Russia’s defence ministry has said 1,730 fighters at the Azovstal steelworks in Mariupol have surrendered since Monday, with 771 surrendering in the last 24 hours, and 80 wounded. The ministry said “those in need of inpatient treatment [will] receive assistance in medical institutions” in Novoazovsk and Donetsk.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has said in a statement: “The ICRC started on Tuesday 17 May to register combatants leaving the Azovstal plant, including the wounded, at the request of the parties. The registration process that the ICRC facilitated involves the individual filling out a form with personal details like name, date of birth and closest relative. This information allows the ICRC to track those who have been captured and help them keep in touch with their families.”
Russia’s news agency Tass has quoted Denis Pushilin, the head of the Russian-controlled territory of Donetsk as saying that more than half of the Ukrainian fighters who were inside the Azovstal steelworks have now left the plant.
The governor of Russia’s Kursk region, Roman Starovoyt, has posted details of a claimed attack on the village of Tyotkino. He said one person was killed and houses and factories were damaged.
Serhiy Haidai, Ukraine’s governor of Luhansk, has claimed that “Russians used aircraft to destroy civilian objects in the areas of the settlements of Loskutivka, Katerynivka and Orikhove” overnight. He also claimed that “16 enemy attacks were repulsed in Luhansk and Donetsk last night”.
The UK’s Ministry of Defence has claimed that Russia’s Lt Gen Serhiy Kisel has been suspended for failing to capture Kharkiv, and V Adm Igor Osipov has been suspended from commanding the Black Sea fleet. The MoD’s intelligence briefing stated: “A culture of cover-ups and scapegoating is probably prevalent within the Russian military and security system. Many officials involved in the invasion of Ukraine will likely be increasingly distracted by efforts to avoid personal culpability for Russia’s operational setbacks.”
The trial of 21-year-old Vadim Shishimarin has continued in Kyiv. He is a Russian tank commander charged with the murder of a 62-year-old civilian who was riding his bicycle on a village road. Shishimarin has pleaded guilty.
Finland’s prime minister, Sanna Marin, has said in an interview with an Italian newspaper that she does not anticipate Nato opening a permanent base or placing nuclear weapons on Finnish soil. “This issue is not on the agenda,” she told Corriere della Sera.
Poland’s prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, has said that his country will defend Sweden and Finland if they are attacked before they join Nato.
The Italian prime minister, Mario Draghi, has called for an urgent ceasefire in Ukraine so that serious negotiations can begin to end the war. Draghi said it was important to maintain pressure on Russia through economic sanctions “because we have to bring Moscow to the negotiating table”.
G7 finance ministers will meet in Germany on Thursday hoping to thrash out a plan to bolster Ukraine’s war-ravaged economy. The US Treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, said before the meeting in Koenigswinter that what had been agreed so far was “not enough” and called on other countries to “join us in increasing their financial support”.
The UN secretary general, António Guterres, has warned that food shortages stoked by the war in Ukraine could cause “malnutrition, mass hunger and famine, in a crisis that could last for years” around the world.
Russia’s Aeroflot, Ural Airlines and Rossiya Airlines have been targeted with new sanctions to prevent them selling off landing slots at UK airports.
The US embassy in Kyiv has reopened after closing nearly three months ago at the beginning of the war. Staff ran the star-spangled banner up the flagpole outside the embassy at a ceremony on Thursday morning.
Switzerland’s department of foreign affairs has announced that it will reopen its embassy in Kyiv.
