French President Emmanuel Macron praised the heroism of Ukraine’s army and people and said that there were “traces of barbarism” from Russian forces after a visit to the Ukrainian town of Irpin, which was the closest Russian troops got to Kyiv in the early stages of the war. He and other European leaders visited the town before meeting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
German chancellor Olaf Scholz, Italian prime minister Mario Draghi and Macron arrived in Kyiv after an overnight train journey from Poland. The three leaders were greeted with air raid sirens in the Ukrainian capital, as Russia continued to strike targets across the country. Scholz said Russia’s war of “unimaginable cruelty” and “senseless violence” in Ukraine must end. Romania’s President Klaus Iohannis also visited Irpin with them, and is expected to join them later for talks with the Ukrainian leader.
Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said the leaders of France, Germany and Italy should “not be focused exclusively on weapons shipments to Ukraine” during their visit. Dmitry Medvedev, a former Russian president and now deputy chairman of the Security Council of Russia, said the visit of the French, German and Italian leaders to Kyiv is of “zero use”.
Ukraine has ignored a Russian ultimatum to surrender Sievierodonetsk, with Moscow controlling 80% of the embattled eastern city that has become a focal point of Russia’s advances in the east of the country. Russia ordered Ukrainian forces to stop their “senseless resistance and lay down arms” from Wednesday morning and accused Kyiv of disrupting plans to open a humanitarian corridor for civilians to leave the area.
Thousands of civilians, including women, children and elderly people, are trapped in Sievierodonetsk with a diminishing supply of food, clean water, sanitation and electricity. An urgent situation is developing in the bunkers beneath the Azot chemical plant in the city, a UN spokesperson said. About 500 civilians believed to be trapped alongside soldiers inside Azot were preparing to flee the city through a possible humanitarian corridor.
Serhai Haidai, Ukraine’s governor of Luhansk, has said “Fierce battles are fought for every house” in Sievierodonetsk, as Russia continues its attempts to capture the city in eastern Ukraine.
Russia’s chief negotiator, Vladimir Medinsky, said Moscow was ready to restart peace talks with Kyiv but claimed it had yet to receive a response to its latest proposals.
Russia’s combat force in the Donbas is highly likely operating in increasingly ad hoc and severely undermanned groupings, the UK ministry of defence has said in its latest report.
An overnight Russian air-launched rocket strike hit a suburb of the northern Ukrainian city of Sumy, killing four and wounding six.
Denis Pushilin, head of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, has called for “all Russian cities” in Ukraine, including Odesa, to be occupied by pro-Russian forces.
Children born in Ukraine’s Kherson region since 24 February will automatically receive Russian citizenship, according to a statement by the Russian-imposed authority occupying the region.
Britain has announced a fresh wave of sanctions against Russia aimed at people involved with the “barbaric treatment of children in Ukraine”. Those who have been sanctioned include Moscow’s children’s rights commissioner, Maria Lvova-Belova, for the “forced transfer and adoption” of 2,000 Ukrainian children. Patriarch Kirill, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church and a long-time Putin ally and vocal supporter of the war in Ukraine, has also been sanctioned.
Russia’s foreign ministry announced new sanctions against 121 Australian citizens, including journalists and defence officials, citing what it calls a “Russophobic agenda” in the country.
US President Joe Biden yesterday announced a new $1bn arms packages for Ukraine , following appeals by Kyiv for help on the eastern and southern fronts. The support package, confirmed on Wednesday, includes 18 additional howitzers with tactical vehicles to tow them, 36,000 rounds of 155mm ammunition for the howitzers and two Harpoon coastal defence systems, the defence department said.
Russia and the United States must discuss the extension of the START nuclear arms reduction treaty, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the RIA news agency in an interview on Thursday. The matter was important for global security and Russia’s military operation in Ukraine was no reason to avoid its discussion, Peskov added.
Two American volunteers in Ukraine have gone missing and are feared to have been taken prisoner by Russia, officials and family members said on Wednesday. Alexander Drueke, 39, and Andy Tai Ngoc Huynh, 27, are both US military veterans who had been living in Alabama and went to Ukraine to assist with war efforts.
Zelenskiy has urged the EU to tighten sanctions on Russia and warned Moscow’s forces could attack other countries. In an address to the Czech parliament Wednesday, Ukraine’s president said Moscow’s invasion “is the first step that the Russian leadership needs to open the way to other countries, to the conquest of other peoples”.
Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, said on Wednesday allies would continue to supply Ukraine with heavy weapons and long-range systems, with an agreement on a new package of assistance to Kyiv expected at the summit in Madrid later this month. The agreement would help Ukraine move from old Soviet-era weaponry to “more modern Nato standard” gear, he said. Stoltenberg was speaking before a meeting in Brussels of defence ministers from Nato and other countries to discuss and coordinate help for Ukraine.
At the meeting in Brussels on Wednesday, the US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, said Ukraine was facing a “pivotal moment on the battlefield” in Sievierodonetsk, with Russian forces using long-range weapons to try to overwhelm Ukrainian positions. Austin urged America and its allies not to “let up and lose steam” and to “intensify our shared commitment to Ukraine’s self-defence”.
China’s Xi Jinping has assured Vladimir Putin of China’s support on Russian “sovereignty and security” prompting Washington to warn Beijing it risked ending up “on the wrong side of history”. China is “willing to continue to offer mutual support [to Russia] on issues concerning core interests and major concerns such as sovereignty and security”, the state broadcaster CCTV reported Xi as saying during a call with Putin held Wednesday . A US state department spokesperson responded: “China claims to be neutral, but its behaviour makes clear that it is still investing in close ties to Russia.”
