A Russian general dubbed the 'Butcher of Mariupol' owing to his alleged brutal military tactics in Ukraine including the destruction of a maternity hospital also stands accused of orchestrating Moscow’s bombing campaign in Syria which largely destroyed the city of Aleppo six years earlier.
Colonel-General Mikhail Mizintsev, director of the Russian National Centre for Defence Management, has gained a fearsome reputation for carrying out merciless attacks including on civilians.
According to Sergei Bratchuk, spokesman for the military headquarters in Odesa, Mr Mizintsev is personally in charge of the siege of Mariupol.
The city, on Ukraine’s Azov Sea coast, has seen some of the most intense fighting of the month-long war, prompting officials to warn it was being turned to “ashes”.
On 9 March, a Russian airstrike devastated a maternity hospital in Mariupol, killing at least three and injuring 17.
A week later, on 16 March, a Russian bomb flattened a theatre despite the word "children" having been scrawled in huge white letters on the pavement next to it to indicate that civilians were sheltering inside.
Around 300 people were killed in that airstrike, Ukrainian authorities said on Friday, in what would make it the war's deadliest known attack on civilians yet. There were also reports from the UN on Friday of the expectation of mass graves in the city.
The bloodshed is certain to fuel allegations Moscow has committed war crimes by killing civilians, a charge that is also levelled directly at Mr Mizintsev.
Oleksandra Matviichuk, head of the Centre for Civil Liberties in Ukraine, tweeted a photo of Mr Mizintsev and said: “Remember him. This is Mikhail Mizintsev. He is leading the siege of Mariupol. It was he who ordered the bombing of a children's hospital, the drama theatre etc. He has huge experience of destroying cities in Syria. We’ll take care of the meeting him in the Hague #RussianWarCrimes.”
Russian warplanes carried out a devastating bombing campaign in Syria alongside President Bashar al-Assad’s own forces in 2016.
The divided city of Aleppo was the scene of some of the country’s fiercest fighting and large swathes of it were reduced to rubble.
Images being shared of bomb-damaged Ukrainian cities next to war-ravaged Aleppo suggest Russians are employing similar tactics in their latest conflict.
Mr Mizintsev’s reputation for ruthlessness extends to his treatment of Russian soldiers, according to an intercepted phone call which was made public by Ukrainian officials. In it, he is heard apparently threatening to have the ear of a junior officer whose uniform was not correctly worn cut off.
“Look at that scum standing there, frowning with his bovine eyes, showing me his unhappy face, his stinking mug,” he is heard saying.
“Why is he still serving? And why should I have to waste my time with your scum? If you’re the head of a unit, then step up to the plate. Why has his face not been messed up? Why has his ear not been cut off? Why is he not limping by now?”
Mariupol, which is normally home to about 400,000 people, has been under heavy bombardment for weeks.
Civilians trapped there have been sheltering in basements with little food, power or running water.
Mr Mizintsev had appealed to Ukrainian troops defending the strategic port to lay down arms and exit the city via humanitarian corridors, but that proposal was quickly rejected by the Ukrainian authorities.
Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said in remarks carried by Ukrainska Pravda news outlet that Kyiv already had told Russia that "there can be no talk about surrender and laying down weapons." She rejected the Russian statement as "manipulation."
Additional reporting by agencies
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