Russia-Ukraine War: Ukraine carried out a strike on fuel storage facility in Russia.
New Delhi:
Ukraine has regained control of “the whole Kyiv region” after Russian forces retreated from some key towns near the Ukrainian capital, deputy defence minister Ganna Maliar said. Meanwhile, an Ukrainian negotiator in peace talks with Russia said that Moscow had “verbally” agreed to key Ukrainian proposals.
Ukrainian helicopters recently carried out a strike on a fuel storage facility in Russia’s western town of Belgorod, some 40 kilometres (25 miles) from the border, according to the local governor.
Peace talks between Ukrainian and Russian officials have resumed via video, but Moscow warned that the helicopter attack will hamper negotiations. Moscow said in peace talks earlier this week it would scale back attacks on the capital Kyiv and the northern city of Chernigiv.
The air strike was “carried out by two Ukrainian army helicopters, which entered Russian territory at a low altitude”.
The Red Cross says it is “impossible to proceed” with the planned evacuation of civilians from the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol on Friday.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky warned that Russia is preparing “powerful strikes” in the country’s east and south, including Mariupol.
Here are the LIVE updates on Russia-Ukraine War:
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Ukraine War Live: Russia Says Peace Talks Should Continue, Slams “Hostile” Ukraine
Russia’s talks with a “hostile” Ukraine have not been easy, but the main thing is that they are continuing, RIA news agency quoted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying on Saturday. “Ukraine is a very difficult country, very difficult for us. In its current state it is hostile towards us,” the agency cited him as telling Belarus television. Russia and Ukraine have held several rounds of negotiations, both in Turkey and by video conference. (Reuters)
Ukraine Russia Conflict: Ukraine Says Russia “Verbally” Agreed To Its Proposals
Ukraine’s top negotiator in peace talks with Russia said Saturday that Moscow had “verbally” agreed to key Ukrainian proposals, raising hopes that talks to end fighting are moving forward. The negotiator told Ukrainian television channels that any meeting between Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin would “with a high probability” take place in Turkey. (AFP)
Ukraine has regained control of “the whole Kyiv region” after invading Russian forces retreated from some key towns near the Ukrainian capital, deputy defence minister Ganna Maliar said on Saturday. “Irpin, Bucha, Gostomel and the whole Kyiv region were liberated from the invader,” Maliar said on Facebook, referring to towns that have been heavily destroyed by fighting. (AFP)
Russia’s talks with Ukraine have not been easy, but the main thing is that they are continuing, RIA news agency quoted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying on Saturday.
He also said Russia would like to continue talks with Ukraine in neighbouring Belarus but Kyiv opposed the idea. Russia and Ukraine held several rounds of talks in Belarus last month before their delegation met in Istanbul last week.
RIA said Peskov had been speaking in an interview with Belarus television which is due to be shown later on Saturday.
The bodies of at least 20 men in civilian clothes were found lying in a single street Saturday after Ukrainian forces retook the town of Bucha near Kyiv from Russian troops, AFP journalists said.
One of the bodies of the men had his hands tied, and the corpses were strewn over several hundred metres (yards) of the residential road in the suburban town northwest of the capital.
The cause of death was not immediately clear although at least one person had what appeared to be a large head wound.
Russian forces withdrew from several towns near Kyiv in recent days after Moscow’s bid to encircle the capital failed, with Ukraine declaring that Bucha had been “liberated”
Pope Francis came the closest he has yet to implicitly criticising President Vladimir Putin over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, saying on Saturday a “potentate” was fomenting conflicts for nationalist interests.
Moscow says the action it launched on Feb. 24 is a “special military operation” designed not to occupy territory but to demilitarise and “denazify” its neighbour. Francis has already rejected that terminology, calling it a war.
“From the east of Europe, from the land of the sunrise, the dark shadows of war have now spread. We had thought that invasions of other countries, savage street fighting and atomic threats were grim memories of a distant past,” the pope said in an address to Maltese officials after arriving on the Mediterranean island nation for a two-day visit.
Russian forces are making a “rapid retreat” from areas around the capital Kyiv and the city of Chernigiv in northern Ukraine, Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhaylo Podolyak said on Saturday.
“With the rapid retreat of the Russians from the Kyiv and Chernigiv regions… it is completely clear that Russia is prioritising a different tactic: falling back on the east and south,” he said on social media.
Ukraine’s economy shrank 16% year-on-year in the first quarter of this year and could contract 40% in 2022 as a result of Russia’s invasion, the economy ministry said in a statement on Saturday, citing preliminary estimates.
“Areas in which remote work is impossible have suffered the most,” it said.
he European Union is working on further sanctions on Russia but any additional measures will not affect the energy sector, the EU‘s Economic Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni said in Cernobbio on Saturday.
The 27-nation bloc will be faced with a growth slowdown caused by the war in Ukraine but not a recession, he added, saying the 4% growth forecast was too optimistic and the EU would not reach it.
Seven humanitarian corridors to evacuate people from Ukraine’s besieged regions are planned for Saturday, Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.
The planned corridors include one for people evacuating by private transport from the city of Mariupol and by buses for Mariupol residents out of the city of Berdyansk, Vereshchuk said.
Ukrainian forces continue to advance against withdrawing Russian forces in the vicinity of Kyiv, British military intelligence said on Saturday.
Russian forces are also reported to have withdrawn from Hostomel airport near the capital, which has been subject to fighting since the first day of the conflict, Britain’s Ministry of Defence said in a regular bulletin.
“In the east of Ukraine, Ukrainian forces have secured a key route in eastern Kharkiv after heavy fighting,” the ministry added.
*Residents fleeing the besieged region around southern port Mariupol take a convoy of buses and private cars to reach Ukrainian-controlled Zaporizhzhia.
*The fleet’s arrival comes as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says over 3,000 people have been rescued from Mariupol, though it is not immediately clear if he is referring to the bus passengers.
*The Red Cross says its own Mariupol rescue effort was forced to turn back after “arrangements and conditions made it impossible to proceed”, but adds its team will try again Saturday.
* Zelensky said sanctions imposed by the United States and other countries on Russia are working and need to be increased.
* The United States added 120 Russian and Belarusian entities, mostly companies linked to the military, to the list of those restricted from receiving US supplies and goods.
* Sanctions by the United States and its allies are pushing Russia into recession and starting to turn it back into a closed economy, a senior US Treasury official said.
* Europe vowed to stay united against Russia’s demand that they pay for its gas in roubles, as the threat of an imminent supply halt eased.
* China told the EU it would seek peace in Ukraine but on its own terms, deflecting pressure for a tougher stance towards Russia.
* Ukraine recaptured more territory around Kyiv from Russian soldiers who left shattered villages and their own abandoned tanks as they moved away from the capital.
* The U.S. military, seeking to lower nuclear tensions with Russia, cancelled an intercontinental ballistic missile test that it had initially aimed only to delay, the Air Force told Reuters.
* In the Russian border city of Belgorod, a logistics hub for its war effort, Moscow said Ukrainian helicopters struck a fuel depot, causing a huge fire. Ukraine denied responsibility.
* Zelensky said the military situation in eastern Ukraine remained extremely difficult and Russia was preparing for new strikes there.
China is not deliberately circumventing sanctions on Russia, a senior Chinese diplomat said on Saturday, a day after China and the European Union held a virtual summit during which the EU told Beijing not to allow Moscow to work around Western sanctions imposed over its invasion of Ukraine.
Ukraine refused Friday to deny it had carried out an airstrike on Russian soil, as hopes of de-escalation faded in President Vladimir Putin’s war and evacuation operations for besieged Mariupol failed.
Peace talks between Ukrainian and Russian officials resumed via video, but the Kremlin warned the helicopter attack on a fuel depot in the town of Belgorod would hamper negotiations.