Volyna, who is not a Catholic, but an Orthodox Christian, said that he was turning to the pope for concrete help “because the time has come when prayers are not enough.”
“Bring the truth to the world, evacuate people and save their lives from the hands of Satan, who wants to burn all living things,” the military commander said.
The besieged city of Mariupol has been under Russian bombardment since March 1. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said that more than 100,000 people remain trapped in Mariupol with limited access to food and water.
A spokesman for UN Secretary General António Guterres said on April 18 that he was “greatly concerned by the continuing appalling humanitarian situation in the besieged city of Mariupol, which has been largely destroyed by weeks of unrelenting Russian attacks.”
The Russian assault on the city intensified last weekend after Ukraine’s prime minister declared that Ukrainian military forces will not heed the Russians’ call for them to surrender, but “will fight to the end.”
Ukrainian officials have said that Russian forces in Mariupol outnumber Ukrainian troops by six to one.
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