The word “children” is painted on the ground outside the ruins of the Mariupol Drama Theatre, 17 March 2022. Photo: Pavel Klimov / Reuters

The Ukrainian city of Mariupol, occupied by Russia since spring 2022, was “wiped off the map” in the early days of the war, the head of Russia’s Investigative Committee, Alexander Bastrykin, said on Wednesday, adding that there were “no military targets” in the city.

Speaking at the St. Petersburg International Legal Forum, Bastrykin compared Mariupol to besieged Leningrad during World War II, adding that he was “shocked” by the extent of the damage to the city when he arrived there after its “liberation” by the Russian army.

“I would compare besieged Leningrad with Mariupol. The Germans hit besieged Leningrad on schedule, 7am and 7pm. There was a huge number of damaged buildings, you can see it in photographs … But Mariupol simply shocked me. The city was practically wiped off the map. There were no military targets there,” Bastrykin said, implying that the damage was inflicted by the Ukrainian armed forces.

The Ukrainian port city of Mariupol, which had a pre-war population of over 400,000, was occupied by Russian forces in May 2022 after a months-long siege. The city was formally annexed by Russia in September of the same year as part of the so-called Donetsk “People’s Republic” in eastern Ukraine.

The siege of Mariupol’s true death toll is still unknown, as the city remains under Russian occupation. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an interview with Italian newspaper Il Foglio in January that he had “information that the Russians killed about 20,000 people” in Mariupol, but noted that he could not confirm the information precisely.

According to an independent estimate by Human Rights Watch based on satellite and other images of grave sites, at least 8,000 civilians were killed in the siege that reduced the city to rubble as Russia indiscriminately shelled residential areas.