The Biden administration on Thursday announced it is levying sanctions against Russia's largest military shipbuilding and diamond mining companies. The move blocks their access to the US financial system as the United States looks to exact more economic pain on President Vladimir Putin for the invasion of Ukraine.
Ukraine-Russia conflict: India has chosen side of peace, Jaishankar says in Lok Sabha
A DAY after India, in its statement at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) meeting, “unequivocally condemned” the civilian killings in the Ukrainian city of Bucha, the government told Lok Sabha on Wednesday that it supports the call for an “independent investigation” into the deaths. Countering criticism on the Centre’s stand, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said India is “strongly against” the conflict, and “if it has chosen a side, it is a side of peace, and for an immediate end to violence”.
Replying to the discussion on the situation in Ukraine, Jaishankar said: “We are strongly against the conflict, we believe that no solution can be arrived at by shedding blood and at the cost of innocent lives. In this day and age, dialogue and diplomacy are the right answers to any disputes”.
Stating that India was “deeply disturbed” by the Bucha killings, he said: “We strongly condemn the killings that have taken place there. This is an extremely serious matter and we support the call for an independent investigation.”
Russia vs the West: A clash of civilisations
One of the world’s most derided visions of international affairs is Samuel Huntington’s infamous “Clash of Civilisations”. Huntington saw the state of the post-Cold War conflict as chiefly being between civilisational complexes that had shared history, geographic contiguity and a common culture. He argued that the primary axis of future conflict would be cultural fault lines between civilisations rather than between political ideologies.
Huntington mapped civilisations largely in line with geographically clustered ethno-religious groupings. For example, he predicted (in 1993) that the Islamic world would be the Western culture’s chief antagonist, the likelihood of a Sino-Islamic alliance, and positioned India (“Hindu” culture) and Russia (“Orthodox” culture) as “swing civilisations”. It is particularly interesting to dust off Huntington’s pages and revisit his predictions regarding Russia and India. Most importantly, he also identified Ukraine as a unique “cleft” between civilisations due to the linguistic and religious divide between western and eastern Ukraine.
Donors including the Canadian government and the European Commission on Saturday pledged a combined 9.1 billion euros in donations, loans and grants to support refugees fleeing the war following Russia's invasion.
The fundraising event in Warsaw, Poland, yielded 1.8 billion euros to support internally displaced people inside Ukraine, and 7.3 billion euros for refugees who have fled the country to neighbouring states. Governments, companies and individuals together pledged 4.1 billion euros in donations, which will be distributed largely via the Ukrainian authorities or the United Nations. The remaining 5 billion euros were loans and grants from EU financial institutions - including a 4 billion euro programme to help provide housing, education and healthcare for refugees arriving in EU countries.
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"We stand by your side, be it now in the times of war, be it with the refugees, but most importantly after this war has been won by Ukraine, for the time for reconstruction and rebuilding the country," said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who visited Kyiv on Friday and co-hosted the event with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. (Reuters)
Ukraine is ready for a tough battle with Russian forces amassing in the east of the country, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said, a day after a missile attack in the east that officials said killed more than 50 civilians trying to evacuate.
*Zelenskiy met Prime Minister Boris Johnson, one of his staunchest backers, in Kyiv on Saturday, with the British leader using the visit to set out a new financial and military aid package for Ukraine.
* Johnson was the latest foreign leader to visit Kyiv after Russian forces pulled back from the outskirts of the capital last week.
* Donors including the Canadian government and the European Commission pledged a combined 9.1 billion euros in donations, loans and grants to support refugees fleeing the war.
* British military intelligence said Russian operations continue to focus on the Donbas region, Mariupol and Mykolaiv, supported by continued cruise missile launches by Russian naval forces.
* Russian forces have destroyed an ammunition depot at the Myrhorod Air Base in central-eastern Ukraine, Interfax news agency reported, quoting Russia's Defence Ministry.
* More people need to evacuate from the Luhansk region in eastern Ukraine as shelling has increased in recent days and more Russian forces have been arriving, Luhansk Governor Serhiy Gaidai said.
* European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Russian forces appeared to have committed war crimes by targeting civilians in Ukraine, but she said lawyers must investigate the alleged incidents.
* S&P lowered Russia's foreign currency ratings to "selective default" on increased risks that Moscow will not be able and willing to honor its commitments to foreign debtholders.
* The United States on Friday broadened its export curbs against Russia and Belarus, restricting access to imports of items such as fertilizer and pipe valves as it seeks to ratchet up pressure on Moscow and Minsk.
The European Commission will pledge 1 billion euros to support Ukraine and countries receiving refugees fleeing the war following Russia's invasion, the president of the EU's executive, Ursula von der Leyen, said on Saturday.
"Six hundred million of those will go to Ukraine, to the Ukrainian authorities and partially to the United Nations," von der Leyen said at a fundraising event for Ukraine in Waraw, Poland.
"And 400 million euros will go to the frontline states that are doing such an outstanding job and helping the refugees that are coming," she said. (Reuters)
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy was meeting British Prime Minister Boris Johnson in Kyiv on Saturday, a senior official on Zelenskiy's staff said."Right now a visit of Boris Johnson in Kyiv started from one-on-one meeting with President Zelenskiy," Andriy Sybiha, deputy head of Ukraine's president office, said on Facebook. (Reuters)
Russia staged war games on Saturday in Kaliningrad - an enclave on the Baltic Sea sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania - Interfax news agency cited the Baltic Fleet Command as saying, days after a senior official warned European countries against any potential action against Kaliningrad.
"Up to 1,000 military personnel...and more than 60 military equipment units were involved in the control checks," Interfax news quoted the Russian Baltic Fleet Command's press service as saying.
Separately, 20 Su-27 fighters and Su-24 front-line naval aviation bombers conducted planned combat training overnight, simulating attacks on low-speed air and ground targets, command posts and military equipment in Kaliningrad, Interfax said. It did not give a reason for the exercises or say when they had been planned.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko warned European countries on Wednesday against any potential action against the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, saying "this would be playing with fire”. (Reuters)
Italy's foreign minister has reportedly told staff that Italy will reopen its embassy in the Ukrainian capital after Easter.
News agency ANSA quoted Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio on Saturday as telling his ministry's crisis unit that Italy “will be among the first to return” to Kyiv. He called it “another gesture to demonstrate support for the Ukrainian population, a concrete way to affirm that diplomacy must prevail”. Di Maio said the return would be coordinated with other European Union nations.
The EU itself announced the return of its ambassador on Friday. On Saturday, EU ambassador Matti Maasikas tweeted a picture of an EU flag atop a flagpole with the words “First things first”. (AP)
Ukraine called on civilians in the eastern Luhansk region to flee from Russian shelling after officials said more than 50 civilians trying to evacuate by rail from a neighbouring region were killed in a missile attack on Friday.
* British military intelligence said Russian operations continue to focus on the Donbas region, Mariupol and Mykolaiv, supported by continued cruise missile launches by Russian naval forces.
* Russian forces have destroyed an ammunition depot at the Myrhorod Air Base in central-eastern Ukraine, Interfax news agency reported, quoting Russia's Defence Ministry.
* The Kremlin said on Friday the "special operation" in Ukraine could end in the "foreseeable future" with its aims being achieved by the Russian military and peace negotiators.
* More people need to evacuate from the Luhansk region in eastern Ukraine as shelling has increased in recent days and more Russian forces have been arriving, Luhansk Governor Serhiy Gaidai said.
* Ten humanitarian corridors to evacuate people from besieged regions have been agreed for Saturday, Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.
* European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Russian forces appeared to have committed war crimes by targeting civilians in Ukraine, but she said lawyers must investigate the alleged incidents.
* S&P lowered Russia's foreign currency ratings to "selective default" on increased risks that Moscow will not be able and willing to honor its commitments to foreign debtholders.
Ukraine’s Ministry of Defence has accused Russian forces of leaving behind ‘tormented bodies’ in the town of Makariv in the Kyiv region. It said that as Ukrainian rescuers are advancing in areas liberated by Russian forces, new “war crimes are [being] uncovered”. “The town of Makariv in the Kyiv region is half-ruined. 132 tormented bodies of tortured, murdered citizens have already been found,” it said.
The perpetrators of civilian killings in the Ukrainian town of Bucha were guilty of war crimes and must be held accountable, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Saturday.
'This is something we cannot forget,' Scholz said, referring to the deaths of civilians in the town to the northwest of Kyiv. 'We cannot overlook that this is a crime. These are war crimes we will not accept... those who did this must be held accountable.' Read more
YouTube has blocked Duma TV which broadcasts from Russia's lower house of parliament, drawing an angry response from officials who said the world's most popular streaming service could face restrictions in response. On Saturday, a message on YouTube said the Duma channel had been "terminated for a violation of YouTube's Terms of Service".
YouTube, owned by Alphabet Inc's, has been under pressure from Russian communications regulator Roskomnadzor and officials were quick to respond."From the look of it, YouTube has signed its own warrant. Save content, transfer (it) to Russian platforms. And hurry up," foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on the Telegram messaging service. The communications watchdog said it had requested Google restore access to the Duma channel immediately.
"The American IT company adheres to a pronounced anti-Russian position in the information war unleashed by the West against our country," Roskomnadzor said.Google did not immediately reply to a Reuters request for comment. (Reuters)
Ukraine on Saturday called on civilians in the eastern Luhansk region to flee from Russian shelling after officials said more than 50 civilians trying to evacuate by rail from a neighbouring region were killed in a missile attack.
Air raid sirens rang out across much of the east of Ukraine on Saturday morning, officials said, as Luhansk Governor Serhiy Gaidai urged people in a televised address to leave as Russia was amassing forces for an offensive.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called for a "firm global response" to Friday's missile attack on a train station crowded with women, children and the elderly in Kramatorsk, in the Donetsk region. The city mayor, who estimated 4,000 people were gathered there at the time, said at least 52 died.
Russia's defence ministry denied responsibility for the attack, saying in a statement the missiles that struck the station were used only by Ukraine's military and that Russia's armed forces had no targets assigned in Kramatorsk on Friday. All statements by the Ukrainian authorities on the attack were "provocations," it said. (Reuters)
As reported earlier in this blog, 10 humanitarian corridors for civilian evacuations are to open in Ukraine's east on Saturday, according to Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk.
The corridors will allow residents to leave a number cities in the regions of Donetsk, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia.
Those in Mariupol, Enerhodar, Tokmak, Berdyansk and Melitopol will be able to evacuate to the city of Zaporizhzhia, while those in Severodonetsk, Lysychansk, Popasna, Girske and Rubizhne can evacuate to the city of Bakhmut in the Donetsk region. (AP)
Hours after around 52 people were killed in a missile strike on a railway station in eastern Ukraine, the country’s President Volodomyr Zelenskyy called for a “firm, global response” to the incident.
“Like the massacre in Bucha, like many other Russian war crimes, the missile strike on Kramatorsk must be one of the charges at the tribunal, which is bound to happen,” he said in his latest late-night address. “All the efforts of the world will be aimed to establish every minute: who did what, who gave orders. Where did the rocket come from, who was carrying it, who gave the order and how the strike was coordinated.”
Here are the top updates.
Russian defence ministry says Russian forces have destroyed air ammunition depot in Ukraine's Poltava region, reports Russian news agency IFAX. (Reuters)
?? Britain's defence ministry said that Russian forces are targeting civilians, a day after a missile attack on a train station crowded with women, children and the elderly killed at least 52 people, according to Ukrainian officials.
?? Ukraine said the station in the city of Kramatorsk was hit by a Tochka U short-range ballistic missile containing cluster munitions, which explode mid-air, spraying lethal bomblets. The city mayor estimated about 4,000 people were at the station.
?? Russia's defence ministry was quoted by RIA news agency as saying the missiles said to have struck the station were used only by Ukraine's military and that Russia's armed forces had no targets assigned in Kramatorsk on Friday.
?? Ukraine now expects an attempt by Russian forces to gain full control of Donetsk and neighbouring Luhansk in the east, both partly held by Moscow-backed separatists since 2014.
?? The Kremlin said the "special operation" in Ukraine could end in the "foreseeable future" with its aims being achieved by the Russian military and peace negotiators.
?? Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg warned of a war that could last months or even years.
The leader of Sweden's second-biggest opposition party will, should neighbour Finland apply to join Nato, suggest that his party change its stance towards favouring a Swedish membership, he told daily Svenska Dagbladet.
A change of stance by the Sweden Democrats party would mean a swing to a parliamentary majority in favour of long-neutral Sweden joining the alliance.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine has prompted the two countries to consider joining, although Sweden is more hesitant than Finland which has a 1,300 km border with Russia. The Finnish government has said it would clarify next steps in the coming weeks regarding a possible decision to seek membership. (Reuters)
As the staging ground for an assault on the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, one of the most toxic places on Earth, was probably not the best choice. But that did not seem to bother the Russian generals who took over the site in the early stages of the war.
“We told them not to do it, that it was dangerous, but they ignored us,” Valeriy Simyonov, chief safety engineer for the Chernobyl nuclear site, said in an interview.
Apparently undeterred by safety concerns, the Russian forces tramped about the grounds with bulldozers and tanks, digging trenches and bunkers — and exposing themselves to potentially harmful doses of radiation lingering beneath the surface. (Read more)
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he wants a tough global response to Russia after its forces fired a missile at a crowded train station, killing at least 52 people.
Zelenskyy's voice rose in anger during his nightly address late Friday, when he said the strike on the Kramatorsk train station, where 4,000 people were trying to flee a looming Russian offensive in the east, amounted to another war crime.
Russia denied it was responsible for the strike. Among those killed were children, and dozens of people were severely injured. (AP)
More evacuations are needed from the Luhansk region in Ukraine as shelling has increased in recent days and more Russian forces have been arriving, Luhansk Governor Serhiy Gaidai said on Saturday.
He said that some 30% of people still remain in settlements across the region and have been asked to evacuate.
"They (Russia) are amassing forces for an offensive and we see the number of shelling has increased," Gaidai told the public television broadcaster. (Reuters)
Ten humanitarian corridors agreed for Saturday in Ukraine, including from Mariupol by private transport, said Ukraine's deputy PM. (Reuters)
Russia continues to hit Ukrainian non-combatants, such as the civilians killed in Friday's rocket strike on Kramatorsk railway station in eastern Ukraine, British military intelligence said on Saturday.
"Russian operations continue to focus on the Donbas region, Mariupol and Mykolaiv, supported by continued cruise missile launches into Ukraine by Russian naval forces," the Ministry of Defence said, adding that Russia's ambitions to establish a land corridor between Crimea and the Donbas continue to be thwarted by Ukrainian resistance. (Reuters)
In Bucha, Mayor Anatoliy Fedoruk has said investigators found at least three sites of mass shootings of civilians and were still finding bodies in yards, parks and city squares — 90% of whom were shot. Russia has falsely claimed that the scenes in Bucha were staged.
On Friday, workers pulled corpses from a mass grave near a church under spitting rain, lining up black body bags in rows in the mud. About 67 people were buried in the grave, according to a statement from Prosecutor-General Iryna Venediktova's office.
Actor Priyanka Chopra has made an appeal to world leaders to come out in support of the refugees of Ukraine. In an Instagram post, she said that the current refugee crisis is the “largest we have seen as human beings”.
In the video, Priyanka, who is also a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, said, “World leaders, this is a direct appeal to you. We need you to answer the call from activists and advocates working to support the humanitarian and refugee crisis that we are watching every day in Eastern Europe. We need you to take action to help the displaced people from Ukraine, and all around the world.” (Read more)
A senior US defense official says the Pentagon has determined that some of the Russian combat units that retreated from the Kyiv area in recent days are so heavily damaged and depleted that their combat utility is in question.
The official described these units as "for all intents and purposes eradicated," with only a small number of functioning troops and weapons remaining. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal US military assessments, did not say how many units sustained such extensive damage.
The official says that the US believes Russia has lost 15 to 20 per cent of the combat power it had assembled along Ukraine's borders before launching its invasion February 24. (AP)
The United States Friday broadened its export curbs against Russia and Belarus, restricting access to imports of items such as fertiliser and pipe valves as it seeks to ratchet up pressure on Moscow and Minsk following the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
President Joe Biden's administration also restricted flights of American-made aircraft that are owned, controlled or leased by Belarusians from flying into Belarus "as part of the US government's response to Belarus's actions in support of Russia's aggressive conduct in Ukraine. (Reuters)
US President Joe Biden and South African President Ramaphosa in a phone call Friday discussed the impact of the Ukraine crisis on commodity prices, supply chains and food security in Africa, the White House said in a statement. (Reuters)
Global food prices have surged to a new all-time high.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) food price index averaged 159.3 points in March, up from the previous month’s 141.4 points, which had itself broken an earlier record of 137.6 points scaled 11 years ago in February 2011.
The release Friday of the benchmark gauge for international food prices came on the day the Reserve Bank of India kept its key policy interest rates unchanged. This, even as its monetary policy committee warned about “elevated global price pressures in key food items” imparting “high uncertainty” to the inflation outlook and “warranting continuous monitoring”. (Read more)
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in Kyiv Friday presented Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy with paperwork for his country to join the European Union.
Handing over a document at a joint press conference, she said: "This is where your path towards the European Union begins."
"We stand ready to support you in filling out this questionnaire," von der Leyen said, adding: "It will not be, as usual, a matter of years, but rather a matter of weeks" to complete this step.
The questionnaire, she explained, forms the basis of an opinion that gets passed on to the European Council. Von der Leyen said she intended to, "present Ukraine's application to the [European] Council this summer."
?? Ukraine demands more weapons and tougher sanctions on Russia following Kramatorsk train station strike.
?? The United States restricted Russia and Belarus' access to imports of fertilizers and pipe valves, among other goods.
?? The death toll in the missile strike at a train station in eastern Ukraine rose to at least 52 people. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that 300 people had been wounded.
?? A total of 6,665 people were evacuated from cities across Ukraine, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said in an online post.
?? At least 67 people were buried in a mass grave on the grounds of a church in the town of Bucha outside Kyiv, the Ukrainian prosecutor general's office said.
?? Rights organizations criticised Russia's decision to close the offices of 15 international NGOs that were still operating in the country. The organisations included Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.
?? Food prices around the world reached an all-time high last month due to fallout from Russia's invasion in Ukraine, the UN's Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) said on Friday.
?? The mayor of Makariv, a village west of Kyiv, said 132 civilians were found shot to death.
?? Speaking following talks in Kyiv, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen offered Ukraine a first step towards advancing its membership bid in the European Union. (Deutsche Welle)
The European Union nations have agreed to ban Russian coal in the first sanctions on the vital energy industry over the war in Ukraine, but it has underlined the 27 countries’ inability to agree so far on a much more sweeping embargo on oil and natural gas that would hit Russia harder but risk recession at home.
The coal ban should cost Russia 4 billion euros ($4.4 billion) a year, the EU’s executive commission said. Energy analysts and coal importers say Europe could replace Russian supply in a few months from other countries, including the US. (Read more)
Pavlo Kyrylenko, the regional governor of Donetsk, in the Donbas, said 52 people were killed, including five children, and many dozens more were wounded after a missile hit a train station in eastern Ukraine.
Photos from the station in Kramatorsk showed the dead covered with tarps, and the remnants of a rocket with the words "For the children" painted on it in Russian. About 4,000 civilians had been in and around the station, heeding calls to leave before fighting intensifies in the Donbas region, the office of Ukraine's prosecutor-general said. (AP)
A day after Russia's suspension from the UN Human Rights Council amid its invasion of Ukraine, the White House on Friday said it does not anticipate the same for Moscow in the Security Council where it is a veto-wielding Permanent Member.
"I know a question has been asked about whether Russia should be kicked out of being a permanent member. We don't anticipate that happening," White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki told reporters at her daily news briefing.
"But obviously, the step taken yesterday to suspend Russia from the UNHRC is an indication of the global response and horror at the atrocities we have seen happen on the ground in Ukraine. But beyond that, I don't have any other predictions of reforms," she said. A day earlier, Russia was suspended from the UN Human Rights Council. (PTI)
The United States would prefer India to move away from its "long-term history of non-alignment G77 partnership with Russia", the Biden Administration has told lawmakers, observing that there is a great opportunity for defence trade with India.
America's relationship with India is a very critical one, Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman told members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee during a Congressional hearing early this week.
The United States, she said, has told Indians that it will be very hard for them now to get spare parts or to get them replaced from Russia because of the sanctions. (PTI)
The death toll in the Russian rocket strike on a train station in east Ukraine rose to 50 on Friday, news agency AFP reported. Among the total number of casualties reported so far, five were children. The station was hit when civilians tried to evacuate to safer parts of the country, the state railway company said.
Ukraine's Odessa imposes weekend curfew over 'missile strike threat', AFP reports quoting authorities
An international organization formed to identify the dead and missing from the 1990s Balkan conflicts is preparing to send a team of forensics experts to Ukraine as the death toll mounts more than six weeks into the war caused by Russia's invasion. Authorities in Kyiv have reached out to the International Commission on Missing Persons to help put names to bodies that might otherwise remain anonymous amid the fog of war. --AP
Turkish official says Russia and Ukraine are 'willing to hold talks in Turkey' despite Bucha images, AFP reports.
EU adopts 5th round of sanctions against Russia over its military aggression against Ukraine Sanctions incl prohibition to purchase, import or transfer coal &other solid fossil fuels into the EU, prohibition to provide access to EU ports to vessels registered under Russian flag.
At least 39 people were killed and over 100 were wounded in a Russian rocket strike in east Ukraine on Friday as civilians tried to evacuate to safer parts of the country, the state railway company said. “The inhuman Russians are not changing their methods. Without the strength or courage to stand up to us on the battlefield, they are cynically destroying the civilian population,” news agency AP quoted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as saying after the attack. “This is an evil without limits. And if it is not punished, then it will never stop,” he added.
Britain has added two adult daughters of Russian President Vladimir Putin to its sanctions list, following similar moves by the US and the European Union. The government said Friday it is imposing asset freezes and travel bans on Putin's daughters Katerina Tikhonova and Maria Vorontsova, as well as Yekaterina Vinokurova, daughter of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. --Reuters
Japan expelled eight Russian diplomats Friday, in a rare move it said was in response to Russia's actions in Ukraine, including the killing of civilians.
The step comes after European Union nations, including France and Germany, said this week they would expel Russian diplomats.
.Several trade officials were among the diplomats expelled by Japan, but not the Russian ambassador, Mikhail Galuzin, said foreign ministry officials, who declined to give further details. (Reuters)
For the first time since 1994, members of the legendary rock band Pink Floyd reunited to release a new single ‘Hey Hey Rise Up’ in support of the people of Ukraine. The new song features the vocals of Ukrainian musician Andriy Khlyvnyuk, who enlisted in the Ukrainian Army and was wounded in battle. All proceeds from the single will go to the Ukraine Humanitarian Fund, the band said in a statement.
When Russia invaded Ukraine in February this year, Khlyvnyuk decided to cut short his US tour and return to his homeland, where he took up arms against Moscow’s military forces. In a video shared on Instagram a few days later, Khlyvnyuk, dressed in his military fatigues, performed the popular Ukrainian protest song ‘The Red Viburnum In The Meadow’ in Kyiv’s Sophia Square. (Read more)
The European Union imposed has sanctions on two adult daughters of Russian President Vladimir Putin as part of a new package of measures targeting Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, according to two EU officials.
The EU included Maria Vorontsova and Katerina Tikhonova in its updated list of individuals facing assets freeze and travel bans. The move from the European bloc follows a similar move two days earlier by the United States. (AP)
More than 30 people were killed and over 100 were wounded in a Russian rocket strike in east Ukraine on Friday as civilians tried to evacuate to safer parts of the country, the state railway company said. (Reuters)
Ukraine said two Russian rockets hit a railway station in Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine, as per a Reuters report.
Donetsk governor, citing police and rescue workers, said that dozens are feared killed or wounded in a rocket strike on Kramatorsk railway station in east Ukraine.
Russia gave the most sombre assessment so far of its invasion of Ukraine, describing the "tragedy" of mounting troop losses and the economic hit from sanctions, as Ukrainians were evacuated from eastern cities before an anticipated major offensive.
?? Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia had sustained "significant losses" in Ukraine.
?? British military intelligence said Russian forces were shelling cities in the east and south and had advanced further south from the city of Izium, which is under their control. Reuters could not immediately verify the report.
?? The governor of Ukraine's eastern region of Luhansk said on Friday Russia was accumulating forces in the country's east but had not broken through Ukrainian defences.
?? Capturing Mariupol is still the main focus of Russian troops and Russian battalions are blockading and bombarding the northeastern city of Kharkiv, the Ukrainian military said.
?? The United States will send new weapon systems to Ukraine, after Nato foreign ministers agreed to accelerate arms deliveries. Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg warned of a war that could last months or even years. (Reuters)
Ukraine forces control Sumy region bordering Russia, reports news agency AFP, quoting the region's governor.
Ukraine said it aimed to establish up to 10 humanitarian corridors to evacuate trapped civilians Friday, but civilians trying to flee besieged Mariupol will have to use private vehicles.
The 10 planned safe corridors announced by Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk were all in southern and eastern Ukraine. Ukrainian officials say Russian forces have been regrouping for a new offensive, and that Moscow plans to seize as much territory as it can in the eastern part of Ukraine known as Donbas bordering Russia.
Vereshchuk said 4,676 civilians had been evacuated from Ukrainian towns and cities on Thursday. (Reuters)
The governor of Ukraine's eastern region of Luhansk said Friday Russia was accumulating forces in eastern Ukraine but had not broken through Ukrainian defences. (Reuters)
China’s abstentions on UN votes to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine are a “win”, said the US envoy to the United Nations, underscoring how Beijing’s balancing act between its partner Russia and the West may be the best outcome for Washington.
Beijing has refused to call Russia’s actions in Ukraine an invasion and has repeatedly criticised what it says are illegal Western sanctions to punish Moscow. (Read more)
The International Energy Agency said Thursday that its member countries are releasing 60 million barrels of oil from their emergency reserves on top of previous US pledges to take aim at energy prices that have soared since Russia invaded Ukraine.
The Paris-based organisation says the new commitments made by its 31 member nations, which include the United States and much of Europe, amount to a total of 120 million barrels over six months, the largest release in the group's history.
Half of that will come from the US as part of the larger release from its strategic petroleum reserve that President Joe Biden announced last week. (AP)
Microsoft Corp said it had disrupted hacking attempts by Russian military spies aimed at breaking into Ukrainian, European Union, and American targets.
In a blog post, the tech firm said a group it nicknamed "Strontium" was using seven internet domains as part of an effort to spy on government bodies and think tanks in the EU and the United States, as well as Ukrainian institutions such as media organizations.
Microsoft did not identify any of the targets by name. (Reuters)
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Thursday night that work has begun to dig through the rubble in Borodianka, another city northwest of Kyiv that was occupied by the Russians.
He also said "it is much scarier" there, with even more victims of the Russian troops.
In his daily nighttime video address to the nation on Thursday, Zelenskyy said the Russians were preparing to shock the world in the same way by showing corpses in Mariupol and falsely claiming they were killed by the Ukrainian defenders. (AP)
The United States and its allies have imposed sanctions against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s two daughters as the West looks to penalise Moscow for the killing of Ukrainian civilians.
As the spotlight now shines upon a family shrouded in secrecy for years, we take a look at who Putin’s daughters are.
Putin has two children, Maria and Katerina, from his marriage to Lyudmila Putina, a former Aeroflot steward whom he divorced in 2013, becoming the first Russian leader to divorce since Peter the Great in 1698. (Read more)
In the weeks after Russia invaded Ukraine and images of the devastation wrought there flooded the news, Hoan Ton-That, CEO of the facial recognition company Clearview AI, began thinking about how he could get involved.
Ton-That drafted a letter explaining that his app “can instantly identify someone just from a photo” and that police and federal agencies in the United States used it to solve crimes. That feature has brought Clearview scrutiny over concerns about privacy and questions about racism and other biases within artificial intelligence systems.
The tool, which can identify a suspect caught on surveillance video, could be valuable to a country under attack, Ton-That wrote. He said the tool could identify people who might be spies, as well as deceased people, by comparing their faces against Clearview’s database of 20 billion faces from the public web, including from “Russian social sites such as VKontakte.” (Read more)
Russia gave the most sombre assessment so far of its invasion of Ukraine, describing the "tragedy" of mounting troop losses and the economic hit from sanctions, as Ukrainians were evacuated from eastern cities before an anticipated major offensive.
Moscow has previously acknowledged its attack has not progressed as quickly as it wanted, but on Thursday Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov lamented the rising death toll.
"We have significant losses of troops," he told Sky News. "It's a huge tragedy for us." (Reuters)
This was India’s 12th vote at the United Nations where it abstained — 11th since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24 — but it was New Delhi’s sharpest message to Moscow so far.
For, an abstention — it doesn’t count to calculate the tally — at the United Nations General Assembly on the resolution to suspend Russia from the UN Human Rights Council is, effectively, seen as siding with those who voted “Yes”, essentially the West-led by the US.
More so, when according to a note accessed by Reuters, Russia had warned countries that a Yes vote or abstention will be viewed as an “unfriendly gesture” with consequences for bilateral ties. The Indian Express has learnt that Russian envoy Denis Alipov had reached out to top Indian diplomats to vote in its favour.
Yet, New Delhi chose to abstain. Here's why.
The chairman of Russian aluminium giant Rusal called Thursday for an impartial investigation into the killing of civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, which he described as a crime, and urged an end to the "fratricidal" conflict.
While the statement from Chairman Bernard Zonneveld, a Dutch national, did not touch on who was to blame for the deaths of civilians in the town, it is unusual for a large Russian company to comment publicly on the conflict.
Ukraine and several Western governments have accused Moscow of war crimes after the bodies of civilians shot at close range were found in the town of Bucha following a Russian withdrawal. (Reuters)
The United States blacklisted two Russian state-owned enterprises, United Shipbuilding Corp and the Alrosa diamond mining company, denying them access to the US financial system over Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the Treasury Department said Thursday. (Reuters)