Russian Investigative Committee probe Mariupol hospital capture

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The Russian Investigative Committee opened Saturday a criminal case against Ukrainian militants and mercenaries over their holding of hostages in a maternity hospital in Mariupol.

"A criminal case has been initiated on the grounds of a crime under... part 2 of article 206 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation," which is the premeditated capture of two or more hostages committed by a group of people with the use of violence, the committee explained in a statement.

According to the committee, Unidentified Ukrainian militants fired Friday at the building of the Mariupol maternity hospital.

After opening fire, the militants seized the building, deployed heavy weaponry, and captured at least 100 civilians, including pregnant women and about 40 children. They proceeded to use them as hostages and human shields.

This is not the first violation of crime committed by the Ukrainian side in Mariupol, as the Azov battalion, a notorious far-right neo-Nazi group, opened fire on civilians during their evacuation from the city, killing at least two people and injuring four others.

Kiev had previously claimed that hospitals in this city had been the target of Russian attacks, but the allegations were proven false.

Russian First Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations Dmitry Polyanskiy revealed that the allegations were false, and he reminded the United Nations that Moscow had warned that the hospital the allegations were surrounding had become a military site at the hands of radicals.

Russia had launched a special military operation in Ukraine due to NATO's eastward expansion, the Ukrainian shelling of Donbass, and the killing of the people of the Donetsk People's Republic and Lugansk People's Republic, in addition to Moscow wanting to "denazify" and demilitarize Ukraine.