Ukraine is bracing for the start of a Russian offensive in its eastern Donbas region as Moscow focuses on seizing territory there after being driven back from the capital Kyiv earlier this month.
Russia’s main target in Donbas is the port of Mariupol, where thousands are believed to have died under a near-seven week siege.
Thousands of troops are amassing in the area for a new assault, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said.
The first European Union leader to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin in person since the war began, Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer, said following talks in Moscow the offensive was “evidently being prepared on a massive scale”.
Western sanctions on Moscow will intensify as long as the invasion persists, Nehammer said.
“(Telling Putin) once will not be enough. Ten times will not be enough. It might have to be done 100 times,” he told reporters.
World powers including China and India have so far refrained from sanctioning Russia.
Lured by steep oil discounts, India has purchased more Russian crude since the February 24 invasion than it did for the whole of last year, data compiled by Reuters shows.
In a video call, US President Joe Biden told India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi “very clearly that it is not in their interest” to increase reliance on Russian energy, White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said.
After withdrawing forces from northern Ukraine, including suburbs of the capital Kyiv lain to waste under its occupation, Russia has turned its sights toward Donbas.
It is demanding Ukraine cede control of territory there to separatist fighters.
Capturing Mariupol, the main eastern port, would allow Moscow to link troops advancing from the east with those from Russian-annexed Crimea in the south and shift their focus to a new attempt to encircle the main Ukrainian force in the east.
Thousands have fled from the Donbas region.
In his latest plea for international support, Zelenskiy told South Korea’s parliament tens of thousands had already been killed in Mariupol, a figure that has not been confirmed independently.
Russia has repeatedly denied attacking civilians.
There were unconfirmed media reports on Monday suggesting chemical weapons were used in Mariupol.
Zelenskiy warned in his nightly video address on Monday of potential Russian use of chemical weapons, but did not say they had been used.
The number of people leaving Mariupol has fallen because Russian forces slowed pre-departure checks, said Petro Andryushchenko, an aide to the mayor of the city.
Around 10,000 people were awaiting screening by Russian forces, he said.
Russia does not allow military personnel to leave with civilian evacuees. There was no comment from Moscow, which has previously blamed Ukraine for blocking evacuations.
Ukrainian fears intensified last week after 57 people were killed in a Russian missile strike on a train station in Donbas, where thousands were trying to flee the expected advance.
Moscow denied blame for the missile strike as well as Ukrainian and Western accusations Russian forces committed war crimes north of Kyiv.
The United Nations is hearing accounts of rape and violence by Russian and Ukrainian forces, UN officials said.
Kateryna Cherepakha, president of La Strada-Ukraine, said the rights group’s emergency hotlines had received calls accusing Russian soldiers of nine cases of rape, involving 12 women and girls.
“This is just the tip of the iceberg,” she told the UN Security Council via video.
“We know and see – and we want you to hear our voices – that violence and rape is used now as a weapon of war by Russian invaders in Ukraine.”
Russia’s deputy UN ambassador denied the allegations and accused Ukraine and allies of “a clear intention to present Russian soldiers as sadists and rapists”.
Ukraine’s UN mission did not respond to a request for comment on allegations of sexual violence by Ukrainian forces and civil defence militias.
Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said Moscow would not pause the fighting for any new round of peace talks, which last convened on April 1.
“A decision was made that during the next rounds of talks, there would be no pause (in military action) so long as a final agreement is not reached,” Lavrov said.
