Russia-Ukraine War Highlights: Russia says it will ‘radically’ reduce military activity near Kyiv, Chernihiv

Head of self-proclaimed Donetsk Republic in East Ukraine says may consider the issue of joining Russia, reports Reuters citing a local news agency.

Russia's communications regulator on Tuesday said it had drawn up two administrative cases against Alphabet Inc's Google for failing to remove banned information from its YouTube video-sharing platform, accusing it of blatantly promoting false content. Roskomnadzor said Google could be fined up to 8 million roubles ($91,533), or as much as 20% of the company's annual revenue in Russia for repeat offences. It said YouTube had become one of the key platforms in the "information war" against Russia.

Google did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment. Russia has restricted access to Twitter and Meta Platforms' flagship Facebook and Instagram services since sending troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24, as a simmering dispute with U.S. technology giants has escalated into a battle to control information flows.

YouTube, which has blocked Russian state-funded media globally, is under heavy pressure from Moscow, which earlier this month accused it of spreading what it called threats against Russian citizens. "The American platform openly enables the spread of false content, containing inaccurate publicly significant information about the course of the special military operation in Ukraine, discrediting the armed forces of the Russian Federation, as well as information of an extremist nature with calls for violence against Russian servicemen," Roskomnadzor said. (Reuters)

Russia has repeatedly fired hypersonic missiles at Ukrainian military targets, the top U.S. military commander in Europe, Air Force General Tod Wolters, told a Senate hearing on Tuesday. "Most of those strikes have been designated at specific military targets," Wolters said. Russia announced on March 19 that it used hypersonic Kinzhal (Dagger) missiles to destroy a large weapons depot in Ukraine's western Ivano-Frankivsk region. (Reuters)

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has not seen "signs of real seriousness" from Russia in pursuing peace after its invasion of Ukraine, he said on Tuesday, adding that Moscow should end its aggression now and pull its forces back. (Reuters)

Oil prices dropped on Tuesday, extending losses from the previous day on signs of progress in talks between Russia and Ukraine to end their weeks-long conflict, with prices further pressured by China's new lockdowns to curb the spread of the coronavirus.

Brent crude fell $6.51, or 5.8%, to $105.97 a barrel by 1342 GMT and U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude was down $6.41, or 6%, at $99.55. Both benchmarks lost about 7% on Monday.

Ukrainian and Russian negotiators met in Turkey for the first face-to-face talks in nearly three weeks. The top Russian negotiator said the talks were 'constructive'.

Russia promised at the peace talks to scale down its military operations around Kyiv and northern Ukraine, while Ukraine proposed adoption of neutral status but with international guarantees that it would be protected from attack.

'Oil prices are under pressure again on expectations from peace talks between Ukraine and Russia, which could lead to an easing of sanctions,' said Hiroyuki Kikukawa, general manager of research at Nissan Securities. Sanctions imposed on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine have disrupted oil supplies, driving prices higher. Prices were also pressured on Tuesday by fears over Chinese demand after new lockdowns in Shanghai to curb rising coronavirus cases. Shanghai accounts for about 4% of China's oil consumption, ANZ Research analysts said. (Reuters)

Harjot Singh, who was shot multiple times in Ukraine's capital Kyiv last month while fleeing the war-torn country, has been discharged from the Army hospital. His condition is now stable, his brother Prabhjot said on Tuesday.

'He (Harjot) was discharged yesterday. He is doing fine but it will take time for him to recover properly,' Prabhjot told PTI.

Harjot's family has also sought financial help from the government for his treatment. 'Our financial condition is not very well. We urge the Indian government to help us in my brother's further treatment,' Prabhjot said. Harjot was brought back to India on a special Indian Air Force flight on March 7.

Amid the fierce Russian military offensive, the 31-year-old Indian student, along with his two friends, had boarded a cab for the western Ukrainian city of Lviv in a bid to escape Kyiv. He was shot four times, including in his chest. (PTI)

Peace talks between Russian and Ukrainian negotiating teams, held in Istanbul on Tuesday, will not continue for a second day, the Turkish foreign ministry said.Russia has decided to drastically cut its military activity around Kyiv and Chernihiv in Ukraine, one of its deputy defence ministers said earlier. (Reuters)

Ukraine proposed adopting a neutral status in exchange for security guarantees at talks with Russia, meaning it would not join military alliances or host bases, Ukrainian negotiators said. Russia said it had decided to drastically cut its military activity focused on Kyiv and Chernihiv in Ukraine.

* Earlier, a Russian rocket hit an administration building in the southern Ukrainian port of Mykolaiv, killing three people and wounding 22, emergency services said.

* Russia said it destroyed a fuel depot in western Ukraine's Rivne region. Defence minister Sergei Shoigu said Russia had degraded Ukraine's military and would respond if NATO supplied Ukraine with planes and air defence systems. * On Tuesday morning, British military intelligence said Ukrainian forces were continuing counter attacks to the northwest of Kyiv, and Russia has kept up heavy shelling of Mariupol.

* The Ukraine-Russia talks began in Istanbul with "a cold welcome" and no handshake, Ukrainian television reported.

* Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich was there, to "enable certain contacts" between the two sides, the Kremlin said.

* U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi visited Ukraine on to help keep facilities there safe, apparently without Russia's blessing.

* Russia said it was launching a buyback offer on its $2 billion sovereign Eurobonds maturing on April 4, its biggest debt payment of the year, and would make full payment to bondholders taking up the offer in roubles.

* European shares rallied to five-week highs, buoyed by the talks. The rouble hit a more than one-month high.

* Holcim, the world's biggest cement-maker, said it was exiting the Russian market; Japan will ban the export of high-end cars and luxury goods to Russia; Germany wants to end all fossil fuel imports from Russia.

* The United States and its allies plan new sanctions on Russian supply chains, Deputy U.S. Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo said.

* "It is up to the sides to stop this tragedy," Turkey's President Tayyip Erdogan told the delegations. (Reuters)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says seven people were killed in a missile strike on the regional government headquarters in the southern city of Mykolayiv. Zelenskyy, who spoke to the Danish parliament through a translator, said Tuesday's strike also left 22 people injured.

Russia has decided to drastically cut its military activity focused on Kyiv and Chernihiv in Ukraine, its deputy defence minister said on Tuesday, after talks between Russian and Ukrainian negotiating teams in Istanbul, news agency Reuters reported.

The British government has ordered its first detention of a superyacht in British waters, the BBC reported. The BBC said the 38 million pound yacht, named Phi, is owned by an unnamed Russian businessman. (Reuters)

The Kremlin on Tuesday dismissed reports that Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich had been poisoned, saying they were untrue and part of an "information war". Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that Abramovich was not an official member of the Russian delegation at talks with Ukraine in Turkey, but that he was present at them. Peskov told reporters on a conference call that it would become clear either on Tuesday or Wednesday if the peace talks were promising.

The Kremlin has said Abramovich played an early role in peace talks but that the process was now up to negotiating teams. Sitting next to Erdogan's spokesman at the talks, Abramovich adjusted his headphones to listen to the president's speech, TV showed.

According to the Wall Street Journal and the investigative outlet Bellingcat, which cited people familiar with the matter, Abramovich and Ukrainian peace negotiators suffered symptoms of suspected poisoning earlier this month after a meeting in Kyiv. Ukrainian officials poured cold water on the report.

The West has imposed heavy sanctions on Abramovich and other Russian billionaires, as well as Russian companies and Russian officials, in a bid to force Putin to withdraw from Ukraine.

Abramovich had sought to sell his English soccer club Chelsea, a process that was taken out of his hands by the British government when it blacklisted him. The superyachts linked to him, together worth an estimated $1.2 billion, have been docked at Bodrum and Marmaris in southwest Turkey since last week. (Reuters)

Russian and Ukrainian negotiators began the first direct peace talks in more than two weeks on Tuesday in Istanbul, with the surprise attendance of Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich who is sanctioned by the West over Moscow's invasion of Ukraine.

The two teams sat facing each other at a long table in the presidential office, with the Russian oligarch sitting in the front row of observers wearing a blue suit, a Turkish presidential video feed showed.

Three sources confirmed the unexpected attendance of Abramovich, who had already visited the country since the war began and has two of his superyachts docked at Turkish resorts.

In a speech ahead of the talks on the Bosphorus strait, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan told the delegations the time had come for concrete results and that progress would pave the way for a meeting of the countries' two leaders. "It is up to the sides to stop this tragedy. Achieving a ceasefire and peace as soon as possible is to the benefit of everyone. We think we have now entered a period where concrete results are needed from talks," he said. "The negotiating process, which you have been carrying out under the orders of your leaders, has raised hopes for peace."

Ukrainian television said the meeting began with "a cold welcome" and no handshake between the delegations. Ukraine said on Monday its most ambitious goal at the meeting was to agree a ceasefire, while a senior U.S. official said Russian President Vladimir Putin did not appear ready to make compromises to end the war. (Reuters)

Russian airlines could be frozen out of the aircraft leasing market well beyond the Ukraine conflict, one of the industry's biggest players warned on Tuesday, blaming what executives have described as a default involving hundreds of Western jets.

Global leasing companies had until Monday to sever ties with Russian carriers under Western sanctions imposed over Moscow's invasion of Ukraine, but executives say only a fraction of the more than 400 jets directly involved have been returned.

Domhnal Slattery, chief executive of Dublin-based Avolon, the world's second-largest leasing firm, told Reuters its own risk is limited, with a net exposure of below $200 million on 10 jets still blocked in Russia after it recovered four aircraft. But the mainly Ireland-based leasing sector, which accounts for about half of the world's airline fleet, will be in no hurry to reset relations with Russian airlines even if sanctions against Moscow are lifted, he predicted. (Reuters)

At least three people were killed and 22 wounded on Tuesday when a rocket struck the regional administration building in the southern Ukrainian port city of Mykolaiv, Reuters quoted the Ukrainian emergencies service as saying. In an online post, it said 18 of the wounded had been pulled from the rubble by rescue workers who continue to work at the scene.

Russia’s defence minister has said that Ukraine’s military capability is seriously degraded and it no longer has an airforce, news agency Reuters reported. He also said that around 600 foreign mercenaries have been killed in Ukraine over the last two weeks. (Reuters)

Russia is set to resume supplies of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) from a Sea of Azov port Tuesday for the first time since Moscow started its military operation in Ukraine, data from the port and Refinitiv Eikon showed.

Supplies of LPG, which is used in the petrochemical industry and to fuel vehicles and stationary generators, had been halted from the Temryuk terminal since February 24 following a ban on shipments in the region imposed by the Russian sea and river transport regulator.

According to the port data, there are plans to load a gas tanker called Premier on Tuesday under the flag of the Comoro Islands. (Reuters)

There were plenty of rave reviews for “Putin’s People,” a 2020 bestseller about the Russian president’s inner circle, but a small group of spectacularly rich men hated the book, and they didn’t hide their feelings. Over the course of a few weeks, all of them filed suit against the author, Catherine Belton, and her publisher, HarperCollins.

The first case was filed by Roman Abramovich, a billionaire confidant of President Vladimir Putin who contested a suggestion in the book, articulated by three former associates, that he had bought the Chelsea footballl team on instructions from the Russian leader.

Britain has long had a reputation for plaintiff-friendly libel laws, and despite reform efforts in the past decade, the country has remained an accommodating home away from home for Russia’s robber barons. Until the war in Ukraine changed the political climate, the public here knew little about the history of the men who earned their fortunes by allying themselves with Putin, in no small part because reporting on them could prove financially ruinous. 

Billionaire Roman Abramovich, one of the Russian oligarchs sanctioned by the West over Moscow's invasion of Ukraine, is attending peace talks between Ukrainian and Russian delegations in Istanbul Tuesday, three sources said.

Roman Abramovich and Ukrainian peace negotiators reportedly suffered symptoms of suspected poisoning after a meeting in Kyiv in March.

The Chelsea owner and the negotiators’ health has improved and ‘their lives aren’t in danger,' per @WSJ pic.twitter.com/qSH91vHIaI

— B/R Football (@brfootball) March 28, 2022

The Kremlin has said previously Abramovich played an early role in peace talks but the process was now in the hands of the two sides' negotiating teams. (Reuters)