War crimes in Russian-occupied Ukraine, confirms UN probe body
War crimes including rape, torture and confinement of children have been committed in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, the head of a UN-mandated investigation body said on Friday.
Ukraine and its Western allies allege a litany of rights abuses by Russian soldiers since the February 24 invasion, but Moscow denies that as a smear campaign.
“Based on the evidence gathered by the Commission, it has concluded that war crimes have been committed in Ukraine,” Erik Mose, who heads the Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine, told the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.
He did not specify who was to blame but the commission has focused on areas previously occupied by Russian forces such as Kyiv, Chernihiv, Kharkiv and Sumy. (Read more)
More than 730 people were detained across Russia at protests against a mobilisation order on Saturday, a rights group said, three days after President Vladimir Putin ordered Russia's first military draft since World War Two for the conflict in Ukraine.
The independent OVD-Info protest monitoring group said it was aware of detentions in 32 different cities, from St Petersburg to Siberia.
Unsanctioned rallies are illegal under Russian law, which also forbids any activity considered to defame the armed forces.
"Do you want to be like me?" read a placard held by a woman in a wheelchair at a rally in Moscow.
Footage from the same protest showed Russian officers carrying men and leading women to police vans. (Reuters)
The stridently pro-Kremlin editor of Russia's state-run RT news channel expressed anger on Saturday that enlistment officers were sending call-up papers to the wrong men, as frustration about a military mobilisation grew across Russia.
Wednesday's announcement of Russia's first public mobilisation since World War Two, to shore up its faltering invasion of Ukraine, has triggered a rush for the border by eligible men, the arrests of over 1,000 protesters, and unease in the wider population.
Now, it is also attracting criticism of the authorities from among the Kremlin's own official supporters, something almost unheard of in Russia since the invasion began seven months ago. (Reuters)
Russian forces launched new strikes on Ukrainian cities Saturday as Kremlin-orchestrated votes continued in occupied regions of Ukraine to pave the way for their annexation by Moscow.
Zaporizhzhia Gov. Oleksandr Starukh said the Russians targeted infrastructure facilities in the Dnieper River city, and one of the missiles hit an apartment building, killing one person and injuring seven others. The British Defense Ministry said that Russia was targeting the Pechenihy dam on the Siverskyy Donets River in northeastern Ukraine following previous strikes on a dam on a reservoir near Kryvyi Rih, causing flooding on the Inhulets River. (Reuters)
A total of 211 ships with 4.7 million tonnes of agricultural products on board have left Ukraine so far under a deal brokered by the United Nations and Turkey to unblock Ukrainian sea ports, the Ukrainian infrastructure ministry said Saturday.
The ministry said eight ships with 131,300 tonnes of agricultural products are due to leave Ukrainian Black Sea ports on Saturday.
Ukraine's grain exports slumped after Russia invaded the country on Feb. 24 and blockaded its Black Sea ports, driving up global food prices and prompting fears of shortages in Africa and the Middle East. (Reuters)
?? Russian attacked a dam on the Siverskyi Donets river with a suspected short-range ballistic missile, the second strike on a dam since Sept. 15, apparently with the aim of flooding Ukrainian military crossing points, British military intelligence said.
?? A Russian missile hit a residential building in Zaporizhzhia causing casualties, the town's acting mayor told media.
?? A UN-mandated investigation commission said it had found evidence of war crimes including executions, rape, torture and confinement of children in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, after visits to 27 areas and interviews with more than 150 victims and witnesses.
?? Russia denies deliberately attacking civilians in the conflict and says abuse accusations are a smear campaign. It did not immediately comment on the report.
?? Ukraine said it would downgrade diplomatic ties with Iran over its decision to supply Russian forces with drones.
?? The White House said the United States sees no reason to adjust its nuclear posture after Russia's President Vladimir Putin's warned the West he was not bluffing when he said he'd be ready to use nuclear weapons to defend Russia. (Reuters)
Russia struck the Pechenihy dam on the Siverskyi Donets River in northeast Ukraine this week using short-range ballistic missiles or similar weapons, the British military said on Saturday.
The attack on Sept. 21 and 22 followed an earlier one on the Karachunivske dam near Krivyi Rih in central Ukraine on Sept. 15, the Defence Ministry said in its daily intelligence bulletin, adding that Ukrainian forces are advancing further downstream along both rivers.
Russian commanders may be attempting to strike sluice gates of the dams in order to flood Ukrainian military crossing points, the ministry said in its bulletin released on Twitter.
The attacks are unlikely to have caused significant disruption to Ukrainian operations due to distance between damaged dams and combat zones, according to the ministry. (Reuters)
President Vladimir Putin of Russia has thrust himself more directly into strategic planning for the war in Ukraine in recent weeks, American officials said, including rejecting requests from his commanders on the ground that they be allowed to retreat from the vital southern city of Kherson.
A withdrawal from Kherson would allow the Russian military to pull back across the Dnieper River in an orderly way, preserving its equipment and saving the lives of soldiers. (Read more)
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s surprise draft to reinforce his invasion of Ukraine ran into growing resistance across Russia on Friday as villagers, activists and even some elected officials asked why the conscription drive appeared to be hitting minority groups and rural areas harder than the big cities.
Some of the greatest anguish played out hundreds or thousands of miles away from the front line, in the Caucasus Mountains and the northeastern region of Yakutia, a sparsely populated expanse that straddles the Arctic Circle. Community leaders described remote villages where much of the working-age male population received conscription notices in recent days, leaving families that subsist off the land without men around to work before the long winter. (Read more)
The body pulled from a pit in Izium, Ukraine, was in a bad state of decomposition, the skin peeling from the bone and drained of colour. But one thing stood out: a blue-and-yellow bracelet around the dead man’s wrist.
The colours of the Ukrainian national flag had barely faded.
The corpse, one of hundreds exhumed after Ukraine reclaimed Izium from the Russians this month, was another reminder of the savage toll of the war. But the bracelet conveyed something different: the fortitude and individuality amid a grim tableau of mass death. And it seemed to send an almost defiant message: Ukraine lives on, even if some of its people do not.
The image quickly captured the imagination of the nation. (Read more)
?? Ukrainian officials said people were banned from leaving some occupied areas until the four-day vote was over, armed groups were going to homes to force people to cast ballots, and employees were threatened with the sack if they did not participate.
?? The votes in the provinces of Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia were hastily organised after Ukraine recaptured large swathes of the northeast in a counter-offensive.
?? Ukraine, Western leaders and the United Nations condemned the votes as an illegitimate precursor to illegal annexation. There are no independent observers, and much of the pre-war population has fled.
?? The United States is prepared to impose additional economic costs on Russia in conjunction with US allies if Moscow moves forward with annexing portions of Ukrainian territory, the White House said.
?? Nato will ramp up its help for Kyiv in response to the "sham" referendums, the alliance's secretary-general said.
?? Russia maintains that the referendums offer an opportunity for people in the region to express their view. (Reuters)
Russia launched referendums on Friday aimed at annexing four occupied regions of Ukraine, drawing condemnation from Kyiv and Western nations who dismissed the votes as a sham and pledged not to recognise their results.
Ukrainian officials said people were banned from leaving some occupied areas until the four-day vote was over, armed groups were going into homes, and employees were threatened with the sack if they did not participate. (Read more)