The occupiers want to limit the population of Mariupol and settle residents mainly near the seaport to service it.
The adviser to the Mayor of Mariupol Petro Andryushchenko reported about this.
Andryushchenko noted that, as it has been stressed since the beginning of the war, the only and main goal of control over Mariupol is access to the port, as the deepest in the Sea of Azov, and the establishment of a military base there.
"All this has to be served by a limited number of people. Now we see a trend towards confirmation and implementation," said the Mayor's adviser.
He noted that on Easter the occupiers deported 149 people from Mariupol to russia, including 23 children.
Andryushchenko added that about 100,000 people remain in the city.
Russia deported almost 800 Ukrainians from Mariupol to Cheboksary and Vladivostok, and deported 308 Mariupol residents to the Far East, to the city of Nakhodka in the Primorsky Krai.
The russian leadership had plans to deport a large number of Ukrainians to concentration camps in western Siberia for forced labor on building new cities.
Earlier, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that russian occupation troops had already deported more than 500,000 Ukrainian citizens.
According to Western media reports, illegally deported Ukrainians are indeed being sent to the most remote and disadvantaged regions of the russian federation. They have been transported to Siberia, Chechnya, the Far East and the North Caucasus.