Russia’s war with the Ukraine has now officially entered its fourth week.
With Mariupol currently a nightmarish scene of street fighting and civilians attempting to take cover from bombings by Russian military forces, efforts to rescue the thousands of civilians trapped in the city remain ongoing.
While it remains too soon to even try and predict if any of the two countries will emerge a victor from the fight, world emerging superpower China continues to weigh up its own options. Some are even arguing that China is clearly interested on building on a pre-war friendship with Putin and Russia, while knowing full well that Russia knows absolutely no limits in creating absolute autocracy.
Some others, on the other hand, believe in America’s capacity and position of power into shaming China in severing all friendship bonds with Russia.
Biden Issues Warning To China
But according to what has been reported so far, neither scenario seems likely to overpower the other, meaning while Russia will continue to seek its own interests, China is interested mainly in hastening America’s decline as a world-governing superpower.
President Joe Biden, meanwhile, is seemingly focused on warning his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping of the dire implications of providing material and military support to Russia as it continues its war with the Ukraine.
No Ultimatums Say Ukraine
Potentially escalating news this week is that the Ukraine said on Monday that it would not be giving in to ultimatums made by Russia regarding Moscow’s demands that it stops defending the heavily besieged Mariupol.
The region has become the focal point of Putin’s assault on the country, but attacks have recently been extended also to the country’s second largest city, namely Kharkiv.
Current figures show that nearly a quarter of the country’s 44 million people have been forced to flee their homes, with Germany predicting this number could increase to as high as 10 million over the coming weeks.
Europe says it now believes that Russia is using the refugee crisis as a bargaining tool. Europe has responded to this by saying it intends to take even more severe action on top of the existing sanctions already placed on Russia.
Putin’s military on Monday ordered residents of Mariupol to surrender and call a cease-fire by 5 a.m. local time. The demand furthermore stipulated that those who intended to leave the region would be permitted to do so, but that those who chose to remain behind would be left to the mercy of tribunals organised by “Moscow separatists”.
The Ukraine government, however, insisted that no ultimatums made by Moscow and Putin would be surrendered to, and that those cities under current attack would continue to defend themselves and their right to occupy the country. Either way, it was a gamble like the tragamonedas Peru offers.
Thousands Saved From Mariupol
Mariupol is a port city situation on the Sea of Azov and was pre-war home to around 400,000 people. The city is now facing severe shortages of water, power, food, and medicine.
On Monday morning, some 8,000 people were taken to safety via several humanitarian borders. Among those, 3,007 residents are estimated to be from the heavily under-fire Mariupol.
