KYIV, Ukraine (AFP) – As battle continued around Kyiv, including in a crucial neighbourhood where defenders claim to have pushed out Russian invaders, Ukraine claimed Monday that at least 5,000 people had perished in the “catastrophic” humanitarian disaster gripping devastated Mariupol.

On the eve of new face-to-face peace discussions in Turkey on Tuesday, multiple cities in Ukraine remained under Russian bombing as Kyiv and its Western partners sought to end the month-long conflict.

According to a top Ukrainian official, at least 5,000 people have been buried in the besieged southern port of Mariupol, and as many as 10,000 may have died, confirming the city’s worst-case scenarios of destruction.

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