Ukraine defies Russian demand to surrender Mariupol

Ukraine defied a Russian demand that its forces lay down arms before dawn on Monday in Mariupol, where hundreds of thousands of civilians have been trapped in a city under siege and already laid to waste by Russian bombardment, Reuters reported Monday.  

Mariupol, a port on the Sea of Azov, home to 400,000 people before the war has been under siege and constant bombardment, with no food, medicine, power or fresh water, since the beginning of Russia’s attack on Feb 24.  
Russia’s military had ordered Ukrainians inside the city in the country’s southeast to surrender by 5 a.m., saying those who did so would be permitted to leave, while those who stayed would be turned over to tribunals run by Russian-backed separatists.  

“Lay down your arms.All who lay down their arms are guaranteed safe passage out of Mariupol.” Colonel-General Mikhail Mizintsev, director of the Russian National Centre for Defence Management, said in a briefing distributed by the defence ministry  

6 bodies were laid out on the pavement by a shopping mall in Kiev that had been struck overnight by Russian shelling late Sunday. Ukraine’s Prosecutor General said 8 people had been killed in the shelling.  

Nearly a quarter of Ukraine’s 44 million people have already been driven from their homes, including 3.4 million who have fled abroad, the United Nations said. A U.N. tally includes more than 900 confirmed civilian deaths but the true total is unknown. KYIV, March 21 ReuterS