First responders work at a site of fuel storage facilities hit by cruise missiles, as Russia's attack on Ukraine continues, in Lviv (Press service of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine/Handout via Reuters)Russia-Ukraine War Crisis Live: President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has urged the West to give Ukraine tanks, planes and missiles to fend off Russian forces as his government said Moscow’s forces were targeting the country’s fuel and food depots. Ukrainian Interior Ministry adviser Vadym Denysenko said on Sunday that Russia had started destroying Ukrainian fuel and food storage centres, meaning the government would have to disperse stocks of both in the near future.
Appearing to confirm that, the Russian defence ministry said its missiles had wrecked on Saturday a fuel deposit as well as a military repair plant near the western city of Lviv, just 60 km (40 miles) from the Polish border, Reuters reported. Four rockets hit Lviv on Saturday, local officials said, urging residents to stay indoors. The back-to-back airstrikes shook the city which has become a haven for over 200,000 displaced due to the war. Lviv had been largely spared since the invasion began, although missiles struck an aircraft repair facility near the main airport a week ago, AP reported.
Meanwhile, a nuclear research facility in Kharkiv again has come under shelling by Russia, Ukraine’s nuclear watchdog said. The State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate said that the neutron source experimental facility in the Kharkiv Institute of Physics and Technology came under fire Saturday, AP reported.
Conductor Herman Makarenko performs during an open-air concert named "Free Sky" at Independence Square in central Kyiv, Ukraine March 9, 2022. REUTERS/Gleb Garanich
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has urged the West to give Ukraine tanks, planes and missiles to fend off Russian forces as his government said Moscow's forces were targeting the country's fuel and food depots.
U.S. President Joe Biden's three-day tour of Europe ended with comments suggesting Washington was taking a much sharper line on Russia, when he said on Saturday Russian President Vladimir Putin "cannot remain in power".
Ukrainian Interior Ministry adviser Vadym Denysenko said on Sunday that Russia had started destroying Ukrainian fuel and food storage centres, meaning the government would have to disperse stocks of both in the near future.
Appearing to confirm that, the Russian defence ministry said its missiles had wrecked on Saturday a fuel deposit as well as a military repair plant near the western city of Lviv, just 60 km (40 miles) from the Polish border. (Reuters)
The governor of the Lviv region says a man was detained on suspicion of espionage at the site of one of the two rocket attacks that rattled the city on Saturday.
Maksym Kozytskyy said police found the man had recorded a rocket flying toward the target and striking it. Police also found on his telephone photos of checkpoints in the region, which Kozytskyy said had been sent to two Russian telephone numbers.
Rockets hit an oil storage facility and an unspecified industrial facility, wounding at least five people. A thick plume of smoke and towering flames could be seen on Lviv’s outskirts hours after the attacks.(AP)
Russia struck military targets in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv with high-precision cruise missiles, the Russian defence ministry said on Sunday, Reuters reported.
Russian forces have taken control of Ukraine’s Slavutych, where workers at the defunct Chernobyl nuclear plant live, and three people were killed, Interfax Ukraine news agency quoted the local mayor as saying.
The governor of Kyiv region, Oleksandr Pavlyuk, had earlier announced the capture in an online post. The town sits just outside a safety exclusion zone around Chernobyl – the site of the world’s worst nuclear disaster in 1986 – where Ukrainian staff have continued to manage the site even after the territory was occupied by Russian forces soon after the start of the Feb. 24 invasion. Read more.
Ukraine's nuclear watchdog says that a nuclear research facility in Kharkiv again has come under shelling by Russia and the fighting makes it impossible to assess the damage. The State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate said that the neutron source experimental facility in the Kharkiv Institute of Physics and Technology came under fire Saturday. Ukrainian authorities have previously reported that Russian shelling damaged buildings at the Kharkiv facility, but there has been no release of radiation. The newly built neutron source facility is intended for the research and production of radioisotopes for medical and industrial needs. (AP)
Ukraine interior minister adviser says Russia beginning to destroy our oil depots and food warehouses. (Reuters)
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy angrily warned Moscow that it is sowing a deep hatred for Russia among his people, as constant artillery barrages and aerial bombings are reducing cities to rubble, killing civilians and driving others into shelters, leaving them to scrounge for food and water to survive. "You are doing everything so that our people themselves leave the Russian language, because the Russian language will now be associated only with you, with your explosions and murders, your crimes," Zelenskyy said in an impassioned video address late Saturday.
Russian General Yakov Rezantsev killed in combat, according to Ukraine’s defence ministry. He was the eventh general Ukraine claims to have killed since the war began, The Independent reported.
Days after the invasion began, Rezantsev had said that he was confident the Russian campaign would be successful within a matter of hours, according to a conversation intercepted by the Ukrainian army.
Russia's defence ministry said on Saturday Azeri armed forces had entered a zone policed by Russian peacekeepers in the Nagorno-Karabakh region, in a violation of an agreement, but Azerbaijan challenged these claims.
Russia said it had called on Azerbaijan to pull out its troops, and was "applying efforts" to move forces to their initial positions. It also said Azerbaijan had carried out four drone strikes in Nagorno-Karabakh. Azerbaijan's defence ministry refuted Moscow's version of events and described Russia's statement as "one-sided". (Reuters)
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, visibly irritated, on Saturday demanded Western nations provide a fraction of the military hardware in their stock piles and asked whether they were afraid of Moscow.
Several countries have promised to send anti-armor and anti-aircraft missiles as well as small arms but Zelenskiy said Kyiv needed tanks, planes and anti-ship systems."That is what our partners have, that is what is just gathering dust there.
This is all for not only the freedom of Ukraine, but for the freedom of Europe," he said in a late night video address.Ukraine needed just 1% of NATO's aircraft and 1% of its tanks and would not ask for more, he said. (Reuters)
US President Joe Biden was not calling for regime change in Russia when he said on Saturday that Russian President Vladimir Putin 'cannot remain in power,' a White House official said. “The president’s point was that Putin cannot be allowed to exercise power over his neighbors or the region. He was not discussing Putin’s power in Russia, or regime change,” the official said following Biden's speech in Warsaw. (Reuters)
Nights are spent huddling underground from Russian strikes pounding their encircled city into rubble. Daylight hours are devoted to hunting down drinkable water and braving the risk of standing in line for the little food available as shells and bombs rain down.
In the second month of Russia’s invasion, this is what now passes for life in Chernihiv, a besieged city in northern Ukraine where death is everywhere.
It isn’t yet quite as synonymous with atrocious human suffering as the pulverized southern city of Mariupol. Read more.
Britain has seized two jet aircraft belonging to Russian billionaire Eugene Shvidler as Western governments seeking to end the war in Ukraine put pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin by targeting the luxury lifestyles of his closest supporters.
Treasury Secretary Grant Shapps said Saturday that the two aircraft would be detained "indefinitely" after three-week investigation that had already grounded the planes. The Times of London described the aircraft as a $45 million Bombardier Global 6500 and a $13 million Cessna Citation Latitude. (AP)
In his latest nightly address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on the US and Europe to supply more defence equipment, including planes, tanks, and anti-missiles defences and anti-ship weaponry. "This is what our partners have. This is what is covered with dust at their storage facilities. After all, this is all for freedom not only in Ukraine - this is for freedom in Europe,”
Russian rockets struck the western Ukrainian city of Lviv on Saturday while President Joe Biden visited neighbouring Poland, a reminder that Moscow is willing to strike anywhere in Ukraine despite its claim to be focusing its offensive on the country's east.
The back-to-back airstrikes shook the city that has become a haven for an estimated 200,000 people who have had to flee their hometowns. Lviv had been largely spared since the invasion began, although missiles struck an aircraft repair facility near the main airport a week ago.
Among the many who sought refuge in Lviv was Olana Ukrainets, a 34-year-old IT worker from the northeastern city of Kharkiv.
Named after one of Ukraine’s most famous movie and theatre directors, the Les Kurbas Academic Theatre is housed in a beige five-storey building, which looks less baroque than the rest of Lviv. Closer than 300 metres from the city centre, it has suspended its programmes to provide shelter to Ukrainians fleeing the war launched by Russia, now on for more than a month.
Founded in the 13th century, Lviv was named by the King of Ruthenia after his son Lev, which meant lion. Which is why it is called the Lion City locally. Now, a month into the war, as Russia destroys Ukrainian cities, Lviv, which has been largely untouched so far, despite three explosions on the outskirts on Saturday, has become the world’s entry point into the country.
Among the westernmost cities of Ukraine, Lviv is also reflective of the crossroads of history and geography, and the clashing geopolitics of world powers, that mark this region. If the Russian invasion has turned most of Lviv’s residents against an overbearing Moscow, the remnants of the city’s Soviet past are still visible. Like most of Ukraine, people here know both Russian and Ukrainian; the younger generation has picked up English from Hollywood films and TV shows, but hardly any of the elderly know it. Unlike the Latin script used in the rest of Europe, Ukrainians use Cyrillic, like Russia. And while being part of the West is a dream that has got new wings, in a city that is nearly all white, one of Lviv’s favourite street foods — like in large parts of the former Soviet republic — is kebab, a throwback to the bloc’s Caucasus links. Read more.
A safe haven providing passage for people seeking to enter or leave Ukraine, the city of Lviv was jolted out of its lull on Saturday afternoon as at least five Russian missiles struck just east of the city, leaving five people wounded.
The first of the blasts hit around 4.45 pm, minutes after a public opera performance on in front of the Lviv National Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre and featuring a singer from Kharkiv – the city that has been at the receiving end of Russian invasion – was cut short by air sirens.
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The reaction was leisurely, with the city mostly untouched by the violence now treating these sirens as false alarms. But then came the blast. Even as some people moved to the shelters, others rallied around, with shouts of “Glory Ukraine”. Read more.