DNIPRO, Ukraine — As Russia faced new international condemnation Wednesday over mounting evidence of atrocities by its troops, Moscow asserted that more than 1,000 Ukrainian troops in Mariupol had surrendered, dealing what would be a heavy blow to defenders’ desperate efforts to hold the strategic southern port city.
The Russian defense ministry’s claim could not be verified, and Ukraine said the battle for Mariupol continued.
As a seventh week of warfare drew to a close, Russian artillery pounded cities and towns in preparation for what is expected to be an all-out offensive in the country’s eastern industrial heartland known as the Donbas. Satellite imagery from the U.S. firm Maxar Technologies has shown a growing buildup of Russian troops and heavy equipment in at least three likely staging grounds for an assault.
