UNITED NATIONS, April 20. /TASS/. The only possible explanation of how civilians ended up inside the besieged Azovstal plant in Mariupol is that they were taken there by nationalists to be used as a human shield, Russian First Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN Dmitry Polyansky told the UN Security Council session on Ukraine on Tuesday.

"One month into the siege of Azovstal plant, those same radicals and neo-Nazis suddenly declared that allegedly, there had been civilians inside the plant all that time, even though until yesterday, they had never uttered a word about it," the Russian diplomat said. "They did not mention any civilians even when hundreds of them, once surrounded, were giving in and laying down arms."

"So they exposed themselves once again: the only way civilians could get inside the Azovstal was for them being kept as a human shield," Polyansky added.