Did Azovstal's ultimatum signal a new phase?

What did the weekend of 17 April 2022 reveal about the direction of the war? The day combined a hardening siege in the south-east, long-range strikes far from the front line and a small sign of movement in the opposite direction across the Polish border.

An ultimatum at Azovstal

On 17 April 2022, Russian forces issued an ultimatum to the last Ukrainian holdouts at the Azovstal iron and steel works in Mariupol, including what Russia called "foreign fighters". As reported at the time, most of the Ukrainian soldiers remaining in the city, along with a large group of civilians, had taken shelter inside the giant plant as Russian troops advanced through the besieged city. The terms demanded that soldiers lay down their arms by 6am Moscow time and evacuate by 1pm. The defenders of the Azov Sea port ignored the ultimatum.

Strikes far from the front

The same day, Russian missile strikes on Lviv killed six people. A day earlier, on 16 April, Russian missile strikes hit Kharkiv and killed one person, and a restaurant operated by the World Central Kitchen was confirmed destroyed. The Russian Air Force also launched airstrikes on Kyiv on 16 April.

These attacks followed a larger wave. On 15 April, Russia launched major missile strikes on Kyiv, saying they were retaliation for the April 2022 attacks on Belgorod and Bryansk. Russia's defence ministry spokesman, Igor Konashenkov, said Kalibr long-range missiles hit the Vizar military plant near Kyiv, which produced and repaired anti-aircraft and anti-ship missile systems. Russia described this as a response to an alleged helicopter bombing of a residential building in Klymovo, which Russia blamed on Ukraine. Ukraine denied that it ever took place.

Diplomacy and displacement

On 16 April it was reported that Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich had visited Kyiv in an effort to revive peace talks between Russia and Ukraine. Nothing on 17 April showed those efforts translating into a change on the battlefield: the Mariupol ultimatum and the Lviv strikes pointed the other way.

One figure moved in a different direction. According to the Polish Border Guard, on 17 April more Ukrainians entered Ukraine from Poland than left, for the first time since the invasion began.

Other threads

The aftermath of the sinking of the Russian warship Moskva, which went down on 14 April, still drew discussion. Some Ukrainian experts suggested it might have carried nuclear weapons, a claim two senior US intelligence officials rejected, saying they did not believe it was aboard. Separately, on 15 April Sviatoslav Shevchuk, Ukraine's ambassador to the Vatican and archbishop of Kyiv, condemned a Vatican plan to have a Ukrainian and a Russian woman carry the cross together during a Good Friday procession. He objected to what was presented as reconciliation while Ukraine was still suffering from a war started by Russia.

What it showed

Taken together, 17 April 2022 showed an offensive concentrating on Mariupol while missile strikes reached cities far from the front, and a defence that rejected surrender terms. The ultimatum went unanswered, and the defenders stayed inside Azovstal.