Lavrov confirms Russia deliberately bombed maternity hospital in Mariupol

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has confirmed that the bombing of the children's and maternity hospital in Mariupol was a conscious, deliberate decision by the Russian Army.

He said this at a press conference in Antalya, after talks with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitriy Kuleba.

Lavrov stressed that he considered the maternity hospital to be a military target.

"A few days ago, at a UN Security Council meeting, the Russian delegation presented factual information that this maternity hospital had long been taken over by the Azov battalion and other radicals and that all the women in labour, all the nurses and in general all the staff had been told to leave it. It was a base of the ultra-radical Azov battalion," he said.