The latest developments on the Russia-Ukraine war:
The latest developments on the Russia-Ukraine war: LVIV, Ukraine — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said he will continue negotiating with Russia and is waiting for a meeting with Vladimir Putin. Zelenskyy has repeatedly called for a meeting with Putin. But so far, his requests have gone unanswered by the Kremlin. Zelenskyy said Sunday during his nightly address to the nation that his delegation has a “clear task” to do everything to ensure a meeting between the two presidents. Zelenskyy said talks are held daily between the two countries via video conference. He said the talks are necessary to establish a cease-fire and more humanitarian corridors. He said those corridors have saved more than 130,000 people in six days. The humanitarian convoy to the besieged city of Mariupol was blocked Sunday by Russian forces. Zelenskyy said they would try again Monday. ____ LVIV, Ukraine — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said it is a “black day” after Russia shelled a military base in the western part of his country. Zelenskyy said in his nightly address on Sunday that Russia fired 30 rockets at the Yavoriv military base. He said the attack killed 35 people and injured 134 injured others. The base is less than 25 kilometers (15 miles) from the Polish border. Zelenskyy said he had given Western leaders “clear warning” of the danger to the base. He asked NATO leaders again to establish a no-fly zone over Ukraine. He warned “it is only a matter of time” before Russian missels fall on NATO territory. Military analysts say the U. S, Britain and their European allies are unlikely to impose a no-fly zone because they believe it could escalate the war in Ukraine into a nuclear confrontation between NATO and Russia. ___ GENEVA — The Red Cross is warning of a “worst-case scenario” for hundreds of thousands of civilians in the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol unless the parties agree to ensure their safety and access to humanitarian aid. The head of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Peter Maurer, said in a statement said Sunday that residents of Mariupol “have endured a weeks-long life-and-death nightmare.” The Geneva-based humanitarian agency said hundreds of thousands of people in the city are “facing extreme or total shortages of basic necessities like food, water and medicine.” “Dead bodies, of civilians and combatants, remain trapped under the rubble or lying in the open where they fell,” the ICRC added. “Life-changing injuries and chronic, debilitating conditions cannot be treated. The human suffering is simply immense.” The Red Cross called on the parties to agree on the terms of a cease-fire, routes for safe passage, and to ensure the deal is respected. It offered to act as a neutral intermediary in negotiations. ___ Ukraine says it has restored a broken power line to the Chernobyl power plant, the scene of a nuclear meltdown in 1986, which is held by Russian troops. Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko said that “heroes” from the national power grid company managed to restore the connection. The power is used to run pumps which keep spent nuclear fuel cool to prevent radiation leaks. Ukraine said Wednesday that power had been cut to the site and that there was enough diesel fuel to run on-site generators for 48 hours. The International Atomic Energy Agency played down concerns, saying it saw little risk of the pools containing the spent fuel overheating even without electricity. Belarus said Thursday it had set up an emergency power line to Chernobyl from its nearby border. ___ GENEVA — The U.N. human rights office says at least 596 civilians have been killed in Ukraine since the start of the war, and at least 1,067 have been injured. The Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights said Sunday that 43 of those killed were children, while 57 were injured. The Geneva-based office had documented 579 civilian deaths and 1,002 injured a day earlier. It said most recorded civilian casualties were caused “by the use of explosive weapons with a wide impact area,” such as shelling from heavy artillery and missile strikes. U.N. officials said they believe the actual number of casualties is “considerably higher” than so far recorded because the receipt of information has been delayed and many reports still need to be corroborated. ___ BELGRADE, Serbia — Dozens of cars drove through the Serbian capital of Belgrade on Sunday in support of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The occupants waved Russian and Serbian flags, honked horns and chanted pro-Putin slogans. Some cars had the letter Z painted on them — a symbol of support for the Russian president. The protest was organized by a small far-right group. Serbia has refused to join international sanctions against its ally Russia despite formally seeking EU membership and voting in favor of the U.N. resolution condemning Moscow’s aggression. Serbia’s dominant state-controlled media are daily carrying Moscow’s war propaganda, creating a strong pro-Putin mood among Serbia’s ultranationalists and far-right groups. ___ BERLIN — Three U.N. agencies are calling for an immediate end to attacks on health care facilities in Ukraine, calling them “an act of unconscionable cruelty.” In a joint statement Sunday, the U.N. Children’s Fund, the World Health Organization and the U.N. Population Fund said that “horrific attacks are killing and causing serious injuries to patients and health workers, destroying vital health infrastructure and forcing thousands to forgo accessing health services despite catastrophic needs.” “To attack the most vulnerable — babies, children, pregnant women, and those already suffering from illness and disease, and health workers risking their own lives to save lives — is an act of unconscionable cruelty,” they said. Since the start of the war at least 12 people were killed and 34 were injured, while 24 facilities and five ambulances were damaged or destroyed, the agencies said. They said that some 4,300 children have been born since the conflict began and 80,000 Ukrainian women are expected to give birth in the next three months, with oxygen and other medical supplies running dangerously low. “The health care system in Ukraine is clearly under significant strain, and its collapse would be a catastrophe. Every effort must be made to prevent this from happening,” they said. ___ BERLIN — The head of a group providing humanitarian aid in Ukraine says the international community needs to start making plans for how to help the country when the war ends. Pavlo Titko, who heads the Ukraine branch of the Germany-based Malteser aid group, says the conflict could worsen the already difficult demographic situation in Ukraine where many educated young people have moved abroad, leaving the poor and elderly behind. Titko told The Associated Press in a telephone interview Sunday from Ukraine’s eastern city of Lviv that the country needs a “long-term perspective.” He urged Western nations to create partnerships between cities and institutions such as those established with Ukraine during the 1990s that helped prevent some of the worst impacts of the economic crisis following the collapse of the Soviet Union. Titko said Malteser Ukraine, which provides thousands of warm meals at train stations and border crossings each day, has also begun offering psychological help to those traumatized by the war. That need will dramatically increase in future, he predicted. ___ LIMASSOL, Cyprus — Dozens of Russian nationals joined Ukrainians in the coastal resort town of Limassol, home to a sizeable Russian expatriate community, to protest the war in Ukraine. About 50 Russians converged on Limassol’s promenade prior to joining with other protesters Sunday to chant slogans including “Stop the war, stop Putin” and “Russia without Putin.” They waved blue and white flags that they said were the Russian national flag without the red stripe that represented “blood and violence.” Protester Evgeniya Shlykova, who has been living and working in Cyprus for five years, told The Associated Press that despite Russian propaganda, Ukraine “didn’t deserve this action from our government” and that protesters are demanding an immediate end to the war “that we don’t support.
