Volodymyr Zelensky claims Russia’s generals expect to lose thousands of soldiers in weeks to come
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People walk their bikes across the street as smoke rises above a plant of Azovstal Iron and Steel Works on May 2, 2022
Up to 200 civilians remain trapped inside bunkers in the Azovstal steel works, despite an evacuation operation led by the UN to save civilians from the site, a Ukrainian fighter in Mariupol has said.
Captain Sviatoslav Palamar, 39, a deputy commander of Ukraine’s controversial Azov Regiment, said his fighters could hear the voices of people trapped in bunkers of the vast industrial complex.
The United Nations had earlier conducted a “safe passage operation” for civilians in the steelworks, which was serving as the last-remaining Ukrainian stronghold in the city of Mariupol.
Up to 1,000 civilians were thought to have been stuck underneath the Azovstal plant with minimal supplies alongside hundreds of fighters – some said to be suffering with festering wounds – after Vladimir Putin told Russian troops to blockade the area last week “so that a fly can’t get through”.
One evacuee from the steelworks said that survivors still trapped inside were running out of food. “Children always wanted to eat. You know, adults can wait,” she said.
KEY POINTS
- Up to 200 civilians remain trapped inside Azovstal steel works, claims fighter
- Zelensky says humanitarian corridors are ‘working for first time’
- Rocket strike hits Odesa causing deaths and injuries – governor
- Russia banned from making Euro 2028 bid as part of Uefa measures
- Ukraine admits ‘Ghost of Kyiv’ fighter pilot is a myth
Russia has killed 220 children in war, says Zelensky
Volodymyr Zelensky has accused Russia of claiming the lives of 220 Ukrainian children in the invasion, stating that the free world did not justify Nazism and killing children because of this reason.
“220 Ukrainian children have been killed by the Russian army since February 24. And we still don’t know about everyone, because we don’t have access to the temporarily occupied areas of our state. 1570 educational institutions were destroyed or damaged by shelling. It’s in a little over two months,” Mr Zelensky said in a nightly address.
He added that a 14-year-old boy was killed and A 17-year-old girl was woundeda after a shrapnel hit her.
“What is it? For what? What did these children and the dormitory threaten the Russian state with? And that’s how they fight. That’s all,” Mr Zelensky said.
“That is why the whole free world united so that no one justifies Nazism, kills children or destroys peaceful cities as Russia does,” Mr Zelensky said.
Here’s more detail on what to expect when Boris Johnson addresses the Ukrainian parliament tomorrow, with a speech expected to evoke Winston Churchill:
PM to evoke Churchill as he tells Ukrainian parliament this is their ‘finest hour’
Prime minister becomes first world leader to speak by video link to Kyiv assembly since invasion two months ago
Zelensky suggests Russia ‘never learned lessons’ of Second World War
Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov’s suggestion that Adolf Hitler had Jewish origins shows that Moscow has forgotten, or never learned, the lessons of the Second World War, Volodymyr Zelensky has said.
“I have no words ... No one has heard any denial or any justification from Moscow. All we have from there is silence.... this means that the Russian leadership has forgotten all the lessons of World war two,” Mr Zelensky, who is Jewish, said in his nightly video message.
“Or perhaps they have never learned those lessons.”
Boris Johnson to hail Ukraine’s ‘finest hour’ in address to Verkhovna Rada
Boris Johnson is due to address Ukraine’s parliament – the Verkhovna Rada – via video link tomorrow, to set out details of a £300m package of military support.
Downing Street said the package will include electronic warfare equipment, a counter battery radar system, GPS jamming equipment and thousands of night vision devices.
In his address, the prime minister will echo the words of Winston Churchill to the British people during the Second World War, as Mr Zelensky did when he spoke to Westminster in March.
“When my country faced the threat of invasion during the Second World War, our parliament, like yours, continued to meet throughout the conflict, and the British people showed such unity and resolve that we remember our time of greatest peril as our finest hour,” Mr Johnson is expected to say.
“This is Ukraine's finest hour, an epic chapter in your national story that will be remembered and recounted for generations to come.
“Your children and grandchildren will say that Ukrainians taught the world that the brute force of an aggressor counts for nothing against the moral force of a people determined to be free.”
US Senate could start processing Ukrainian aid package next week, Schumer says
The US Senate could take up Joe Biden's request for $33bn in emergency aid for Ukraine as soon as next week, Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer has suggested.
“It is my hope that a bipartisan agreement can be reached very soon and that the Senate can begin processing this aid package on the floor as early as next week,” the Democratic leader said in remarks opening the Senate.
“Quickly approving this emergency funding is essential to helping the people of Ukraine in their fight against Russia,” Mr Schumer said. “Again, I expect both sides to work quickly, decisively and with bipartisan cooperation to get this aid out the door and onto the president's desk.”
Mr Biden asked Congress on Thursday for the money to support the government in Kyiv – marking a dramatic escalation of Washington’s funding for Ukraine.
Boy killed in Russian missile strike in Odesa, Zelensky says
A 14-year-old boy has been killed and a 17-year-old girl wounded in a Russian missile strike which hit a dormitory in Odesa, Volodymyr Zelensky has said.
“How did these children and the dormitory threaten the Russian state?” Mr Zelensky said in his nightly video address.
Earlier, the secretary of Ukraine's Security Council, Oleksiy Danylov, was quoted by media as saying the strike also hit a church, blowing the roof off.
Russia appears to reroute internet traffic in Kherson via its own comms system
Russia has rerouted internet traffic in the occupied Ukrainian region of Kherson through Russian communications infrastructure, according to the internet service disruption monitor NetBlocks.
The move appeared aimed at tightening Moscow's grip on a region where it claims it has taken full control, with Moscow-appointed authorities in parts of Kherson having also said that the region will start using the Russian rouble.
London-based NetBlocks said it had tracked a near-total internet blackout across Kherson region on Saturday that affected various Ukrainian providers. Connection was restored after several hours, but various metrics showed traffic was now going through Russia.
“Connectivity on the network has been routed via Russia’s internet instead of Ukrainian telecoms infrastructure and is hence likely now subject to Russian internet regulations, surveillance, and censorship,” NetBlocks said on its website.
Britain's Ministry of Defence said yesterday that Russian moves in the region are “likely indicative of Russian intent to exert strong political and economic influence in Kherson over the long term”.
UK to investigate any ‘credible’ claims of Russian arms embargo breach
Boris Johnson’s government has said it will investigate any “credible allegations” its arms embargo on Russia has been breached, amid concerns that Vladimir Putin’s arsenal of modern weaponry relies heavily on components produced in the UK and other Western nations.
A Whitehall inquiry is under way, according to the Daily Telegraph, after a report by the Royal United Services Institute think-tank highlighted the extent to which the Russian equipment deployed in Ukraine depends on imports of sophisticated electronics.
“The pattern is universal,” the report, by Dr Jack Watling and Nick Reynolds stated. “Almost all of Russia's modern military hardware is dependent upon complex electronics imported from the US, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Japan, Israel, China and further afield.
“In some instances these components are civilian dual-use electronics that can be procured commercially. In many more, however, they are pieces of military or specialised technologies for which there are a small number of regulated suppliers.
Britain has had an arms embargo on Russia in place since Mr Putin's illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014, the terms of which it strengthened in December as Moscow began amassing troops at Ukraine’s border.
“The UK has one of the most robust and transparent export control regimes in the world, and an immediate arms embargo was imposed on Russia in July 2014 following its illegal annexation of Crimea,” a government spokesman said.
“We take all credible allegations of breaches of export control seriously and we will take further action if appropriate.”
Exclusive: ‘Thousands’ of refugees forced into overcrowded homes as UK system branded a ‘disaster’
Thousands of Ukrainians seeking refuge in the UK have been forced to live in overcrowded accommodation, with whole families sharing single rooms, charities have warned.
Charities warn the majority of those arriving under the route are experiencing overcrowding because their relatives in the UK do not have spare rooms and no checks are carried out on these properties pre-arrival.
A survey carried out by the Greater London Authority of nine charities in the capital found that of 83 Ukrainian clients on the family scheme seeking support, 58 per cent were in unsuitable accommodation and 17 per cent were at immediate risk of homelessness.
Clive Betts, Labour MP and chair of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee, said the Home Office’s Ukraine family scheme was a “dysfunctional disaster”.
You can read the full report, from The Independent’s social affairs correspondent May Bulman, here:
Ukraine Family scheme branded ‘disaster’ as ‘thousands’ stuck in overcrowded UK homes
Exclusive: Families living in single rooms and forced to declare themselves homeless after fleeing war, charities warn
Germany says it will back EU embargo on Russian oil
In a major shift, Germany has said it is prepared to back an immediate European Union embargo on Russian oil.
The move could enable the bloc to announce such a ban within days, and EU ambassadors will discuss the proposed sanctions when they meet on Wednesday.
“We have managed to reach a situation where Germany is able to bear an oil embargo,” German economy minister Robert Habeck said in Brussels, where he met with EU colleagues. “This means it won't be without consequences.”
Finance minister Christian Lindner told Die Welt newspaper: “With coal and oil, it is possible to forgo Russian imports now”, but warned: “It can't be ruled out that fuel prices could rise.”
Germany had already reduced the share of Russian oil in its imports from 35 per cent to 12 per cent prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but had previously said it needed months to phase out Russian crude to soften the economic impact.
However, weaning Europe off Russian oil is likely to be easier than reducing dependence on Russian natural gas, which Moscow has demanded European customers pay for in roubles – a call rejected by the EU. Last week, Moscow cut off supplies to Poland and Bulgaria.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/ukraine-russia-nuclear-war-mariupol-latest-b2070082.html
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