The head of the Wagner Russian mercenary group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, has said that a Ukrainian counteroffensive could turn into a “tragedy” for Russia. Prigozhin, a key ally of Vladimir Putin who has led the Russian attack of Bakhmut, complained that his fighters lacked ammunition.
“We (Wagner) have only 10-15% of the shells that we need,” he said, blaming the leadership of the Russian army. He predicted a counterattack could take place in mid-May. “This counteroffensive could become a tragedy for our country,” he said.
Ukraine is preparing for the much-expected counter offensive, with the war entering into a deadlock in recent months. It is hoped Ukrainian forces will have similar gains to autumn last year, where they retook part of Kherson.
Ahead of the offensive, the Russian army has replaced its highest ranking official in charge of logistics. Alexei Kuzmenkov – a former official from the National Guard has replaced Col Gen Mikhail Mizintsev.
Pope Francis has said that the Vatican was involved in a peace mission to try to end the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. “I am willing to do everything that has to be done. There is a mission in course now but it is not yet public. When it is public, I will reveal it,” Francis told reporters during a flight home after a three-day visit to Hungary.
Four people have been killed from an overnight Ukrainian strike on the Russian border village of Suzemka, the governor of Russia’s western Bryansk region said on Sunday. “Two more civilians have been found and removed from the rubble. Unfortunately, both of them died,” local governor Alexander Bogomaz said on Telegram.
A growing poverty crisis in Ukraine has led many to turn to Kyiv’s pawn shops to surrender mobile phones, appliances and other belongings in order to get by. Poverty increased from 5.5% to 24.2% in Ukraine in 2022, pushing 7.1 million more people into poverty with the worst impact out of sight in rural villages, according to a recent report by the World Bank. With unemployment unofficially at 36% and inflation hitting 26.6% at the end of 2022, the institution’s regional country director for eastern Europe, Arup Banerji, had warned that poverty could soar.
Funerals for two of the six children killed in a Russian missile strike on a tower block in Uman, central Ukraine, on Friday have taken place. A cruise missile caused a whole section of the building to collapse, killing at least 23, in one of the deadliest attacks on civilians this year.
The number of children killed by the war has reached 477, according to figures just posted to the Ukrainian prosecutor general’s Telegram account. The toll rose after it emerged on Saturday that two more children had died in the rocket attack in Uman.
One woman was killed in Kherson by Russian shelling, Oleksandr Prokudin, head of the oblast’s regional military administration said that artillery had hit Bilozerka and Odradokamianka, during which the 58-year-old was killed. More than 27 attacks were reported on residential areas of the wider Kherson region on Saturday, according to its authorities, with about 135 shells fired.
There have been reports of heavy shelling in the Kharkiv region. Several homes in the city of Kupyansk have been hit with anti-aircraft missiles, according to local officials. The hit caused fires at residential houses and garages and four cars were destroyed. No casualties have been reported.
The UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) reports that Russian commanders have probably started “punishing breaches in discipline” by detaining offending troops in what they call “Zindans” – which are holes in the ground covered with a metal grille.
Joe Biden says he is “working like hell” to secure the release of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, held in Russia on espionage charges. He praised the “absolute courage” of the US journalist and reiterated calls on Moscow for his immediate release. Biden, speaking at an annual dinner for White House correspondents on Saturday night, directly addressed the parents of Gershkovich. “We all stand with you. Evan went to Russia to shed light on the darkness that you all escaped from, years ago. Absolute courage … to the entire family, everyone in this hall stands with you. We’re working every day to secure his release,” Biden said.
Ukraine’s general staff of the armed forces is claiming that 470 Russian troops were killed in fighting on Saturday. A daily update on social media said this brought Russia’s total combat losses to 190,510 since the start of the war. The total has not been independently verified.
A huge fire in the Crimean port city of Sevastopol on Saturday has been put out after what was reported to be a Ukrainian drone strike on fuel tanks at a Russian navy depot. Video footage posted on social media showed a large waterside area on fire, with a column of black smoke rising from the burning fuel. The fire was later extinguished, according to the Moscow-installed governor, Mikhail Razvozhayev. A Ukrainian military intelligence official said more than 10 tanks of oil products with a capacity of about 40,000 tonnes intended for use by Russia’s Black Sea fleet were destroyed, RBC Ukraine reported.
The death toll from Russia’s aerial attacks on cities across Ukraine early on Friday has risen to at least 26, including six children, as Kyiv said preparations for a counter-offensive against Moscow’s forces were nearly complete.
Nancy Pelosi has spoken about her surprise visit to Ukraine just after the Russian invasion had begun. Pelosi and other lawmakers were ushered secretly into Kyiv, via a route that she will not divulge. “It was very, it was dangerous,” Pelosi told the Associated Press before Sunday’s first anniversary of that trip. “We never feared about it, but we thought we could die because we’re visiting a serious, serious war zone.” She added of the fight: “We must win. We must bring this to a positive conclusion – for the people of Ukraine and for our country. There is a fight in the world now between democracy and autocracy, its manifestation at the time is in Ukraine.”
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said in an interview on Saturday he carries a pistol and would have fought to the death alongside his inner circle had the Russians stormed his Kyiv headquarters at the start of the war. In the first days after the 24 February 2022 invasion, Ukrainian officials said Russian intelligence units tried to break into Kyiv, but were defeated and failed to reach Bankova Street in the centre, home to the presidential offices. “I know how to shoot. Could you imagine [a headline like] ‘The president of Ukraine is taken captive by Russians?’ This is a disgrace. I believe this would be a disgrace,” he told the 1+1 television channel.
There is a realistic possibility the Russian missiles that struck Ukraine on Friday were an attempt to intercept Ukrainian reserve units and military supplies that were recently given to the country, the MoD said on Saturday. In its intelligence update, the ministry said Moscow launched “the first major wave of cruise missile strikes against Ukraine since early March 2023”. The bombardment killed at least 25 people, and were a departure from Russia’s use of long-range strikes that targeted energy infrastructure over winter, it said.
Russian occupying authorities in southern Ukraine said on Saturday that Ukrainian forces were subjecting the city of Novaya Kakhovka to “intense artillery fire” that had cut off electricity. The city’s authorities said on Telegram: “Novaya Kakhovka and settlements around the district are under very intense artillery fire from the armed forces of Ukraine.” Novaya Kakhovka is in the part of the southern Kherson region that Russia controls.
Five EU countries have agreed on a deal to allow the transit of Ukrainian food exports, the European Commission said, after temporary bans were imposed on the foodstuffs amid protests by farmers. The agreement with Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia comes as limits on Ukraine grain’s export channel via the Black Sea necessitate export overland via the country’s neighbours.
Russia on Saturday promised it would respond harshly to what it said was Poland’s illegal seizure of its embassy school in Warsaw, an act it called a flagrant violation of the Vienna Convention on diplomatic relations. Polish state-run news channel TVP Info had earlier reported that police had showed up outside the Russian embassy school on Kielecka Street in Warsaw on Saturday morning. Moscow’s ambassador to Poland, Sergei Andreyev, told Russian state news agencies on Saturday that the move was illegal, but Poland said it was within its rights to take back the building.
