Russian orthodox priests escorted a humanitarian convoy into the besieged and encircled city of Mariupol, Ukraine.
According to The Telegraph, the priests, who represent Russia’s largest denomination, volunteered to accompany 90 tonnes of medicine and food into the city in the hope that Russian troops would be less willing to fire on them.
Previous attempts at getting aid into the city, which has been cut off by Russian troops, have failed.
It is believed that the priests were hoping to evacuate civilians on their way back, but it is not known whether this attempt was successful.
The New York Times also corroborated the story, reporting that “the 50 miles of road the convoy had to navigate were laced with land mines and buffeted by fierce fighting”.
Russian forces have encircled the south-eastern city of Mariupol, blocking major routes out, destroying bridges and mining some roads. It is thought that hundreds of thousands of people, including 50,000 children remain in the city, with diminishing amounts of food and clean water.
Mariupol’s hospital was bombed last week, leading to a shocking photograph of heavily pregnant blogger Mariana Vishegirskaya covered in blood, escaping the ruins. The Russian embassy in the UK accused the blogger of being a fake, using “very realistic make up”, but its tweets were later removed by Twitter saying they violated rules "related to the denial of violent events".
