturday in an unannounced visit to mark the ninth anniversary of Russia’s annexation of the peninsula from Ukraine, and just two days after the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for the Russian leader.

Mariupol, which fell to Russia in May after one of the war’s longest and bloodiest battles, was Russia’s first major victory after it failed to seize Kyiv and focused instead on southeastern Ukraine.

Russian news agencies report that Putin flew by helicopter to Mariupol.

It is the closest to the front lines Putin has been since the year-long war.

Russian media reports that Putin visited a family in their home in the Nevsky district of Mariupol, a new residential neighbourhood built by the Russian military.

“The head of state also examined the coastline of Mariupol in the area of the yacht club, the theatre building and memorable places of the city,” the Interfax agency cited the Kremlin’s press service.

Putin also met with the top commander of his military operation in Ukraine, including Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov who is in charge of Moscow’s war in Ukraine.

Also Read: Ukraine war: ICC issues arrest warrant for Putin

Mariupol is in the Donetsk region, one of the four regions Putin moved in September to annex. Kyiv and its Western allies condemned the move as illegal.

Donetsk, together with the Luhansk region, comprise most of the Donbas industrialised part of Ukraine that has seen the biggest battle in Europe for generations. War crime

Mariupol, on the Sea of Azov, was reduced to a smouldering shell after weeks of fighting.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation and Europe (OSCE) said Russia’s early bombing of a maternity hospital in Mariupol was a war crime.

The ICC issued an arrest warrant on Friday against Putin, accusing him of the war crime of illegally deporting hundreds of children from Ukraine, a highly symbolic move that isolates the Russian leader further.

Unlike Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy who has made a number of trips to the battlefield to boost the morale of his troops and talk strategy, Putin has largely remained inside the Kremlin during the war

Kyiv and its allies say the invasion, now in its 13th month, is an imperialistic land grab that has killed thousands and displaced millions of people in Ukraine.

Zainab Sa’id