KYIV, Ukraine — Ukraine’s army intelligence chief says that Russia might attempt to break Ukraine in two.
Kyrylo Budanov stated in remarks launched by the Protection Ministry on Sunday that Russian President Vladimir Putin has realized “he can’t swallow all the nation” and would seemingly attempt to cut up the nation underneath “the Korean state of affairs.” That’s a reference to the decades-old division between North and South Korea.
Budanov stated that “the occupiers will attempt to pull the occupied territories right into a single quasi-state construction and pit it towards unbiased Ukraine.” He pointed to Russian makes an attempt to arrange parallel authorities constructions in occupied cities and to bar individuals from utilizing the Ukrainian foreign money, the hryvnia.
Budanov predicted that Ukrainian resistance will develop right into a “complete” guerrilla warfare, derailing Russia’s makes an attempt.
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KEY DEVELOPMENTS IN THE RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR:
— Zelenskyy: West wants extra braveness in serving to Ukraine struggle
— ‘My private tragedy’: Ukrainians brace for an assault on Odesa
— Ukrainians have been welcomed in Hungary however an Afghan pupil was not
— Struggle shakes Europe’s path to vitality independence, local weather objectives
— With out Russia, science going solo on world’s woes, goals
Go to https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine for extra protection
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OTHER DEVELOPMENTS:
PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron has distanced himself from U.S. President Joe Biden’s remark that Vladimir Putin “can’t stay in energy.” He’s urging efforts to de-escalate tensions.
Macron, who has spoken a number of instances to the Russian president in so-far unsuccessful peace-making efforts, is because of converse once more with Putin Sunday or Monday.
“We ought to be factual and … do all the pieces in order that the scenario doesn’t get uncontrolled,” Macron stated Sunday on France-3 tv, when requested about Biden’s comment.
Macron stated: “I wouldn’t use these phrases, as a result of I proceed to talk to President Putin, as a result of what we need to do collectively is that we need to cease the struggle Russia launched in Ukraine, with out waging struggle and with out an escalation.”
He burdened that the U.S. stays an vital ally, saying, “We share many frequent values, however those that reside subsequent to Russia are the Europeans.”
Macron stated he’ll discuss with Putin a few proposed humanitarian hall for the besieged metropolis of Mariupol, additionally mentioned with Turkey and Greece.
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ISTANBUL – The Ukrainian embassy in Ankara says a gaggle of 159 Ukrainian orphans has arrived within the southern Turkish metropolis of Antalya.
The girls and boys aged 4 to 18 had been evacuated from care houses within the Dnipro area, touring first to Poland by prepare earlier than flying to Turkey.
Welcoming the youngsters and 26 care employees, Ukrainian Ambassador Vasyl Bodnar stated the goal was to shelter 2,000 youngsters and employees in Turkey.
“That is the primary group to come back however we’re ready for the second group,” the Demiroren information company quoted Bodnar as saying at Antalya airport. “Youngsters will come from cities that the Russian military has bombed or might bomb.”
The group will keep in lodges within the Mediterranean resort.
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VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis has stepped up his pleas for negotiations to finish the preventing in Ukraine.
Francis instructed the general public in St. Peter’s Sq. on Sunday that “this merciless and mindless struggle” continues after greater than a month, representing “a defeat for all.”
He lamented that folks are burying their youngsters, and “the highly effective determine and the poor die.” As soon as once more, he didn’t cite Russia by identify because the aggressor.
Referring to studies that about one-half of all the youngsters in Ukraine have been displaced by the battle, Francis stated that “struggle doesn’t simply devastate the current but additionally the way forward for society.”
The pontiff reiterated his condemnation of struggle as barbarous and sacrilegious. He stated that “humanity should perceive that the second has come to abolish struggle, to cancel struggle from the historical past of man earlier than it cancels man from historical past.”
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MOSCOW — Russian President Vladimir Putin has praised Russia’s Nationwide Guard on the sixth anniversary of its creation.
Putin specifically addressed the service employees of the Nationwide Guard items concerned within the army operation in Ukraine.
“Comrades, certainly, fight situations contain elevated threat. I’m nicely conscious of the way you act on this scenario: extremely courageously and professionally, skillfully and fearlessly. You resolve essentially the most difficult duties set earlier than you competently and exactly whereas exhibiting private heroism,” Putin stated in a video assertion issued Sunday.
The Nationwide Guard, which numbers over 300,000 personnel, was established by Putin in 2016 as an inside army drive to struggle terrorism and arranged crime, guard state services, management weapons turnover and to offer riot management.
The service studies on to the president.
“Our total huge nation is rightly happy with every of you,” Putin stated. “I need to thanks to your stamina and your impeccable service to Russia, to your loyalty to our fatherland, to your oath of allegiance and your responsibility.”
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KYIV, Ukraine — A supervisor at a UNESCO world heritage website in Kyiv says bombings within the capital are being felt within the landmark constructing and will threaten its foundations.
“We and the landmark really feel the vibrations,” stated Vadim Kyrylenko, an engineer who now could be essentially the most senior on-site supervisor on the St. Sophia Cathedral. “It’s a minimal risk however we really feel it. If there can be a strike close by as I say it could be some extent of no return for our landmark as a result of it is vitally fragile and weak.”
The location shut its doorways to guests as quickly because the struggle in Ukraine began final month. Kyrylenko stated that the one individuals left on website aside from him are a cook dinner, a carpenter and engineers who’re holding the primary features operating.
The Orthodox shrine dates again practically 1,000 years to the daybreak of Christianity within the area. It’s thought of the center of Ukrainian non secular and nationwide identification. The grand construction survived regardless of being within the crosshairs of quite a few invaders and armies.
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A separatist chief in jap Ukraine says that his area needs to carry a vote on becoming a member of Russia.
Leonid Pasechnik, the top of the self-proclaimed Luhansk Folks’s Republic, stated Sunday that it might maintain a referendum “within the nearest time” asking voters whether or not they assist making the area a part of Russia.
Russia has supported the separatist rebels in Luhansk and the neighboring Donetsk areas since an insurgency erupted there in 2014 shortly after Moscow’s annexation of the Crimean Peninsula. Moscow acknowledged their independence on Feb. 21 after which cited their name for army help to launch the invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24.
In talks with Ukraine, Moscow has urged it to acknowledge Russia’s sovereignty over Crimea and the independence of the Donetsk and Luhansk areas. Pasechnik’s assertion might herald a shift within the Russian place.
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BERLIN — Germany’s president is internet hosting a “solidarity live performance” with Ukraine that includes musicians from Ukraine, Russia and Belarus.
The Berlin Philharmonic was taking part in items by Ukrainian, Russian and Polish composers at President Frank-Walter Steinmeier’s Bellevue palace in Berlin. Steinmeier — who addressed the occasion by video as a result of he examined constructive for the coronavirus final week — described it Sunday as a “sign for freedom and peace.”
Steinmeier stated: “Allow us to be vigilant towards sweeping animosities, and allow us to not succumb to (Russian President Vladimir) Putin’s pseudo-historical nationalist delusion. Allow us to not permit Putin’s hatred to develop into a hatred between individuals … in our personal society both.”
Nonetheless, Ukraine’s ambassador to Germany tweeted that he had spurned an invite. Andriy Melnyk wrote that “ONLY RUSSIAN (!) SOLOISTS” had been performing, “no Ukrainians.” He added: “An affront. Sorry, I’m staying away.”
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JERUSALEM — Secretary of State Antony Blinken says the U.S. shouldn’t be attempting to topple Russian President Vladimir Putin, regardless of its harsh condemnations of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Blinken spoke a day after President Joe Biden stated of Putin throughout a speech in Warsaw: “For God’s sake, this man can’t stay in energy.”
At a information convention in Jerusalem, Blinken stated Biden’s level was that “Putin can’t be empowered to wage struggle or have interaction in aggression towards Ukraine or anybody else.”
He stated the U.S. has repeatedly stated that “we would not have a technique of regime change in Russia, or wherever else for that matter.”
“On this case, as in any case, it’s as much as the individuals of the nation in query. It’s as much as the Russian individuals,” Blinken stated.
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BERLIN — Germany’s president is internet hosting a “solidarity live performance” with Ukraine that includes musicians from Ukraine, Russia and Belarus.
The Berlin Philharmonic was taking part in items by Ukrainian, Russian and Polish composers at President Frank-Walter Steinmeier’s Bellevue palace in Berlin. Steinmeier described it Sunday as a “sign for freedom and peace.”
Steinmeier stated: “Allow us to be vigilant towards sweeping animosities, and allow us to not succumb to (Russian President Vladimir) Putin’s pseudo-historical nationalist delusion. Allow us to not permit Putin’s hatred to develop into a hatred between individuals … in our personal society both.”
Nonetheless, Ukraine’s ambassador to Germany tweeted that he had spurned an invite. Andriy Melnyk wrote that “ONLY RUSSIAN (!) SOLOISTS” had been performing, “no Ukrainians.” He added: “An affront. Sorry, I’m staying away.”
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KYIV, Ukraine —- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has once more urged the West to offer Ukraine with warplanes and air protection missiles.
Talking in a video deal with early Sunday, Zelenskyy stated that “our companions have all that, and it’s simply gathering mud. And in reality it’s essential not only for Ukraine’s freedom, however for the liberty of Europe.”
Zelenskyy warned that the Baltic states, Poland and Slovakia might finally face a Russian assault “simply because they may have saved of their hangars simply 1% of all NATO warplanes and 1% of all NATO tanks. Simply 1%! We aren’t asking for extra and we now have been ready for that for 31 days!”
He stated that “our companions should step up their support to Ukraine.”
The president stated that “Ukraine can’t shoot down Russian missiles with shotguns and machine weapons which have accounted for the majority of provides. And we will’t unblock Mariupol with out the required variety of tanks, different armor, and warplanes. All defenders of Ukraine find out about it.”
He added that america and “all European politicians” additionally know that.
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DOHA, Qatar — The pinnacle of the Worldwide Financial Fund is warning that the worldwide financial pressure attributable to Russia’s struggle in Ukraine might stoke civil unrest within the Center East and past.
Talking on the Doha Discussion board in Qatar on Sunday, Kristalina Georgieva stated Russia’s invasion and the ensuing sanctions on Moscow have pressured the world’s poorest to bear the worst of the disaster as they grapple with inflated meals prices and scarcer jobs.
Georgieva hinted that the present scenario evoked the lead-up to the 2011 uprisings often known as the Arab Spring, when skyrocketing bread costs fueled anti-government protests throughout the Center East.
“When costs soar, and poor individuals can’t feed their households, they are going to be on the streets,” she stated. “One factor we find out about hassle in a single place, it travels, it doesn’t keep there.”
Georgieva referred to as for higher international cooperation to fill the gaps in commodity and vitality provides.
“Please, work collectively,” she stated. “Oil producers, gasoline producers and meals producers right now are able to assist cut back this uncertainty.”
She cited Ukraine’s significance as a high wheat exporter in urging a swift decision to the struggle.
“The sooner the tanks are out, the sooner the tractors shall be in,” she stated. “We’d like by July the harvest in Ukraine to contribute to the soundness of meals costs.”
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NEW YORK — The Russian army says it has struck Ukrainian army services with long-range missiles.
Russian Protection Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov stated in assertion on Sunday that the air-launched cruise missiles hit a gasoline depot and a protection plant in Lviv close to the border with Poland a day earlier.
Konashenkov stated one other strike with sea-launched missiles destroyed a depot with air protection missiles in Plesetske, simply west of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv.
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ODESA, Ukraine — The Black Sea port of Odesa is mining its seashores and speeding to defend its cultural heritage from a feared Mariupol-style destiny within the face of rising alarm that the strategic metropolis may be subsequent as Russia makes an attempt to strip Ukraine of its shoreline.
The multi-cultural jewel, expensive to Ukrainian hearts and even Russian ones, can be a massively strategic win for Russia. It’s the nation’s largest port, essential to grain and different exports, and headquarters for the Ukrainian navy.
Bombardment from the ocean final weekend additional raised worries that town is in Russia’s sights.
Residents say Russian President Vladimir Putin can be insane to take Odesa with the brutal strategy that has left different Ukrainian cities in ruins. As soon as a gilded powerhouse of the Russian empire, Odesa consists of one of many best opera homes in Europe and the famed Potemkin Steps between town and the ocean, featured in Soviet filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein’s 1925 silent movie masterpiece “Battleship Potemkin.”
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LONDON — The Russian army seems to be attempting to encircle Ukrainian forces preventing within the separatist areas within the jap a part of the nation, Britain’s Ministry of Protection says.
Russian forces are advancing southward from the realm round Kharkiv and north from Mariupol, the ministry stated in an intelligence briefing launched Sunday morning.
Battlefields in northern Ukraine stay “largely static,” with Ukrainian counterattacks hampering Russian efforts to reorganize their forces, the ministry stated.
In an earlier briefing launched in a single day, the ministry stated Russia continued to strike targets throughout Ukraine, together with many in densely populated areas, the ministry stated.
Russia is counting on “stand-off” missiles launched from inside its personal territory to cut back plane publicity to Ukrainian anti-aircraft hearth, the ministry stated. But it surely stated restricted shares of those weapons will drive Russia to “revert to much less subtle missiles or accepting extra threat to their plane.”
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LVIV, Ukraine — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy angrily warned Moscow that it’s sowing a deep hatred for Russia amongst his individuals, as fixed artillery barrages and aerial bombings are decreasing cities to rubble, killing civilians and driving others into shelters, leaving them to scrounge for meals and water to outlive.
“You’re doing all the pieces in order that our individuals themselves go away the Russian language, as a result of the Russian language will now be related solely with you, together with your explosions and murders, your crimes,” Zelenskyy stated in an impassioned video deal with late Saturday.
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KYIV, Ukraine — Ukraine’s nuclear watchdog says {that a} nuclear analysis facility in Kharkiv once more has come underneath shelling by Russia and the preventing makes it inconceivable to evaluate the harm.
The State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate stated that the neutron supply experimental facility within the Kharkiv Institute of Physics and Expertise got here underneath hearth Saturday.
Ukrainian authorities have beforehand reported that Russian shelling broken buildings on the Kharkiv facility, however there was no launch of radiation. The newly constructed neutron supply facility is meant for the analysis and manufacturing of radioisotopes for medical and industrial wants. The Worldwide Atomic Power Company has stated that the nuclear materials within the facility is all the time subcritical and the stock of radioactive materials could be very low, decreasing the dangers of radiation launch.
Kharkiv has been besieged by Russian forces because the begin of the invasion and has come underneath repeated shelling of its residential buildings and significant infrastructure.
Ukraine’s nuclear services have been threatened by the Russian invasion.
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LVIV, Ukraine — The governor of the Lviv area says a person was detained on suspicion of espionage on the website of one of many two rocket assaults that rattled town on Saturday.
Maksym Kozytskyy stated police discovered the person had recorded a rocket flying towards the goal and putting it. Police additionally discovered on his phone photographs of checkpoints within the area, which Kozytskyy stated had been despatched to 2 Russian phone numbers.
Rockets hit an oil storage facility and an unspecified industrial facility, wounding a minimum of 5 individuals. A thick plume of smoke and towering flames may very well be seen on Lviv’s outskirts hours after the assaults.
