Kyiv, Ukraine – Ukraine’s human rights ombudsman says the Russian military has detained more than 3,000 civilians from Mariupol in another former penal colony near Olenivka in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine.
Seven buses carrying an unknown number of Ukrainian soldiers evacuated from Mariupol’s steel production were spotted arriving Tuesday at the former 120 penal colony near Olenivka.
Ombudsman Lyudmila Denisova told the Telegram earlier Tuesday that civilians had been detained at a former penal colony at 52, also near Olenivka.
She said most civilians were detained for one month, but those considered “particularly unreliable”, including ex-soldiers and police officers, were detained for two months.
Denisova said the detainees included about 30 volunteers who were delivering humanitarian supplies to Mariupol while it was under Russian siege.
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KEY DEVELOPMENT OF THE RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR:
– By targeting schools, Russia is bombing the future
– The fall of Mariupol appears nearby; fighters leave the steel plant
– Sweden and Finland continue to apply for NATO, as Turkey objects
– From civilian to soldier: buried volunteer from the Ukrainian army
– With the echo of Trump, the Republican Party splits over $ 40 billion for Ukraine
– The Minister of the Vatican is visiting Ukraine as Pope toes delicate line
– Europe accused of “double standards” with regard to Ukrainian refugees
– Follow all AP stories about Russia’s war against Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
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OTHER DEVELOPMENTS:
MELITOPOL, Ukraine – Ukrainian guerrillas have reportedly killed several high-ranking Russian officers in the southern city of Melitopol, the regional administration told Telegram.
Russian forces have occupied the city since the beginning of the war.
According to the district administration, the occupiers are trying to cover up the situation, but Russian troops are more active in inspecting cars in the city on Tuesday, most likely looking for guerrillas.
No details of the killings were given and the report could not be confirmed immediately.
During the war, Ukrainians claimed to have killed many Russian generals and other officers. Some of the deaths have been confirmed by the Russians.
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LVIV, Ukraine – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Tuesday began with a combination of Russian attacks with Russian forces firing missiles at the western Lviv region and the Sumy and Chernihiv districts in the northeast and launching air strikes in the eastern Luhansk region.
Zelensky said Russian “sabotage” was taking place in Ukraine’s border areas.
“All this is not just creating tension for our country, it is not just a test for our strength,” Zelenski said in his evening video address. “This is a kind of attempt to compensate the Russian army for a series of failures in the eastern and southern parts of our country.
According to Zelenski, the Russians cannot demonstrate success in the areas where they are trying to attack.
So “they are trying to show success through their missiles and other activities, but also without effect,” Zelenski said. “These strikes, like many previous ones, do not fundamentally change anything. In addition, our air defense and anti-sabotage measures are becoming stronger. “
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Kyiv, Ukraine – The fall of Mariupol looks near as Ukraine seeks to abandon a sprawling steel plant where its troops have endured relentless bombardment for months, making it the largest city to fall into Russian hands.
Much of the steel plant has been turned into rubble.
Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said Ukraine is working to safely withdraw its remaining troops from the Azovstal steel plant.
In his evening video address to the nation, Zelensky said the evacuation mission was being monitored by Ukraine’s military and intelligence officials and “the most influential international mediators are involved.”
However, hundreds of Ukrainian fighters left the Azovstal steel plant and surrendered to Russian hands.
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KANS, France – The 75th Cannes Film Festival kicked off with a video address by Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky.
Zelensky appeared live on Tuesday night via satellite video, wearing a short-sleeved shirt and the side of Ukrainian flags. His message was addressed to officially dressed attendees at the French Riviera Festival, which runs until May 28.
Zelensky spoke at length about the connection between cinema and reality, referring to films such as Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now and Charlie Chaplin’s The Great Dictator, unlike the current situation in Ukraine.
“We need a new Chaplin who will demonstrate that the cinema of our time is not silent,” said Zelenski, who drew applause.
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PARIS – Emmanuel Macron of France spoke with Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky for more than an hour on the phone to discuss the war, including Mariupol and the evacuation of the Azovstal steel plant, according to a statement from the Elysee Palace.
The communiqué said the French president had stated “his full determination to respond to all requests for support from Ukraine”, especially with regard to defense equipment, fuel and humanitarian aid, as well as financial support.
It said Macron also confirmed on Tuesday that arms supplies from France would continue and “increase in intensity in the coming days and weeks”, along with the supply of humanitarian equipment.
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WASHINGTON – US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo says a concerted effort by the European Union and the United States to cut off Russia’s access to technology because of its war against Ukraine has succeeded.
She spoke on Tuesday after returning from a meeting of the EU-US Trade and Technology Council near Paris.
Representatives of the European Commission, the bloc of the executive body of 27 countries and the Biden administration agreed to further coordinate their actions “to mitigate the negative effects” of Russia’s war in Ukraine on the world economy.
Raimondo told reporters during a conversation that joint efforts to implement a series of export controls against Russia “have a strong and significant effect”.
For the United States, she said, exports to Russia had fallen by 80 percent since February, when Russia invaded Ukraine.
“We have essentially stopped sending high-tech products to Russia, which they need for their army,” Raimondo said.
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Kyiv, Ukraine – Russian troops continued the blockade of the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol on Tuesday, the Ukrainian army said in an evening operative update.
The General Staff of the Army announced in a post on its official Facebook profile that in Mariupol the enemy has focused its main efforts on blocking our units in the area of the Azovstal plant.
Ukrainian authorities have not revealed the number of fighters remaining in the steel plant, the last bastion of Ukrainian resistance in the devastated port city after 264 soldiers were evacuated on Monday and taken to Russian-backed separatist territory east of Mariupol.
The military also said the eastern Donetsk region remained at the center of fighting on Tuesday, with particularly fierce clashes around Ukrainian-controlled cities of Severodonetsk, Avdievka and Bakhmut.
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MOSCOW – Russia’s main federal investigative body said Tuesday it intends to question Ukrainian soldiers extracted from the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol as part of its investigation into alleged “crimes by the Ukrainian regime against civilians” in Ukraine’s industrial east.
Russia’s Investigative Committee said in a Telegram publication that “Russian investigators will identify the nationalists (s) and check whether they are involved in crimes against civilians; the information obtained during the interrogations will be compared with other data available in the archives relating to criminal cases. “
It did not provide any additional information on the location or legal status of the Ukrainian fighters.
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Kyiv, Ukraine – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he and his French counterpart had discussed issues ranging from the evacuation of Ukrainian fighters from Mariupol to Ukraine’s prospects for EU membership.
Zelenski wrote on Twitter on Tuesday night that he had ended “a long and meaningful telephone conversation with Emmanuel Macron.”
Zelensky said he had told Macron about “the course of hostilities, the operation to rescue the (Ukrainian) military from Azovstal and the vision for the prospects of the negotiation process.”
He said he also raised the issue of fuel supplies to Ukraine.
“We also discussed support for France’s defense, the preparation of the 6th package of sanctions (against Russia), possible ways to export Ukrainian agricultural products,” Zelensky added, adding that the two also had a “substantial” discussion of the potential candidate. of Kyiv to receive EU candidate status.
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Ukraine’s deputy defense minister expressed hope on Tuesday that the 264 Ukrainian fighters extracted from the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol would be exchanged for Russian prisoners of war, despite remarks by a senior Russian official who called them “criminals” who should to be “brought to justice.”
Hannah Malyar told a briefing on Tuesday that the comment by Russian State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin was a political statement “conceived as domestic propaganda (in view of) domestic political processes in the Russian Federation”.
Malyar said that from Ukraine’s point of view, both the negotiation process and the rescue operation itself are ongoing.
Earlier on Tuesday, Russia’s Interfax news agency quoted Volodin as calling Azovstal’s fighters “Nazi criminals” who should be excluded from any future exchanges.
Volodin was quoted as saying the fighters were “war criminals” and that Russia “must do everything to bring them to justice.”
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justified, they are never good and must be investigated, “he said, adding that the UN health agency would share details of the attacks with Ukrainian authorities …
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