A man sweeps rubble next to a shopping and entertainment mall in Odessa, Ukraine. (AP)Russia Ukraine War Live, Mariupol Fall to Russia: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that 200,000 children are among the Ukrainians who have been forcibly taken to Russia. They include children taken from orphanages, children taken with their parents and children separated from their families, according to Zelenskyy. Zelenskyy said Ukraine would punish those responsible. He said that Ukraine would also show Russia that it “cannot be conquered, that our people will not surrender and our children will not become the property of the occupiers.” Ukraine’s president said that 243 children have been killed so far in the war, 446 have been wounded and 139 are missing.
Meanwhile, a Russian missile hit rail lines in the western Lviv region, a key conduit for supplies of Western weapons and other supplies, officials said. Lviv region Gov. Maksym Kozytskyy said five people were wounded in the strike, adding that more information would be available Thursday. Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to the country’s interior minister, said the Russians hit the Beskidy railway tunnel in the Carpathian Mountains in an apparent effort to cut a key railway link and disrupt shipments of weapons and fuel.
In other news, the US and Germany pledged to equip Ukraine with some of the advanced weapons it has long desired for shooting down aircraft and knocking out artillery, as Russian forces closed in on capturing a key city in the east. Germany said it will supply Ukraine with up-to-date anti-aircraft missiles and radar systems, while the US announced it will provide four sophisticated, medium-range rocket systems and ammunition. The US is trying to help Ukraine fend off the Russians without triggering a wider war in Europe.
The UK's Ministry of Defence says Russia has taken control of most of the Ukrainian city of Sievierodonetsk, although Moscow's forces have sustained heavy losses.
The report says Russia faces challenges when it comes to crossing the Siverskyy Donets River — a vital objective as it prepares to shift focus from consolidating in the Luhansk region to pushing ahead in Donetsk. Although there are various possible crossing sites, the UK assessment is that the river line "likely still remains controlled by Ukrainian forces, who have destroyed existing bridges."
The ministry predicts that Russia will need a short, tactical pause ahead of making "opposed crossings [of the river] and subsequent further attacks further into the Donetsk Oblast, where Ukrainian armed forces have prepared defensive positions." (DW)
Russia has taken control of most of Ukraine's industrial city of Sievierodonetsk, Britain's defence ministry said.
Britain said Ukraine likely remained in control of the river line in crossing sites between Sievierodonetsk and the neighbouring town of Lysychansk, and in the city of Lyman. In both locations, Ukrainian forces have destroyed existing bridges, the ministry added in the intelligence update.
Novartis is resuming business in Ukraine after reviewing how safe it was to operate in the country that Russia invaded in February, the Swiss drugmaker said.
"After studying current safety protocols in the country, and on advice which we will regularly review, we have begun to resume business operations remotely to help the war-torn country restore some basic critical business processes," Novartis said on its website in a post dated June 1. "The safety and security of our people remains our number one objective, and we will constantly review the situation and our business operations in Ukraine."
Novartis said it condemned the war in Ukraine and has been providing humanitarian support, financial donations and medicine to people there. Russia describes its invasion as a "special military operation" to disarm and "de-Nazify" its neighbour. (Reuters)
Russian forces were attempting to consolidate their hold on Ukraine's industrial city of Sievierodonetsk, edging closer to claiming a big prize in their offensive in the eastern Donbas region.
After days of heavy fighting around Sievierodonetsk, much of which has been laid to waste by Russian bombardments, Russian troops were inching forward through the city streets. Ukraine says about 70% of the city is under Russian control. "The enemy has entered the centre of Sievierodonetsk and is trying to take up positions," Ukrainian military spokesman Oleksandr Motuzyanyk said at a briefing.
If Russia captures the city and its smaller twin Lysychansk on the west bank of the Siverskyi Donets river, it would hold all of Luhansk, one of two provinces in the Donbas that Moscow claims on behalf of separatists. (Reuters)
The US and Germany pledged to equip Ukraine with some of the advanced weapons it has long desired for shooting down aircraft and knocking out artillery, as Russian forces closed in on capturing a key city in the east.
Germany said it will supply Ukraine with up-to-date anti-aircraft missiles and radar systems, while the US announced it will provide four sophisticated, medium-range rocket systems and ammunition.
The US is trying to help Ukraine fend off the Russians without triggering a wider war in Europe. The Pentagon said it received assurances that Ukraine will not fire the new rockets into Russian territory.
The Kremlin accused the US of "pouring fuel on the fire." Western arms have been critical to Ukraine's success in stymieing Russia's much larger and better-equipped military, thwarting its effort to storm the capital and forcing Moscow to shift its focus to the industrial Donbas region in the east. (AP)
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that 2,00,000 children are among the Ukrainians who have been forcefully taken to Russia and dispersed across the vast country. They include children from orphanages, children taken with their parents and those separated from their families.
"The purpose of this criminal policy is not just to steal people but to make those who are deported forget about Ukraine and unable to return," Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address to the nation on International Children's Day.
Zelenskyy said Ukraine would punish those responsible but first it would show Russia on the battlefield that "Ukraine cannot be conquered, that our people will not surrender and our children will not become the property of the occupiers."
Zelenskyy said 243 children have been killed so far in the war, 446 have been wounded and 139 are missing, adding that it could be more as his government doesn't have a full picture of the situation in areas occupied by Russian troops. He then described the deaths of 11 children, calling them by their first names and saying how they were killed. (AP)
A Russian missile hit rail lines in the western Lviv region, a key conduit for supplies of Western weapons and other supplies, officials said.
Lviv region Gov. Maksym Kozytskyy said five people were wounded in the strike, adding that more information would be available Thursday.
Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to the country's interior minister, said the Russians hit the Beskidy railway tunnel in the Carpathian Mountains in an apparent effort to cut a key railway link and disrupt shipments of weapons and fuel. (AP)
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Wednesday warned that the Ukraine war is diverting attention away from climate change, while at the same time showcasing the world's “suicidal” dependence on fossil fuels. Speaking ahead of an environmental conference in Stockholm, Guterres said the scale of the conflict has “inevitably” shifted the focus from other issues, including efforts to halt the global temperature rise.
“The sense of urgency in the debate on climate has of course suffered with the war in Ukraine,” Guterres told reporters at the Swedish prime minister's official residence. "But I think this war has demonstrated one thing: How fragile is the world in its dependence on fossil fuels.” He pointed to decisions by the European Union this week to stop most imports of Russian oil as part of sanctions imposed after the Feb 24 invasion of Ukraine. The conflict has underscored how dependent many European countries are on Russian oil and gas.
“So it's time to learn the lesson," Guterres said. "If we do not want again to be in the same situation we are today we need to make a clear bet: massive investment in renewable energy and clear understanding that the dependence on fossil fuels is a suicidal one.” Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson noted that before the Ukraine war the world was grappling with other crises including the COVID-19 pandemic. (AP)
United States, secretary of state, Antony Blinken on Wednesday said that the war could tomorrow if the Russia decides to end its aggression towards Ukraine, news agency Reuters reported. He also said that there were no signs of that happening right now. The secretary of state also added that the US is still looking at many months of conflict in Ukraine. (Reuters)
A steep discount in Russian diesel prices compared with fuel produced by other countries has spread to the European barge market in two-tier trading that is likely to continue as the EU works to phase out Russian refined product imports.
Importing Russian crude oil and refined products does not currently breach Western sanctions but a number of large firms including Shell, BP and TotalEnergies have already stopped buying from Moscow, while others started cutting purchases from May 15.
The discount for Russian crude and refined products is now spreading to diesel barges used to transfer product arriving into northwest European storage to other terminals within the same port or other ports and countries in the region.
From Europe's main oil importing Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp (ARA) hub, barges can head down the Rhine river to Switzerland, France and Germany, making it difficult to determine where fuel originated from. Energy firms and traders that are voluntarily shunning Russian exports are now also starting to specify non-Russian origin when looking to purchase diesel barges. (Reuters)
Russia on Wednesday sharply criticised a U.S. decision to supply advanced rocket systems and munitions to Ukraine, warning it could widen the conflict and increase the risk of direct confrontation with Washington.
U.S. President Joe Biden has agreed to provide Ukraine with rockets that can strike with precision at long-range Russian targets as part of a new U.S. package to help Kyiv defend itself in the three-month-old war that began with Russia's Feb. 24 invasion. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters: "We believe that the United States is purposefully and diligently adding fuel to the fire."
Asked later if the U.S. move increased the chances of a third country becoming involved in the conflict, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said: "Such risks certainly exist." He told a news conference in Saudi Arabia: "It is a direct provocation (by Ukraine), aimed at involving the West in military action." Washington agreed to supply the rockets, which are capable of hitting targets as far away as 80 km (50 miles), after Ukraine gave "assurances" it will not use the missiles to strike inside Russia itself, senior U.S. officials said. (Reuters)
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar will pay a five-day visit to Slovakia and the Czech Republic from Thursday to impart further momentum in ties with the two central European countries.
The visit comes at a time Europe is grappling with the implications of the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the issue is likely to figure in the external affairs minister's talks in both Slovakia and the Czech Republic.
In his visit to Slovakian capital Bratislava from June 2 to 4, Jaishankar will call on Prime Minister Eduard Heger, and will hold bilateral talks with Foreign Minister Ivan Korcok, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said on Wednesday. It said will also attend the GLOBSEC 2022 Forum and speak on the topic 'Taking Friendship to the Next Level: Allies in the Indo-Pacific Region'. (PTI)
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday that cooperation through the OPEC grouping remains relevant for Russia.
Speaking in Saudi Arabia on the latest leg of a visit to the Middle East, Lavrov told a news conference: 'The principles of cooperation on this basis (OPEC ) retain their significance and relevance. The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday that some OPEC members were considering suspending Russia from an oil production deal as Western sanctions hurt its ability to produce more. (Reuters)
Poland stands to get an economic boost from agreements to help Ukraine, the prime minister said on Wednesday, as he opened temporary housing funded and built by Warsaw in a town that was largely destroyed during the war with Russia. The country stands to benefit from possible agreements to re-export Ukrainian grain, help Ukraine rebuild its infrastructure, and by importing power from its neighbouring country.
A staunch ally of Kyiv, Poland has been one of Ukraine's biggest financial supporters since the Feb. 24 invasion, but Mateusz Morawiecki said helping Ukraine could also benefit Poland's economy.
"Today we are preparing several agreements between specific ministries, which will help Ukraine and give Poland an economic impulse," Morawiecki told a news conference in the town of Borodianka near Kyiv. "For example these are agreements concerning the export of Ukrainian grain," he said, adding that Poland could become an economic hub for Ukraine. Poland's railways stand to benefit from transporting Ukrainian grain to Baltic sea ports. (Reuters)
The United States will provide advanced rocket systems to Ukraine to use in defense against Russian forces but not for strikes inside Russia, a White House official said on Wednesday as Washington seeks to contain escalation of the conflict.
U.S. President Joe Biden has agreed to provide Ukraine with rocket systems that can strike with precision at long-range Russian targets as part of a $700 million weapons package expected to be unveiled on Wednesday.
Jonathan Finer, deputy White House national security adviser, said the Ukrainians have been requesting the system and Washington believes it will meet their needs. "We have asked Ukrainians for assurances that they will not use these systems to strike inside Russia. This is a defensive conflict that the Ukrainians are waging. Russian forces are on their territory," Finer said in an interview with CNN. (Reuters)
Standing amid the charred remains of a roadside hotel on a major highway near Kyiv, Isa Akayev explained what drove him to build his Muslim volunteer unit and fight for Ukraine.
"I just want to return home, to Crimea," said Akayev, 57, a gently-spoken father of 13 who sports a long greying beard and shaven head. When Russia annexed his home region from Ukraine in 2014, Akayev moved to Kyiv and formed the Crimea battalion, a small unit dominated by Crimean Tatars, the Muslim Turkic group indigenous to the Black Sea peninsula.
Following Russia's invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, his unit's 50 men took part in battles around the Kyiv region but are now seeking to be deployed to the southern front to fight in the Kherson region bordering Crimea. Their eventual goal of recapturing Crimea looks harder than ever after much of the Kherson region fell under Russian control early in the war, pushing Ukrainian forces back more than 100 km (60 miles) from the peninsula. (Reuters)
The Kremlin said Wednesday the world could be on the verge of a major food crisis, blaming "illegal restrictions" imposed on Russia by Western countries and decisions by Ukrainian authorities.
More than three months since invading Ukraine, Russia has seized large parts of its neighbour's coast and is blockading its ports, but is trying to pin the blame for the lack of grain shipments on Western sanctions and on Kyiv itself.
"We are potentially on the verge of a very deep food crisis linked to the introduction of illegal restrictions against us and the actions of Ukrainian authorities who have mined the path to the Black Sea and are not shipping grain from there despite Russia not impeding in any way," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call. (Reuters)
President Vladimir Putin may need to count even more on China and India should the European Union ban Russian oil, with few other takers in Asia able to process the type of crude Europe typically buys. EU leaders agreed to pursue a partial embargo on Russian crude oil shipped on sea, potentially costing Putin up to $10 billion a year in lost export revenue.
Though that could eventually leave more of Russia’s flagship Urals crude — an oil brand that had been popular in Europe — needing a new home, there will be limited buyers in Asia. That’s because the grade can’t easily be refined in large quantities in countries such as Sri Lanka and Indonesia that don’t have sophisticated processing and blending capabilities to handle the highly sulfuric type of oil, said traders.
In the dusty, northern-most sheikhdom of the United Arab Emirates, where labourers cycle by rustic tea shops, one of the world's largest yachts sits in a quiet port — so far avoiding the fate of other luxury vessels linked to sanctioned Russian oligarchs.
The display of lavish wealth is startling in one of the UAE's poorest emirates, a 90-minute drive from the illuminated high-rises of Dubai. But the 118-metre Motor Yacht A's presence in a Ras al-Khaimah creek also shows the UAE's neutrality during Russia's war on Ukraine as the Gulf country remains a magnet for Russian money and its oil-rich capital sees Moscow as a crucial OPEC partner.
Since Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine, the seven sheikhdoms of the Emirates have offered a refuge for Russians, both those despairing of their country's future as well as the mega-wealthy concerned about Western sanctions. (AP)
Pope Francis appealed to authorities to lift a block on exports of wheat from Ukraine, saying the grain could not be used as a "weapon of war".
Many millions of people, particularly in the world's poorest countries, depend on wheat from Ukraine, the pope told a general audience of thousands of people gathered in St. Peter's Square, calling for the block to be lifted.
The United Nations, which says a global food crisis is worsening, is trying to broker a deal to unblock Ukraine's grain exports, though Western leaders have blamed Russia for holding the world to ransom by blockading Ukrainian ports. "The blocking of exports of wheat from Ukraine is very worrying because the lives of millions of people depend on it, especially in poorer countries," the Pope said. (Reuters)