Azovstal defenders: ‘Surrender is not an option’

Ilya Samoilenko, 27-year-old officer of the Azov regiment, tells foreign journalists on May 8 about the dire situation in Azovstal, Mariupol’s steel plant besieged by Russian forces.

While the outside world was commemorating the end of World War II, Ilya Samoilenko, a 27-year-old officer of the Azov regiment, was speaking online to the press from the basement of Azovstal.

“We feel abandoned,” said Samoilenko from the last Ukrainian stronghold of Mariupol, a city with a pre-war population of 450,000 people, now nearly completely destroyed by Russia.

“We knew a big war with Russia was happening and we were ready,” he added, saying that all Ukrainian governments of the past eight years are to blame for the failure to prevent encirclement. 

As Russia launched an all-out war against Ukraine on Feb. 24, Mariupol became its major target. The largest city of Ukrainian-controlled Donbas was first hit on the next day.