A day after Russian President Vladimir Putin said his troops had won the battle of Mariupol, a Russian military official set out broader goals in the country’s new phase of the war in eastern Ukraine, saying Russia was seeking full control of Donbass and Southern Ukraine.
Rustam Minekayev, acting commander of Russia’s Central Military District, said the control would “provide a land corridor to Crimea, as well as affect (vital) sites in the Ukrainian economy.”
The move will also pave the way for Moldova, including the Russian-backed Transnistria-backed region, Minekayev said.
The top military leader commented on an event in the defense industry, where he acknowledged that the second phase of the war had begun “just two days ago”.
The capture of Mariupol is seen as a focal point in the new phase, but thousands of Ukrainian soldiers and civilians remain in the giant Azovstal steel complex. Putin ordered his troops not to storm the fortress on Thursday, but to seal it “so that not a fly will pass.”
Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Irina Vereshchuk on Friday called on Russia to open humanitarian corridors to evacuate civilians at the plant, but talks are ongoing.
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Latest developments:
►U UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres will travel to Moscow and meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, his office said in a statement on Friday.
►Satellite images showed what appeared to be mass graves near Mariupol, and the mayor said Russian troops had buried about 9,000 civilians killed in the conflict at a nearby mass grave to cover up “war crimes”.
►The UN Office of Human Rights said on Friday that its investigators have documented at least 50 civilian deaths, including through a recent execution, in the Kiev suburb of Bucha.
►The Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency Rafael Mariano Grossi will travel to Ukraine next week to visit the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the agency said on Friday. Russian forces took control of the site at the beginning of the invasion, but have since left, with Ukrainian control of its operations.
►The United Kingdom plans to reopen its embassy in Kyiv next week, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Friday.
In a speech Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia had rejected a truce proposal during Orthodox Easter.
►Russian Olympic swimming champion Evgeny Rilov has been removed from the International Swimming Federation for attending a Putin rally in Moscow, the organization said in a statement, adding that athletes from Russia and Belarus will not be invited to the competitions until the end of the event. year.
►The Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III will travel to Germany next week to meet with a handful of nations to discuss Ukraine’s current and future defense needs, Pentagon spokesman John F. Kirby said.
Another mass grave was found outside Mariupol, the city council and an adviser to the mayor announced on Friday.
The city council has released a satellite image provided by Planet Labs, which they say shows a mass grave measuring about 150 by 80 feet, which can hold the bodies of at least 1,000 Mariupol residents.
It says the new reported mass grave is outside the village of Vinogradne, east of Mariupol.
Earlier this week, satellite images from Maxar Technologies revealed what appeared to be rows of more than 200 freshly excavated mass graves in the town of Manchush, west of Mariupol. The mayor and city council said the grave could hold up to 9,000 civilians.
The discovery of mass graves has led to accusations that the Russians are trying to cover up the massacre of civilians in the city.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Friday that one serviceman had died, 27 others had disappeared and 396 had been rescued after a fire on the legendary Russian warship Moscow last week.
The statement comes a week after the ship, whose proud history dates back to the Cold War, sank in the Black Sea last week. Ukraine says it hit the warship in a missile strike.
The loss of the ship, built in Ukraine during the Soviet era and named after the Russian capital, represents a military failure and a symbolic defeat for Russia, as its troops regrouped before the renewed offensive in eastern Ukraine.
Shortly after the incident, the ministry announced that the entire crew of the ship, which according to media reports is about 500 people, had been rescued. The ministry did not provide an explanation for the controversial reports.
Russia’s pressure on eastern Ukraine continued on Friday with offensive operations in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, a spokesman for the Ukrainian army said.
Ukrainian Defense Ministry spokesman Alexander Motuzyanik provided up-to-date information on Friday’s fighting, saying Russian troops were most active in Izyum and Barvinkove, around Popasna and Severodonetsk, and between the Zaporozhye-Donetsk highway.
CNN and the state news agency Ukrinform reported that the regional military administration in Luhansk, Sergei Haidai, said an evacuation bus from Popasna had been shelled on Friday.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said Ukrainian troops were still fighting for control of Mariupol, despite Russian President Vladimir Putin’s claim of victory in the besieged port city.
“We still believe that Mariupol is disputed, that it was not conquered by the Russians and that there is still active Ukrainian resistance. So they are still fighting for this city, “Kirby told CNN on Friday.
Petro Andryushchenko, an adviser to the mayor of Mariupol, told the Associated Press on Friday that “fighting, shelling and bombing” continue.
Russia has been constantly bombing the city for almost two months and seems to control most of the city. But several thousand Ukrainian soldiers, according to Moscow’s estimates, have endured weeks at the steel plant. Ukrainian authorities also said about 1,000 civilians were trapped.
US President Joe Biden has dismissed Putin’s claims that Mariupol has fallen to Russia. “It is doubtful whether he controls Mariupol,” Biden said. “There is still no evidence that Mariupol has completely fallen.
The head of the UN Office of Human Rights said on Friday that international humanitarian law appears to have been “thrown aside” during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“Russia’s armed forces indiscriminately shelled and bombed populated areas, killing civilians and destroying hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure – actions that could amount to war crimes,” the UN Human Rights Office said in a statement.
The service said it had confirmed at least 2,345 civilian deaths and 2,919 wounded since the invasion began on February 24th. More than 92% of them are registered in the territory controlled by the Ukrainian government, he added.
“During these eight weeks, international humanitarian law has not only been ignored, but also seemingly thrown aside,” said UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michel Bachelet.
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President Joe Biden announced additional military aid to Ukraine on Thursday totaling about $ 800 million, the same amount set last week when Russia focused devastating attacks on the eastern Donbass region.
US military aid to Ukraine includes 72,155 mm howitzers, 72 tow trucks and 144,000 artillery shells, said Pentagon spokesman John Kirby. The howitzers will equip five Ukrainian artillery battalions specifically for the battles in Donbass, Kirby said.
Also included are 121 Phoenix Ghost drones developed by the US Air Force specifically for Ukrainians, Kirby said. The drones have capabilities for the Switchblade kamikaze drones, which are disposable armed drones that fit in a backpack. They are designed with cameras, guidance systems and interruption systems.
Biden said not all US aid was being advertised. “Sometimes we’ll talk quietly and wear a big Javelin, because we send a lot of them,” Biden said, thinking about Javelin surface-to-air missiles and playing a famous line from President Theodore Roosevelt.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked the United States for the new package, which he said was “exactly what we were waiting for.”
“Joey Garrison and Tom Vandon Brooke.”
Russian state media reported on Thursday that Russian security forces had received full information about the entire headquarters of Ukraine’s secret services in the Kherson region.
The state media listed the names, photos and years of birth of 14 employees of the Ukrainian secret service in the Kherson region, which is currently under Russian control.
A Russian-controlled news source said the Ukrainian military aimed to “sabotage the territories liberated by the Russian army”.
Many Russian media outlets are controlled by the state: any journalist or citizen who publishes information that contradicts Putin’s account of the war faces up to 15 years in prison under Russian law.
“Selina Tebor.”
Contribution: Associated Press
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