Russia gave holdout Ukrainian soldiers an ultimatum on Sunday to lay down arms in the pulverized southeastern port city of Mariupol, where Moscow said its forces nearly completely controlled in what would be its biggest capture of the nearly 2-month-old war.
Several hours after the deadline there was no sign of compliance by Ukrainian fighters holed up in the vast Azovstal steelworks overlooking the Sea of Azov.
Having failed to overcome Ukrainian resistance in the north since President Vladimir Putin's Feb. 24 invasion, the Russian military has refocused on the eastern Donbas region where Mariupol is the main port.