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Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev has described economic sanctions imposed on the country as an “act of aggression” on the part of individual states and their unions.
Medvedev, who advises Vladimir Putin on national security matters and is among those subject to sanctions, said Russia had the right to defend itself within the framework of international law. Noone should doubt that it would use this right within the boundaries of what it “considers appropriate”, he said, in a message posted on Telegram.
Sanctions were aimed at weakening the Russian state and prompting uprising against the authorities, but such attempts would backfire, he said. Instead, sanctions would cause the public to rally around the current leadership, while deepening resentment towards those responsible for imposing sanctions, he added.
Poland on Friday summoned France’s ambassador over French President Emmanuel Macron’s reference to Poland’s prime minister as a “far-right anti-Semite” in a budding feud over Russia’s war on Ukraine, reports Associated Press.
Officials in Poland blamed the comments on campaign fervor ahead of this weekend’s presidential election in France.
More from AP:
The bitter exchange between Macron and Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki appears as an unwelcome crack in the European Union’s unity forged amid outrage over Russia’s aggression on Ukraine.
In an interview published online by the French Le Parisien newspaper Thursday, Macron called Morawiecki a “far-right anti-Semite who bans LGBT persons.”
Macron, who is seeking a second term in Sunday’s vote, also claimed that Morawiecki has been trying to help French far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen.
Piotr Mueller, a spokesman for Poland’s right-wing government, said it was a “lie” to suggest that Morawiecki had anything to do with anti-Semitism and blamed Macron’s remarks on the emotions of a heated election campaign.Poles are especially sensitive to accusations of anti-Semitism because of the Holocaust that Nazi Germany largely carried out in Poland.
The French leader’s remarks were in response to Morawiecki’s criticism of his talks with Russia’s leader Vladimir Putin in a still futile effort to end the bloodshed in Ukraine. Morawiecki said on Monday that no talks should be held with (war) criminals like Nazi Germany’s leader Adolf Hitler or the Soviet Union’s Joseph Stalin.
The Czech Republic has delivered tanks, multiple rocket launchers, howitzers and infantry fighting vehicles to Ukraine, among military shipments that have reached hundreds of millions of dollars, Reuters reports.
Ukraine has repeatedly called on the West to urgently supply more weapons, especially heavy equipment.
More from Reuters:
The Czech Republic - a former Soviet satellite as part of then Czechoslovakia - has spare equipment that Ukrainian forces are familiar with in storage as well as a defence industry focused on upgrades and trade in such weapons. It has been among the most active EU nations in backing Ukraine.
Defence sources confirmed to Reuters a shipment of five T-72 tanks and five BVP-1, or BMP-1, infantry fighting vehicles seen on rail cars in photographs on Twitter and video footage this week, but those were not the first shipments of heavy equipment.
“For several weeks, we have been supplying heavy ground equipment - I am saying it generally but by definition it is clear that this includes tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, howitzers and multiple rocket launchers,” a senior defence official said.
“What has gone from the Czech Republic is in the hundreds of millions of dollars.”
The sources declined to discuss numbers of weapons supplied.
The senior defence official said the Czechs were also supplying a range of anti-aircraft weaponry.
Independent defence analyst Lukas Visingr said short-range air-defence systems Strela-10, or SA-13 Gopher in Nato terminology, have been spotted on a train apparently bound for Ukraine, in line with a report in Czech weekly respekt.cz.
The Defence Ministry declined to comment on concrete military aid.
Zelenskiy calls for "firm" global response to railway station strike
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy described the missile strike on a railway station in eastern Ukraine as a Russian war crime “for which everyone involved will be held accountable”.
In his nightly video address, Zelenskiy said five children were among 50 people killed when a missile hit Kramatorsk railway station on Friday.
“We expect a firm, global response to this war crime. Like the massacre in Bucha, like many other Russian war crimes, the missile strike on Kramatorsk must be one of the charges at the tribunal, which is bound to happen,” he said.
“All the efforts of the world will be aimed to establish every minute: who did what, who gave orders. Where did the rocket come from, who was carrying it, who gave the order and how the strike was coordinated,” he said.
Russia has denied responsibility.
Zelenskiy said 38 people were killed instantly, while a further 12 people died in hospital.
Zelenskiy also repeated his call for more weapons to be provided to Ukraine, and for sanctions against Russia to be intensified.
“The pressure on Russia must be increased. It is necessary to introduce a full energy embargo - on oil, on gas. It is energy exports that provide the lion’s share of Russia’s profits. Russian banks must also be completely disconnected from the global financial system,” he said.
Zelenskiy added that Ukraine had provided details of the military equipment it requires.
“Any delay in providing such weapons to Ukraine, any excuses can mean only one thing: the relevant politicians want to help the Russian leadership more than us Ukrainians,” he said.
Updated
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said he had a productive phone call with US President Joe Biden on Friday, in which they “shared views on the conflict in Ukraine”.
I had a productive call with US President @JoeBiden earlier this evening. As part of deepening relations, we agreed to set up a team to strengthen trade, increase investment in infrastructure and work to tackle climate change. pic.twitter.com/NTris3xHfr
— Cyril Ramaphosa 🇿🇦 (@CyrilRamaphosa) April 8, 2022
South Africa was among the 58 countries that abstained from voting on the UN General Assembly resolution which suspended Russia from the UN Human Rights Council in response to Moscow’s invasion of and alleged rights abuses in Ukraine.
“We shared views on the conflict in Ukraine and agreed on the need for a ceasefire and dialogue between Ukraine and Russia,” Ramaphosa wrote on Twitter.
On Thursday, Ramaphosa criticised the UN Security Council as “outdated and unrepresentative,” he said, adding that it disadvantages countries with developing economies.
Some 6,665 people were evacuated through humanitarian corridors on Friday, according to the Kyiv Independent.
It reports that Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said 5,158 people were rescued from Mariupol and Berdiansk.
⚡️Vereshchuk: 6,665 people evacuated through humanitarian corridors on April 8.
— The Kyiv Independent (@KyivIndependent) April 8, 2022
Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said 5,158 people came from Mariupol and Berdiansk. Of those evacuated 1,614 were from Mariupol.
Amnesty International has said it will redouble its efforts to “expose Russia’s egregious human rights violations”, following the news that Moscow has closed the rights group’s local office.
In a statement Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General, said:
The authorities are deeply mistaken if they believe that by closing down our office in Moscow they will stop our work documenting and exposing human rights violations.
We continue undeterred to work to ensure that people in Russia are able to enjoy their human rights without discrimination.
We will redouble our efforts to expose Russia’s egregious human rights violations both at home and abroad.
After a historic collapse in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the ruble has returned to pre-war levels, reports AFP.
However, analysts say that success is in many ways artificial and does not bode well for the health of the Russian economy.
More from AFP:
Sofya Donets, chief economist at Renaissance Capital, said the ruble recovery has been aided by an unprecedented trade surplus amid high energy prices.
Oil and gas, Russia’s main exports, keep flowing abroad, filling Russia’s coffers.
The United States has banned Russian oil imports and the EU adopted a ban on Russian steel imports but those penalties have largely spared key Russian exports.
“It only affects five percent of Russian exports, so it’s not that much,” said Donets.
Robust exports have been supplemented by harsh capital controls introduced by the central bank.
The West froze some $300 billion of Russia’s foreign currency reserves abroad, a move that Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has described as “theft”.
To counter the sanctions, exporting companies were forced to sell 80 percent of their export earnings to buy rubles.
Russians have also been barred from withdrawing more than $10,000 in foreign currency or taking more than that amount out of the country, and foreign investors have been banned from selling Russian assets.
Late Friday the central bank relaxed some curbs, saying that from April 18 it was scrapping the ban on buying dollars and euros introduced in early March.
The rapid ruble recovery does not equal a strong economy, however, analysts said.
Economists believe that the worst economic impact of the sanctions is still to come and expect Russia, which has relied heavily on imports of manufacturing equipment and consumer goods, to plunge into a deep recession.
Rebecca Ratcliffe here, taking over from my colleague Dani Anguiano.
Two UN agencies have called for “urgent action” to help an estimated 1,000 seafarers stranded in Ukrainian ports and waters with dwindling supplies.
According to the heads of the International Labour Organization and International Maritime Organization, more than 100 trading vessels are trapped, including in the besieged city of Mariupol, and on vessels in the Sea of Azov.
They warn:
As well as the dangers arising from bombardment, many of the ships concerned now lack food, fuel, fresh water and other vital supplies. The situation of the seafarers from many countries is becoming increasingly untenable as a result, presenting grave risks to their health and well-being.
The two agencies have called for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, International Committee of the Red Cross and Médecins Sans Frontières to assist in providing vital supplies.
Summary
Here are some of the key developments of the day:
-
The US believes Russia used a short range ballistic missile in an attack on the Kramatorsk train station in east Ukraine, which killed at least 52 people, including five children. Russia has denied it is responsible for the attack.
- Some Russian military units have experienced major losses, a senior US defense official said, and the Pentagon estimates Russia’s combat power is somewhere between 80% and 85% of pre-invasion levels. The US defense department is expecting Russia to shift its focus on the Donbas region and eastern.
-
International prices for food commodities, including grains and vegetable oils, reached all time highs last month amid Russia’s war in Ukraine. The conflict is causing massive disruptions, the United Nations said Friday, threatening millions of people in Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere with hunger and malnourishment.
- Russian troops have “forcibly deported” more than 600,000 Ukrainians, including about 121,000 children, to Russia, Ukraine’s human rights commissioner, Lyudmila Denysova, said. Denysova also said residents of the temporarily occupied city of Izyum in the Kharkiv region are being forcibly moved to Russia.
- The European Commission’s president, Ursula von der Leyen, pledged to offer Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, a speedier start to his country’s bid to become a member of the EU. At a joint press conference with Zelenskiy, the European Commission chief said: “It will not as usual be a matter of years to form this opinion but I think a matter of weeks.”
- Forensic investigators have begun exhuming a mass grave in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, wrapping in black plastic and laying out the bodies of civilians who officials say were killed during the Russian invasion. Since Russian troops pulled back from Bucha last week, Ukrainian officials say hundreds of civilians have been found dead.
- Russia’s justice ministry has revoked the registration of 15 foreign organisations, including those of Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. In a statement, the ministry said the Russian units of the organisations “were excluded due to the discovery of violations of the current legislation of the Russian Federation”. Human Rights Watch said the move is proof the Russian government “has no use for any facts regarding the protections of civilians in Ukraine”.
The attack on the Kramatorsk train station has killed at least 52 people and wounded dozens more, Ukrainian officials said.
Officials previously reported at least 50 people were killed in the strike on the station, which the city’s mayor said was filled with 4,000 people, most of them elderly, women and children, attempting to leave before fighting in the area intensified.
Photos showed a bloodied stuffed animal at the station as well as the dead covered with tarps and the remnants of a rocket with the words “For the children” painted on it in Russian.
The British government, facing growing criticism, said on Friday it had issued 41,000 visas to Ukrainians as part of its efforts to help refugees of Russia’s war in Ukraine.
The government has said it is working as quickly as possible to help Ukrainians as part of what it described as the biggest and fastest refugee operation in its history.
Britain has set up two programs to help Ukrainians, one that allows refugees to stay with people who have offered accommodation and one for those with family who are already in the UK.
More from Reuters:
According to the latest figures, just under 80,000 applications have so been submitted. For the 36,300 made under the family scheme, 28,500 visas had been issued and 10,800 people had been admitted.
But for the “Homes for Ukraine” scheme, just 12,500 visas had been issued from the 43,600 applications. As of Tuesday, just 1,200 refugees had arrived in Britain under this scheme, according to the data.
Those involved, both Ukrainians and the Britons opening up their homes to refugees, have criticised it for being overly bureaucratic and complicated, meaning some refugees have been left in limbo for weeks waiting to travel to Britain despite having accommodation ready for them.
A senior US defense official said some Russian units in Ukraine are depleted and that Russia’s combat power is somewhere between 80% and 85% of pre-invasion levels.
The Pentagon determined some Russian units that recently retreated from around Kyiv were heavily damaged and depleted, putting into question their combat utility.
“We’ve seen indications of some units that are literally, for all intents and purposes, eradicated,” the official said.
There are indications that Moscow has begun mobilizing some reservists and could be looking to recruit more than 60,000 personnel, the official said.
The Pentagon believes Russia used a short range ballistic missile in an attack on the Kramatorsk train station in east Ukraine, which killed at least 50 people on Friday, a senior US defense official said.
The US military thinks a SS-21 Scarab missile was used in the strike, the official said. It is not yet clear whether cluster munitions were used.
“We are not buying the denial by the Russians that they weren’t responsible,” the official said.
The train station attacked today in Ukraine is a “major rail hub” with strategic value, given its location in eastern Europe, senior U.S. defense official says.
— Dan Lamothe (@DanLamothe) April 8, 2022
This is Dani Anguiano taking over the liveblog from my colleague Lauren Aratani.
International prices for food commodities, including grains and vegetable oils, reached all time highs last month amid Russia’s war in Ukraine. The conflict is causing massive disruptions, the United Nations said Friday, threatening millions of people in Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere with hunger and malnourishment.
More from the Associated Press:
The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization said its Food Price Index, which tracks monthly changes in international prices for a basket of commodities, averaged 159.3 points last month, up 12.6% from February. As it is, the February index was the highest level since its inception in 1990.
FAO said the war in Ukraine was largely responsible for the 17.1% rise in the price of grains, including wheat and others like oats, barley and corn. Together, Russia and Ukraine account for around 30% and 20% of global wheat and corn exports, respectively.
Soaring food prices and disruption to supplies coming from Russia and Ukraine have threatened food shortages in countries in the Middle East, Africa and parts of Asia where many people already were not getting enough to eat.
Vadym Prystaiko, Ukraine’s ambassador to the UK, has called for Nato and other international forces to play a more active role in the Black Sea to allow Ukrainian exports, mostly grains, to go out.
The US defense department is expecting Russia to shift its focus on the Donbas region and eastern.
Ukraine, according to John Kirby, press secretary for the US Department of Defense. The US is looking to provide more supplies to the region, including weapons, ammunition and intel.
Kirby: With apparent focus of invasion shifting to Donbas & eastern Ukraine, DOD continues to look to provide Ukraine w/what can be most helpful in the region, whether weapons, ammunition, or intel. Potential for increased intensity and prolonged conflict, @PentagonPresSec notes.
— Andrew Clevenger (@andclev) April 8, 2022
Kirby also said that the attack at the railway station in eastern Ukraine is “a piece of Russian brutality in the prosecution of this war’ and noted that Russia had claimed responsibility for the attack until it saw the civilian casualties.
Updated
Responding to Russia’s announcement that the government is closing the local offices of human rights organizations Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, Human Rights Watch says that the move is further proof that the government “has no use for any facts regarding the protections of civilians in Ukraine”.
“HRW has been working on Russia since the Soviet era, when it was a closed totalitarian state. We found ways of documenting human rights abuses then, and we will do so in the future,” the organization said in a statement. “As we did this, we called on Russia to return to the standards it is obligated to uphold under the UN human rights system. And we will continue to do this.”
The Russian government had already made it abundantly clear that it has no use for any facts regarding the protection of civilians in #Ukraine.
— Human Rights Watch (@hrw) April 8, 2022
This is just one small further proof of that.
Updated
A clip from earlier today of Maria Zakharova, Russia’s director of information and press department for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, has gone viral for some bizarre comments she made about Ukrainians and borscht.
“They wouldn’t share the borscht recipe … It had to belong to one people, to one nationality,” Zakharova, referring to the beet soup. “They couldn’t bear the thought that every … housewife in the world would be able to cook it her way. This is what we are talking about. The xenophobia, the fascism, the extremism ... ”
Bizarre comments by Maria Zakharova, the Russian MFA spox:
— V. Cheianov, Esq. (@cheianov) April 8, 2022
"Even cookbooks were banned [in Ukraine]. Why? Because they wouldn't share the borscht recipe... It had to belong to one people, to one nationality. They couldn't bear the thought that.. every housewife in the world
./1 pic.twitter.com/zqjBXIQzOI
Updated
Ukraine’s prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said that prosecutors and forensic teams are working to examine bodies found in Bucha and on exhuming bodies from a temporary mass burial. Venediktova said that 164 bodies had been found in the Kyiv suburb, according to CNN.
Exhumation of bodies from the place of temporary mass burial began in Bucha. Prosecutors & forensic teams and examine each body.We already have over 100 pages of data about invaders, who occupied Bucha.Our current task is to identify all involved in the massacre.#RussianWarCrimes pic.twitter.com/OnDADna6Nh
— Iryna Venediktova (@VenediktovaIV) April 8, 2022
Updated
This is Lauren Aratani taking over for Léonie Chao-Fong.
The US defense department said that some Russian military units have seen some serious losses, according to a senior US defense official, ABC News is reporting.
“We’ve seen indications of some units that are literally for all intents and purposes eradicated,” the official said.
There has also been indications that Russia has been deploying reservists and are hoping to recruit 60,000 troops for mobilization.
U.S. also sees indications Russians have begun mobilization of reservists, and are hoping to recruit upwards of 60k troops for this mobilization phase. "It remains to be seen how successful they'll be..and where those reinforcements would go, how much training they would get."
— Matt Seyler (@MattSeyler) April 8, 2022
Updated
Summary
It is 9pm in Kyiv. Here’s where we stand now:
-
A Russian ballistic missile hit a crowded train station in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk, where 4,000 people were waiting to be evacuated, on Friday mid-morning. At least 50 people, including five children, were killed, according to the governor of Donetsk, Pavlo Kyrylenko. Russia has denied it was responsible.
-
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, accused Russian forces of deliberately targeting civilians and said no Ukrainian troops were at the train station when it was attacked. In a statement, Zelenskiy said: “This is an evil that has no limits. And if it is not punished, it will never stop.” The Ukrainian foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, also accused Russia of the “deliberate slaughter” of civilians.
-
The United Nations children’s agency Unicef’s Ukraine representative, Murat Sahin, condemned the rocket strike on Kramatorsk station in east Ukraine and demanded that “the killing of children must stop now”. In a statement, Sahin said the agency did “not know yet how many children were killed and injured in the attack, but we fear the worst”.
- Boris Johnson condemned the attack on fleeing civilians at the Kramatorsk train station, describing it as “unconscionable” in a joint press conference with the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz. Scholz said he agreed that Vladimir Putin “bears the responsibility for these war crimes”.
-
Russian troops have “forcibly deported” more than 600,000 Ukrainians, including about 121,000 children, to Russia, Ukraine’s human rights commissioner, Lyudmila Denysova, said. Denysova also said residents of the temporarily occupied city of Izyum in the Kharkiv region are being forcibly moved to Russia.
-
The European Commission’s president, Ursula von der Leyen, pledged to offer Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, a speedier start to his country’s bid to become a member of the EU. At a joint press conference with Zelenskiy, the European Commission chief said: “It will not as usual be a matter of years to form this opinion but I think a matter of weeks.”
- Forensic investigators have begun exhuming a mass grave in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, wrapping in black plastic and laying out the bodies of civilians who officials say were killed during the Russian invasion. Since Russian troops pulled back from Bucha last week, Ukrainian officials say hundreds of civilians have been found dead.
- Russia’s justice ministry has revoked the registration of 15 foreign organisations, including those of Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. In a statement, the ministry said the Russian units of the organisations “were excluded due to the discovery of violations of the current legislation of the Russian Federation”.
- Russian forces abandoned “a lot” of tanks, vehicles, and artillery in a “hasty” withdrawal from northern Ukraine that may be a sign of a “collapse of the will to fight”, according to a western official. The official confirmed that there are no longer Russian units in northern Ukraine.
- Britain has added the Russian president Vladimir Putin’s daughters to its sanctions list, mirroring moves by the United States. An update to the UK sanctions list announced asset freezes on Katerina Tikhonova and Maria Vorontsova, who were named in US sanctions on Wednesday as Putin’s two adult daughters.
That’s it from me, Léonie Chao-Fong, for today. I will now hand the blog over to my US colleague, Lauren Aratani, who will continue to bring you all the latest news from the war in Ukraine.
Updated
The European Commission’s president, Ursula von der Leyen, pledged to offer Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy a speedier start to his country’s bid to become a member of the EU, Reuters reports.
Von der Leyen handed Zelenskiy a questionnaire which will form a starting point for the EU to decide on membership for Kyiv.
The European Commission chief said:
It will not as usual be a matter of years to form this opinion but I think a matter of weeks.
Zelenskiy told journalists that the questionnaire would be ready in a week.
The EU must monitor Russian attempts to circumvent sanctions and impose stricter ones if necessary, she said at a joint briefing with Zelenskiy in Kyiv:
Russia will descend into economic, financial and technological decay, while Ukraine is marching towards the European future, this is what I see.
Updated
Residents of a village north of Kyiv have said that more than 300 people were trapped in a school basement for weeks by Russian occupiers, scrawling the names of the dead on a peeling wall.
Halyna Tolochina, a member of the Yahidne village council, struggled to compose herself as she went through the list, scribbled in black on the plaster either side of a green door, in the gloomy warren where she said she and hundreds of others were confined.
To the left of the door were the names of seven people killed by Russian soldiers. To the right were the names of 10 people who died because of the harsh conditions in the basement, she said.
“This old man died first,” Tolochina said, pointing at the name Muzyka D, for Dmytro Muzyka, whose death was recorded on 9 March. “He died in the big room, in this one.”
She said Muzyka’s body lay for a few days in a boiler room until, during a break in shelling, some people were allowed to take the dead to be buried in hastily dug graves in the village cemetery.
Reuters spoke to seven residents of Yahidne who said that in total at least 20 people died or were killed during the Russian occupation. No official death toll has been released by Ukrainian authorities.
Reuters was not able to independently verify the villagers’ accounts. Reporters saw one freshly dug grave in a field by the village, and two bodies wrapped in white plastic sheets.
The Kremlin did not respond to requests for comment on the events in Yahidne.
The accounts of what happened in the village add to growing testimony from Ukrainian civilians of suffering in the towns around Kyiv during the weeks of occupation by Russian forces.
Updated
Russia to close Amnesty, Human Rights Watch offices
Russia’s justice ministry has revoked the registration of 15 foreign organisations, including those of Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, Reuters reports.
In a statement, the ministry said the Russian units of the organisations, which also included the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, “were excluded due to the discovery of violations of the current legislation of the Russian Federation”.
121,000 children 'forcibly deported' to Russia, Ukraine’s rights commissioner says
Russian troops have “forcibly deported” more than 600,000 Ukrainians, including about 121,000 children, to Russia, Ukraine’s human rights commissioner, Lyudmila Denysova, said.
In a statement posted on Facebook, Denysova said residents of the temporarily occupied city of Izyum in the Kharkiv region are being forcibly moved to Russia.
Denysova said:
This is not the first time Russian troops have used such tactics. After bringing the city to a critical situation, the enemy offers a conditional corridor to Russia, ostensibly to save people, leaving people no choice.
Currently, Russian media report that they have deported 615,000 people from Ukraine, including 121,000 children.
The Guardian’s Shaun Walker has been visiting the village of Novyi Bykiv, close to the city of Chernihiv, 100 miles north of Kyiv.
Russian forces set up base in a local school, where they smashed up every classroom and stole all the computers, he writes.
In the Ukrainian village of Novyi Bykiv, the Russians set up their base in the local school. The whole place is totally wrecked now, just two years after it was renovated.
— Shaun Walker (@shaunwalker7) April 8, 2022
But the messages they left behind and the way they behaved are quite revealing. Thread: pic.twitter.com/qJ7YeaRDHN
They painted over the faces on posters of Ukrainian historical /literary figures. pic.twitter.com/XHFFcpkoqS
— Shaun Walker (@shaunwalker7) April 8, 2022
On the class blackboards soldiers had left messages. “Slavic brothers, you’re being cheated”. And “sorry, we didn’t want this war”. And grotesquely given what was all around “let’s live peacefully”. Someone else had drawn a GRU bat. pic.twitter.com/kQGT2Ohl6S
— Shaun Walker (@shaunwalker7) April 8, 2022
Updated
Russian forces abandoned “a lot” of tanks, vehicles, and artillery in a “hasty” withdrawal from northern Ukraine that may be a sign of a “collapse of the will to fight”, according to a western official, PA news agency reports.
The western official confirmed that there are no longer Russian units in northern Ukraine, adding:
It has been a pretty hasty withdrawal by Russian forces and there’s a lot of Russian equipment which has been abandoned in that hasty withdrawal and that’s only going to exacerbate the challenge they have in terms of the refurbishment and reconstitution of their forces as they remove them both into Belarus and into Russia.
They added:
Some of it’s kind of unclear as to why it’s been abandoned because you might have thought there is some of these vehicles are still usable and you think they would have been able to take and I think there’s something around the collapse of morale and the collapse of the will to fight.
Updated
Kramatorsk rail strike was a 'crime against humanity', prosecutor general says
Ukraine’s prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova, said a deadly missile strike on a rail station packed with evacuees in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk was a “crime against humanity”, Reuters reports.
Venediktova said a pre-trial investigation has been launched into the Kramatorsk station attack.
Summary
It is just past 7pm in Kyiv. Here’s where we stand now:
-
A Russian ballistic missile hit a crowded train station in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk, where 4,000 people were waiting to be evacuated, on Friday mid-morning. At least 50 people, including five children, were killed, according to the governor of Donetsk, Pavlo Kyrylenko. Russia has denied it was responsible.
-
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, accused Russian forces of deliberately targeting civilians and said no Ukrainian troops were at the train station when it was attacked. In a statement, Zelenskiy said: “This is an evil that has no limits. And if it is not punished, it will never stop.” The Ukrainian foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, also accused Russia of the “deliberate slaughter” of civilians.
-
The United Nations children’s agency Unicef’s Ukraine representative, Murat Sahin, condemned the rocket strike on Kramatorsk station in east Ukraine and demanded that “the killing of children must stop now”. In a statement, Sahin said the agency did “not know yet how many children were killed and injured in the attack, but we fear the worst”.
- Boris Johnson condemned the attack on fleeing civilians at the Kramatorsk train station, describing it as “unconscionable” in a joint press conference with the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz. Scholz said he agreed that Vladimir Putin “bears the responsibility for these war crimes”.
- Forensic investigators have begun exhuming a mass grave in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, wrapping in black plastic and laying out the bodies of civilians who officials say were killed during the Russian invasion. Since Russian troops pulled back from Bucha last week, Ukrainian officials say hundreds of civilians have been found dead.
- Russian forces have now fully withdrawn from Ukraine’s north to Belarus and Russia, the UK’s Ministry of Defence said. “At least some of these forces will be transferred to East Ukraine to fight in the Donbas,” the report added.
- Britain has added the Russian president Vladimir Putin’s daughters to its sanctions list, mirroring moves by the United States. An update to the UK sanctions list announced asset freezes on Katerina Tikhonova and Maria Vorontsova, who were named in US sanctions on Wednesday as Putin’s two adult daughters.
Updated
Boris Johnson has condemned the attack on fleeing civilians at the Kramatorsk train station, describing it as “unconscionable” in a joint press conference with German chancellor, Olaf Scholz.
Johnson said:
The attack at the train station in eastern Ukraine shows the depth to which Putin’s once vaunted army has sunk.
At least 39 people killed and dozens wounded on a train platform crowded with women and children.
It is a war crime indiscriminately to attack civilians and Russian crimes in Ukraine will not go unnoticed or unpunished.
Scholz said he agreed that Vladimir Putin “bears the responsibility for these war crimes”, adding:
I call upon Russia again to finally agree a ceasefire and withdraw its troops.
This war needs to stop immediately.
Updated
The 50-metre motor vessel, modest by oligarch standards, is covered in scaffolding and sitting under a hangar in dry dock, one of many such boats being refitted in the Dutch port of Vlissingen.
What sets the Aquamarine apart is that, until the day of the invasion of Ukraine, it belonged to Russia’s best-known businessman, Roman Abramovich, a Guardian investigation has revealed. On 24 February, ownership of the yacht passed from a company previously controlled by Abramovich to a close associate of his, the Russian businessman David Davidovich.
The Aquamarine is the fifth yacht to have been recently linked to Abramovich, who was placed under sanctions by the UK and EU for his reported links to the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. His fleet includes two megayachts worth more than $1bn, which were scrambled to Turkey after Abramovich was blacklisted, and two smaller boats currently moored in the Caribbean.
Davidovich told the Guardian that he was the owner of Aquamarine as well as the Jersey-domiciled company MHC Jersey Ltd, which is registered as the owner of the yacht on the maritime database MarineTraffic.
“I can confirm that I am the owner of MHC Jersey Ltd and the Aquamarine yacht,” Davidovich said in a written statement.
Davidovich also said that he was the majority owner of the British Virgin Islands-listed Norma Investments, an investment vehicle that is listed as the only shareholder of Aquamarine’s owner MHC Jersey Ltd, according to Jersey public record.
Survivors of the Russian rocket strike on the train station in Kramatorsk said they saw “bodies everywhere” as they desperately searched for loved ones among the wreckage of today’s attack, AFP reports.
Hundreds of people were gathered at the station when the attack took place, waiting for evacuation out of east Ukraine as they had done at the same time for the last several days.
This was how Kramatorsk train station looked before the Russian rocket attacked. Crowds of civilians, including children, scrambling to flee the Donbas as Putin’s forces bear down on the eastern region. https://t.co/nSYXRZF65W
— Christopher Miller (@ChristopherJM) April 8, 2022
One survivor, Natalia, was searching for her passport among the abandoned belongings as she told AFP:
I was in the station. I heard like a double explosion. I rushed to the wall for protection.
I saw people covered in blood coming into the station and bodies everywhere on the ground. I don’t know if they were just injured or dead.
The bodies of around 30 people, all dressed in civilian clothing, were grouped together and placed under plastic sheets next to a kiosk daubed with the colours of Ukraine’s flag outside the station.
Another woman was seen approaching the bodies, holding her phone to her ear and saying:
I’m looking for my husband. He was here. I can’t reach him.
A soldier at one of the three hospitals in the city told AFP that around 50 wounded had arrived from the scene.
He said:
Many of them will die because they have lost a lot of blood, and we don’t have enough blood.
UN children’s agency ‘fears the worst’ over Kramatorsk station strike death toll
The United Nations children’s agency Unicef’s Ukraine representative, Murat Sahin, has condemned the rocket strike on Kramatorsk station in east Ukraine and demanded that “the killing of children must stop now”.
In a statement, Sahin said the agency did “not know yet how many children were killed and injured in the attack, but we fear the worst”.
Sahin said:
Kramatorsk train station has been the main route out for thousands of families evacuating from Donetsk oblast, which has seen some of the war’s worst destruction, to relatively safer areas in Ukraine.
A Unicef team was delivering humanitarian supplies just a kilometre away from the train station when the attack took place, he added.
Civilians, particularly children, must be protected from harm. The killing of children must stop now.
Updated
Germany’s chancellor, Olaf Scholz, and the UK’s prime minister, Boris Johnson, are expected to hold a joint press conference in the next few minutes, following a meeting of the two leaders in Downing Street in London.
My colleague Nicola Slawson will be covering the press conference on our UK politics live blog. I will continue here with the news from the war in Ukraine, and the top lines that emerge in the UK.
Updated
Kramatorsk train station attack death toll rises to 50 – Donetsk governor
A quick snap from Reuters that Ukraine’s governor of Donetsk, Pavlo Kyrylenko, has said the death toll at Kramatorsk train station has risen to 50. That number includes five children.
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, earlier said no Ukrainian troops were at the train station when it was attacked. The mayor of Kramatorsk said there were 4,000 people, most of them elderly, women and children, at the station at the time of the attack. Russia has denied it was responsible.
Luke Harding is in Kyiv for us, and here is his report: ‘Evil that has no limits’: Zelenskiy condemns Kramatorsk station attack
- That is it from me, Martin Belam, from London for this week. I will be back on Monday. I’m handing you over to Léonie Chao-Fong again.
Updated
Russia has just announced that it is expelling 45 employees of the Polish embassy and consulate staff in retaliation for Poland’s actions. On 23 March, Poland’s interior minister Mariusz Kaminski has said his nation would expel “45 Russian spies pretending to be diplomats”.
In addition, Reuters reports Russia is expelling two Bulgarian diplomats from Moscow. Bulgaria had already recalled its ambassador from Moscow for consultations over “undiplomatic, sharp and rude” comments by the Russian ambassador to Sofia.
Forensic investigators have began exhuming a mass grave in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, wrapping in black plastic and laying out the bodies of civilians who officials say were killed during a Russian invasion.
Ruslan Kravchenko from the prosecutor’s office in Bucha told Reuters they had exhumed 20 bodies, 18 of whom had firearms and shrapnel wounds. He said two women had been identified, one of whom had worked at a supermarket in the town centre.
“There are witnesses who can confirm that these people were killed by the Russian forces. Without any reason, they were just walking down the street or being evacuated,” he told Reuters. “Some of them were just speaking Ukrainian.”
Kravchenko said the forensic investigators would work to build up a picture of what happened to those buried in the mass grave, where the remains of corpses poked through the earth.
Since Russian troops pulled back from Bucha last week, Ukrainian officials say hundreds of civilians have been found dead. Bucha’s deputy mayor said more than 360 civilians were killed and around 260-280 were buried in the mass grave by other residents.
The figures have not been independently verified. The Kremlin said on Tuesday the allegations that Russian forces had executed civilians in Bucha were a “monstrous forgery”.
As part of their visit to Ukraine today, European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen and the EU’s top diplomatic official Josep Borrell visited the mass grave in Bucha, accompanied by Ukraine’s prime minister Denys Shmyhal.
Updated
Ukraine’s foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba has just tweeted to say he has had discussions with his counterpart from Bahrain, saying:
Spoke with foreign minister Dr Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani of Bahrain, who briefed me on results of his visit to Moscow. His message there was: Bahrain calls for peace. I informed on Russia’s war crimes, including the murderous missile strike on Kramatorsk train station.
Spoke with Foreign Minister Dr. Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani of Bahrain, who briefed me on results of his visit to Moscow. His message there was: Bahrain calls for peace. I informed on Russia’s war crimes, including the murderous missile strike on Kramatorsk train station.
— Dmytro Kuleba (@DmytroKuleba) April 8, 2022
Updated
The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has arrived at 10 Downing Street in London, the official residence of the British prime minister, Boris Johnson, who greeted him.
Updated
The US embassy in Kyiv has paid no heed to any denials that Russian forces were behind the attack on Kramatorsk train station this morning. They have tweeted an image showing the aftermath of the strike, with the message:
The Russian missile attack on the Kramatorsk railway station, a hub for civilian evacuations, which left dozens of people killed and more than 100 injured, is one more atrocity committed by Russia in Ukraine. The world will hold Putin to account.
There has been another set of diplomatic expulsions. This time Reuters reports it is Finland who are expelling two Russian diplomats, and they will discontinue the visa of another due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
- It is Martin Belam back here on the blog for an hour – you can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com
The number of people fleeing Ukraine has slowed but those now escaping have often spent weeks in “dire” conditions, the UN refugee agency said.
UNHCR said 4,382,316 Ukrainians had fled the country since the war began on 24 February, an increase of 62,822 on Wednesday’s figures. That figure includes 22,957 people who have gone to Russia since 29 March, following updated numbers from Moscow, AFP reports.
UNHCR spokesperson Matt Saltmarsh told reporters:
The war in Ukraine has triggered one of the fastest-growing displacement and humanitarian crises ever.
While the pace of arrivals is slowing, overall flows continue given the ongoing hostilities.
Agency staff had observed that newly arrived refugees were coming from various parts of the country, including the east, having spent weeks “hunkering down at home or in shelters in dire conditions”, he said.
Updated
Russia has banned Chatham House from the country, declaring the London-based thinktank to be an “undesirable organisation” that presents a threat to Russia’s national security and constitutional order.
The decision was announced in a statement by the Russian prosecutor general on Friday.
The decision will ban Chatham House from any activities in Russia. The decision is also meant to have a chilling effect, preventing local organisations from maintaining ties with Chatham House or local media from citing the thinktank’s research.
Chatham House, also known as the Royal Institute of International Affairs, is a prominent UK policy institute with a dedicated Russia and Eurasia programme.
The “undesirable” label has been applied to numerous US non-governmental organisations such as the National Endowment for Democracy and International Republican Institute, as well as a number of UK-based NGOs.
Among them are the Khodorkovsky Foundation and several other NGOs tied to Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the exiled former oligarch who is now a top critic of Vladimir Putin.
Updated
Slovakia has given its S-300 air defence system to Ukraine to help it defend against Russia’s aggression, the Slovak prime minister, Eduard Heger, confirmed today, AFP reports.
In a statement posted on Facebook, Heger added that the move did not mean his country had joined the conflict with Russia:
I can confirm that the Slovak Republic has donated the S-300 air defence system to Ukraine, following Ukraine’s request for assistance.
The donation of the system does not mean that the Slovak Republic has become a part of the armed conflict in Ukraine.
I would like to confirm that #Slovakia has provided #Ukraine with an air-defence system S-300. #Ukrainian nation is #bravely defending its sovereign country and us too. It is our duty to help, not to stay put and be ignorant to the loss of human lives under #Russia’s agression.
— Eduard Heger (@eduardheger) April 8, 2022
Slovakia’s defence “will be strengthened in the coming days by an additional missile defence system from our allies”, he added.
Updated
‘Evil that has no limits’ – Zelenskiy condemns Russian strike on Kramatorsk train station
In a statement, President Volodymr Zelenskiy accused Russian forces of deliberately attacking civilians after a Russian rocket strike on Kramatorsk railway station in east Ukraine killed at least 39 people and wounded 87 others.
At least two children were among the dead, according to the head of Ukrainian railways. Kramatorsk Mayor Oleksander Honcharenko said about 4,000 people had been at the station at the time of the attack.
In a statement, the Ukrainian leader said:
Lacking the strength and courage to stand up to us on the battlefield, they are cynically destroying the civilian population.
This is an evil that has no limits. And if it is not punished, it will never stop.
In a later video address to Finland’s parliament, Zelenskiy said no Ukrainian troops had been at the station at the time of the attack.
Pavlo Kyrylenko, governor of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, accused Russian forces of firing cluster munitions at the railway station, Reuters reports.
The governor shared a photograph showing several bodies lying on the ground beside piles of suitcases and other luggage adding:
The ‘Rashists’ (‘Russian fascists’) knew very well where they were aiming and what they wanted: they wanted to sow panic and fear, they wanted to take as many civilians as possible.
In an online briefing, Kyrylenko said:
If at the beginning they exclusively ... targeted railway tracks, then now it’s not only tracks, but also firing a missile containing cluster munitions which are meant for people.
This is absolute confirmation that this (strike) was intended against civilians.
Russian strike on Kramatorsk station was 'deliberate slaughter' of civilians, Kuleba says
The Ukrainian foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, has accused Russia of the “deliberate slaughter” of dozens of civilians after a Russian rocket strike on the Kramatorsk railway station.
Kuleba wrote on Twitter:
Russians knew that the train station in Kramatorsk was full of civilians waiting to be evacuated. Yet they stroke it with a ballistic missile, killing at least 30 and injuring at least a hundred people.
This was a deliberate slaughter. We will bring each war criminal to justice.
Mykhailo Podolyak, a key adviser to President Zelenskiy, described the attack as “a deliberate act of intimidation”.
Podolyak tweeted:
The strike on the Kramatorsk railway station is a deliberate act of intimidation.
Dozens of dead and wounded civilians. Families with children who were trying to evacuate.
The world must understand: Russia is a state-terrorist. Buying its oil and gas is financing terrorism.
Boris Johnson has moved to paper over differences with Germany on support for Ukraine, by hailing Berlin’s “principled determination” to end its dependency on Russian energy before a meeting in London with the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz.
It is the first meeting between the two men since the Social Democrat Scholz was elected to lead a three-party coalition government, and follows a week in which Germany resisted British calls for the major economies to set out a timetable to end dependency on Russian energy.
In advance of the meeting with Scholz in Downing Street, the UK prime minister said:
I welcome his principled determination to end dependence on Russian energy. How we respond to Russia’s invasion will define the international order for years to come. We cannot let Putin’s crimes go unpunished.
Scholz has been criticised domestically and by Ukrainian politicians for not moving fast enough to wean Germany off its decades-old dependency on cheap Russian energy, and for being slow to back the transfer of the heavy weaponry Ukraine needs.
He has also been warned by German industrialists that an immediate gas embargo would lead to mass unemployment, a position largely shared by the Green party, his coalition partners.
Robert Habeck, the German economy and energy minister, has announced plans to stop importing oil and coal from Russia this year, and gas by mid-2024.
Death toll from Kramatorsk station strike rises to 39, governor says
At least 39 people were killed and 87 wounded in a Russian rocket strike on the Kramatorsk railway station packed with evacuees, regional Governor Pavlo Kyrylenko said, updating an earlier estimate of 30.
In an online post, the governor said many of the wounded were in a serious condition, Reuters reports.
Mayor Oleksander Honcharenko reportedly said hospitals cannot cope with the number of people wounded from the strike.
From Zaborona’s editor-in-chief, Katerina Sergatskova:
The mayor of Kramatorsk Olexander Honcharenko says after the Russian strike on the railway, hospitals can’t cope with the number of wounded.
— katerina sergatskova (@KSergatskova) April 8, 2022
“There are a lot of seriously injured people without arms and legs. They are being operated by 30-40 surgeons at the same time.”
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said no Ukrainian troops were at the train station when it was attacked.
Speaking to the Finnish parliament, Zelenskiy said:
Russian forces hit the train station in Kramatorsk, (firing) on an ordinary train station, on ordinary people, there were no soldiers there.
Updated
Russia denies responsibility for Kramatorsk station strike
The Kremlin has denied that Russia was involved in a missile strike on a railway station in Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine, Reuters reports.
Speaking to reporters, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the Russian armed forces had no missions scheduled for Kramatorsk on Friday.
Russia’s defence ministry has also denied that Russian forces were responsible for the strike, the Russian state-owned news agency RIA reported.
The Russian state-owned organisation quoted the ministry as saying that the missile was of a type used only by the Ukrainian military, and similar to one that hit the centre of the city of Donetsk on 14 March.
The Russian government has consistently denied it has attacked civilians since the beginning of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Updated
Today so far
-
A missile strike on Kramatorsk railway station in eastern Ukraine has left at least 30 people dead and more than 100 wounded, according to reports from Ukraine’s state train company. The mayor of Kramatorsk said there were 4,000 people, most of them elderly, women and children, at the station at the time of the attack. Russia has denied it was responsible.
- Ukraine has announced that today it is aiming to open 10 humanitarian corridors for civilian evacuations. Once again, civilians hoping to escape from Mariupol will have to use their own vehicles – there will be no convoy of buses.
- The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said the situation in the town of Borodianka was “much worse” than in nearby Bucha.
- The Kremlin has admitted suffering “significant losses” of troops since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, in a rare admission of how badly the war has gone for Moscow so far. In an interview with Sky News, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov asked whether the war had amounted to a humiliation for Russia given the number of troops lost. He replied: “We have significant losses of troops. And it’s a huge tragedy for us.”
- Russian forces have now fully withdrawn from Ukraine’s north to Belarus and Russia, the UK’s ministry of defence has said. “At least some of these forces will be transferred to East Ukraine to fight in the Donbas,” the report added.
- Russia says it has destroyed a training centre for foreign mercenaries in Ukraine, north of Odesa, without providing evidence.
- Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Zelenskiy, said any temporary truce with Russia would just be a war postponed for the future, and that Ukraine is working on the possibility of evacuating civilians from Mariupol by sea.
- The Ukrainian prime minister, Denys Shmyhal, said this year’s grain harvest was likely to be 20% less than last year because of a reduced sowing area after Russia’s invasion.
- Vadym Prystaiko, Ukraine’s ambassador to the UK, invited Peskov to come to Bucha to see for himself “if he has stomach to face these people” after Peskov denied Russian troops had committed any atrocities there. Ukraine is investigating 5,149 alleged cases of war crimes committed by Russian forces, the prosecutor’s office has revealed.
- Prystaiko also tried to reassure people that Ukraine would investigate any claims of war crimes against its troops, saying “We’re making this very clear to all our soldiers that there are some limits. Τhe military are fighting. There are some limits. And each and every incident will be investigated.”
-
The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and EU representative Josep Borrell are on their way to Kyiv. Von der Leyen shared a photo of herself stepping off a Ukrainian train alongside the caption “looking forward to Kyiv”.
- The UK has added the Russian president Vladimir Putin’s daughters to its sanctions list, along with the daughter of Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov.
- UK prime minister Boris Johnson is set to meet the German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in London later today as they look to discuss how to help European countries wean themselves off Russian gas
- The UK’s home office says that 12,000 people had arrived in the UK under the Ukraine visa schemes as of Tuesday.
- Nobel Prize winning newspaper editor Dmitry Muratov says he was attacked on a train in Russia on Thursday by an assailant who poured red paint on him.
- In diplomatic developments, Poland’s ambassador to Russia has been summoned to the Russian foreign ministry. Japan has announced that it is expelling eight Russian diplomats, and Montenegro has ordered the expulsion of four Russian diplomats
That is it from me, Martin Belam, for now. I will be back later. I am handing you over to Léonie Chao-Fong for the next few hours.
Updated
Kramatorsk mayor: 4,000 people were at Kramatorsk train station when it was struck
Reuters is quoting the mayor of Kramatorsk saying that about 4,000 people, most of them elderly, women and children, were at the railway station when it was hit by Russian rockets.
Russia’s defence ministry has just issued a denial via the RIA news agency that it attacked the station.
It is currently believed that at least 30 people were killed and 100 people wounded, according to figures issued by Ukraine’s state railway company.
Some images have been arriving over the newswires from the attack on Kramatorsk railyway station in eastern Ukraine.
In this picture, the remains of a rocket with the lettering “for our children” lie on an area of grass near to the station.
This image shows the personal belongings of some of the victims and damage to the station after the attack.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has shared a graphic 10-second clip of the aftermath of the attack on his official Telegram channel.
Reuters reports that Eduard Basurin, the commander of the separatists in Donetsk, has already decried reports of the attack to news agency Tass as a Ukrainian “provocation”.
Updated
UK's home office says 12,000 people have arrived under Ukraine visa schemes
The UK’s home office says that 12,000 people had arrived in the UK under the Ukraine visa schemes as of Tuesday.
About 10,800 people had arrived under the Ukraine family scheme, and 1,200 under the Homes for Ukraine sponsorship scheme, provisional data published on the department’s website shows.
About 79,800 applications have been received for both schemes and 40,900 visas had been granted, the UK government said.
PA Media quotes a pre-recorded interview with the UK home secretary, Priti Patel, which was broadcast on the BBC this morning. She said:
We are an independent third country and we want to give people the status and security of coming to our country along with the warm welcome. Yes, we want to welcome people, we are welcoming people. We have to ensure that they are protected and safeguarded in the United Kingdom as well.
Earlier on Sky News in the UK, the shadow attorney general, Emily Thornberry, criticised the government, saying the home office knew “that it was going to happen”, but then was not prepared for it.
What we’ve done in other cases, we have specialised schemes, so on Hong Kong or Afghanistan, we had special tailored schemes. We should have done the same with Ukraine. But instead we had the home office, kind of putting their fingers in their ears and saying ‘la la la la’. And as people were coming across the border, they were still resisting it. You will remember the Ukrainians being told you can pick fruit if you want to come into the UK. We should have had a proper scheme ready to go.
Updated
UK sanctions President Vladimir Putin's daughters
Britain has added the Russian president Vladimir Putin’s daughters to its sanctions list, mirroring moves by the United States.
Reuters reports an update to the sanctions list announced asset freezes on Katerina Tikhonova and Maria Vorontsova, who were named in US sanctions on Wednesday as Putin’s two adult daughters.
The Foreign Office was also targeting the daughters of the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, with travel bans and asset freezes.
PA Media quotes a foreign office statement that said: “The lavish lifestyles of the Kremlin’s inner circle will be further targeted from today as the UK sanctions the adult daughters of President Vladimir Putin and his foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov.
“Katerina Vladimirovna Tikhonova and Maria Vladimirovna Vorontsova, the daughters of President Putin, and Yekaterina Sergeyevna Vinokurova, daughter of foreign minister Sergei Lavrov, will be subject to travel bans and asset freezes.”
Updated
Nobel Prize winning newspaper editor Dmitry Muratov says he was attacked on a train in Russia on Thursday by an assailant who poured red paint on him.
Muratov said that the incident happened on a train heading from Moscow to Samara. In a post to the Novaya Gazeta Europe’s Telegram channel he said the assailant shouted “Muratov, here’s one for our boys” and that as a result of the assault his eyes “are burning terribly”. He accompanied the post with a selfie taken in the bathroom compartment of a train.
Novaya Gazeta Europe is a newly launched project by the staff at Novaya Gazeta, which was Russia’s leading independent newspaper. It announced 28 March that it was suspending operations for the duration of what it referred to as “the special operation” in Ukraine. That is the term that Russian authorities insist domestic media outlets must use for the war on Ukraine.
The shutdown came after the paper received a second formal warning from the Russian media regulator Roskomnadzor. Novaya Gazeta removed much of its war reporting from its website after Russia passed a law threatening jail terms of up to 15 years for information deemed to be “fake” by Russian authorities.
Longtime editor Muratov shared the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize with Maria Ressa, a journalist from the Philippines. Novaya Gazeta was established by Muratov and colleagues in 1993, and it investigated corruption inside and outside Russia, as well as the long wars in Chechnya. Six of the paper’s reporters and contributors have been murdered for their work. In 2021 Novaya Gazeta said its offices in Moscow had been targeted with a “chemical attack”.
Some diplomatic developments being reported by Reuters here – the Polish foreign ministry says that Poland’s ambassador to Russia has been summoned to the Russian foreign ministry.
On 23 March Poland’s interior minister Mariusz Kaminski said Poland had “expelled 45 Russian spies pretending to be diplomats.” At the time Russia vowed to retaliate.
At the same time, Japan has announced that it is expelling eight Russian diplomats, saying it was in response to Russia’s actions in Ukraine, including the killing of civilians. The eight diplomats included several trade officials but not the ambassador, Mikhail Galuzin, foreign ministry officials said.
AFP, meanwhile, is reporting that Montenegro has ordered the expulsion of four Russian diplomats, citing “violation of diplomatic norms.”
The diplomats have to leave the Balkan nation within a week, the ministry said in a statement, without elaborating further.
The Pobjeda daily newspaper reported that the diplomats were expelled over their “subversive activities,” quoting a government source as saying that a “red line has been crossed.”
Podgorica had previously expelled one Russian diplomat after Russia invaded Ukraine in February.
A little more from Vadym Prystaiko, Ukraine’s ambassador to the UK. He was asked on Sky News earlier this morning how optimistic he was for an end to the war. He said:
We’re making this, we’re trying to build up a very, very uneasy very, very difficult compromise. And so many Ukrainians are not happy with the attempts of the government to find some ground with Russia. People, in most of the cases, don’t even understand how can we sit at the table with those who are just killing each and every day our people. But that’s the nature of any war. They will have to come to an end and we will.
He was speaking before the news of the attack on Kramatorsk train station broke.
Earlier, Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukraine’s president, said any temporary truce with Russia would just be a war postponed for the future, and Ukraine does not need this.
30 people killed, more than 100 wounded in Russian strike on train station in eastern Ukraine – reports
Ukraine’s state railway company say that more than 30 people have been killed and more than 100 were wounded after two Russian rockets struck Kramatorsk railway station in east Ukraine.
The Donetsk governor, Pavlo Kyrylenko, said thousands of civilians were at the station trying to evacuate to safer areas of Ukraine when it was hit.
Reuters report that three trains carrying evacuees were blocked in the same part of Ukraine on Thursday after an airstrike on the line, according to the head of Ukrainian Railways.
Updated
'Dozens' of civilians feared killed or wounded in Russian missile strike on Kramatorsk train station – Donetsk governor
Reuters is carrying a little more detail on the reported strike on Kramatorsk railway station in east Ukraine. They cite Ukraine’s Donetsk governor, Pavlo Kyrylenko, who says that thousands of civilians were at the station trying to evacuate to safer areas of Ukraine. Quoting police and rescue workers, he said dozens were feared killed or wounded in the rocket strike.
While people in the east of Ukraine are still under Russian bombardment and attempting to flee, the situation is now different in Kyiv, with Russian forces having retreated from the areas around Ukraine’s capital. Consequently people are now queuing at Przemysl station in south-eastern Poland to return to Kyiv. Here are a couple of pictures of the scenes last night.
Updated
Two Russian rockets have struck railway station in eastern Ukraine, causing casualties – reports
Two Russian rockets have struck a railway station in Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine, causing casualties, Ukraine’s state railway company has said. Reuters reports the station is used to evacuate civilians from areas under bombardment from Russian forces.
Three trains carrying evacuees were blocked in the same region of Ukraine on Thursday after an air strike on the line, according to the head of Ukrainian Railways.
The report of the attack has not been independently verified. This is a photograph of scenes at the station yesterday, with people queuing for trains in large numbers. Kramatorsk is in Donetsk Oblast.
Updated
Ukraine’s ambassador to the UK, Vadym Prystaiko, was asked on British TV about reports of potential war crimes being committed by Ukrainian forces, referring specifically to a video that appears to show Ukrainian soldiers shooting Russian prisoner of war. He was asked on Sky News what level of committment Ukraine had to investigating itself. He said:
We’re making this very clear to all our soldiers that there are some limits. Τhe military are fighting. There are some limits. And each and every incident will be investigated.
However, he went on to attempt to draw a distinction between the allegations levelled at Russian forces and those made against Ukraine’s military. He said:
On a separate note, we’re talking about civilians, and Russians are killing, raping, just our civilian people. There are differences. All of us hate the war as it is, with people killing each other, but there is a difference, when you kill and shoot at military when you’re fighting, and when you kill innocent civilians.
Updated
Also during his television interview in the UK, Vadym Prystaiko, Ukraine’s ambassador to the UK, responded to Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov’s denials that any war crimes have been committed. He described it as “nothing unexpected.”
He said “That’s the first appearance to the wider TV audience on the world stage, but the message is the same. ‘We have to defend ourselves by killing and coming to Ukraine’. At least he recognised that they’re losing soldiers left and right.”
Prystaiko suggested that if Russia was so sure that alleged atrocities in Bucha and elsewhere were faked, there was a simple option:
They can join the international investigation effort. They can come with anybody else and check it. If he has stomach to face these people. He can come to Bucha himself and check it and see it.
Ukraine's ambassador to the UK calls for Nato ships in the Black Sea
Vadym Prystaiko, Ukraine’s ambassador to the UK, has appeared on Sky News in the UK, and called for Nato and other international forces to play a more active role in the Black Sea, saying:
We have to unlock the Black Sea. Russians block the sea for us. That’s our own sea. We need this for humanitarian assistance to come in Ukraine.
And we actually have it so to allow Ukrainian exports – mostly grains – to go out. We are responsible for a significant chunk of food security around the globe. Many nations in Africa are fed because of Ukrainian grain. And this grain is stuck in our silos, it can’t be exported, it can’t be sent anywhere.
He suggested it would not be such a big shift of current policy, saying:
Nato ships in the Black Sea. They’re welcome in our sea. And there are members of Nato. Three of the main members of Nato [are] within the basin: Turkey, Romania and Bulgaria. So they’re already there. It’s not a big deal. We need to have somebody to reinforce the effort, yes, to come, and be invited to Odesa, all the way in.
Yesterday, Turkey called a videoconference for countries bordering the Black Sea. Turkey said the defence ministers of Bulgaria, Georgia, Poland, Romania and Ukraine joined the call, which discussed mines floating in the sea and regional security. Turkish military diving teams have so far detonated three separate floating naval mines in the Black Sea, while Romania has also defused a stray mine in its waters since the war on Ukraine started.
Updated
Russia says it has destroyed a training centre for foreign mercenaries in Ukraine, north of Odesa. The claim has been reported by Russian news agency Tass via Reuters. It has not been independently verified.
In the UK, opposition party Labour’s shadow attorney general, Emily Thornberry, has been appearing on Sky News. In response to Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov’s denials that any war crimes have been committed, she said “I think they’re very good at fake news.”
She said:
We just have to carry on telling the truth. But more importantly, gathering the information so that when the time comes, we can take out prosecutions against the relevant people. We must hold them to account for the war crimes that they’ve obviously committed. And I mean, the truth is, the evidence that we have at the moment is just the tip of the iceberg. My fear, you know, because we’re only seeing it from the towns and villages where the Russians have withdrawn. There are many other towns and villages where the Russians are still in occupation.
In terms of prosecuting those responsible for some of the images that we have seen emerging from Ukraine, despite Russia’s withdrawal in 2016 from the international criminal court statute, Thornberry said “where there’s a will”, adding:
Remember, people couldn’t believe that we would ever be able to hold the murderers in Yugoslavia to account, and yet we did in the end, and we got most of the major players, stood trial rightly, and now behind bars.
Updated
Ukraine PM: grain harvest likely to be 20% less than last year
The Ukrainian prime minister, Denys Shmyhal, said this year’s grain harvest was likely to be 20% less than last year because of a reduced sowing area after Russia’s invasion. He said there was a shortage of fuel for farmers but Ukraine knew how to keep them supplied. Reuters reports he also said Ukraine had large stocks of grain, cereals and vegetable oil, and could feed its population.
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Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has been speaking and Reuters is carrying the following key lines:
- He says that Russian forces “have no advantage” on warfronts.
- He said negotiations with Russia continue online constantly but the mood changed after the events in Bucha.
- He suggested that any temporary truce with Russia would just be a war postponed for the future, and Ukraine does not need this.
- Podolyak says Ukraine is working on the possibility of evacuating civilians from Mariupol by sea.
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Fabrice Pothier, a former Nato director of policy planning, has been interviewed on Sky News in the UK. He said that Nato needed to do more, saying:
It’s possible and it’s necessary because the choice here is whether we are entering a very long war of attrition, with entire cities in the Donbas and eastern Ukraine being basically wiped out and civilians obviously killed by the thousands, or whether we are trying to help Zelenskiy finish this war on terms that are actually acceptable to him and the Ukrainian population.
Asked about the reported large losses of Russian troops, Pothier said from Brussels that in some ways Russia admitting this was unavoidable, because “the dead Russian soldiers have to come back home.”
However, he made the point that there was also some propaganda value for the Kremlin in losses. He told viewers:
There’s also this kind of Putin narrative of idolising violence, and the sacrifice of violence, and that the ‘special operation’ requires special sacrifices. Clearly he’s saying that to his population on the economic sanctions.
And now they seem to be developing the narrative that yes, there are many soldiers die, but it’s worth it. So never underestimate the Kremlin capacity to turn something terrible into actually a kind of positive narrative to sustain the propaganda.
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Lithuania’s ambassador to Ukraine has returned to Kyiv after Russian forces withdrew from the Ukrainian capital, becoming one of the few diplomats to return to the city.
“I have just walked through the embassy door,” ambassador Valdemaras Sarapinas told Agence France-Presse on Thursday. “Political and moral support is very important for the Ukrainians,” he added.
Like many others, the diplomat left Kyiv as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and had worked since from the western city of Lviv.
Sarapinas’s return came a day after Turkey announced it had moved its embassy in Ukraine back to Kyiv after having temporarily relocated it to Chernivtsi near the Romanian border.
Poland and the Holy See were among the few who had maintained their representation in the city.
Sarapinas said the city was “certainly” different following the Russian troop withdrawal from areas around the capital. “Two weeks ago, it was a dead city ... Now there is life,” he said.
There is a quick snap from Reuters that the governor of Ukraine’s Luhansk region says that Russia is accumulating forces, but they have not broken through Ukrainian defences in the east of the country.
Conservative MP Tobias Ellwood, who is chair of the commons defence select committee, has been on Sky News in the UK. He responded to Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov’s denials that any war crimes have been committed, saying:
It was important for us to hear the diet of news that the Russian people are experiencing. We must brace ourselves, I think, for more horrors to be revealed. More war crimes to be exposed as Russian troops withdraw. But the spokesperson Dmitry Peskov was very, very clear, this is far from over. And there is another dark chapter soon to follow.
He criticised Nato for being too slow to support Ukraine with equipment and for having “simply daft arguments about whether weapons systems are indeed defensive or offensive”.
He said that the alliance might have given them enough weapons not to lose, but “not enough to ensure that they win”.
He suggested that the west had been “too easily spooked by the Kremlin rhetoric” and deterred from acting more decisively, saying “we need to have better confidence and understanding of the escalatory ladder, as we did during the Cold War.”
He added:
What we should take away from that Peskov interview is the fact that Putin is very secure in his job. He’s not scared of any war crimes. He’s not scared of breaching the Geneva Conventions. In fact, he’s taken advantage of the West’s timidity. We’ve given him space to conduct these horrors and that needs to stop.
He urged Nato to take stronger action so that Ukraine can defend Odesa, observing that:
Odesa is a critical port in the south. If that falls, Ukraine will become landlocked. Vital grain exports that we all depend on will not be able to get out. But more importantly, Putin will be able to declare a win.
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Ukraine has announced that today it is aiming to open ten humanitarian corridors for civilian evacuations. Reuters reports that once again, civilians hoping to escape from Mariupol will have to use their own vehicles – there will be no convoy of buses.
- This is Martin Belam taking over the blog in London for the next few hours. You can email me at martin.belam@theguardian.com
Ukraine is investigating 5,149 alleged cases of war crimes committed by Russian forces, the prosecutor’s office has revealed.
#RussianWarCrimes pic.twitter.com/l5DHchEWRF
— Офіс Генерального прокурора (@GP_Ukraine) April 8, 2022
Today so far
- The President of the European Commission and EU representative Josep Borrell appear to be on their way to Kyiv this morning. Ursula von der Leyen shared a photo of herself stepping off a Ukrainian train alongside the caption “looking forward to Kyiv”.
- Boris Johnson is set to meet the German Chancellor later today as they look to discuss how to help European countries wean themselves off Russian gas following the attack on Ukraine. Johnson will host Olaf Scholz at Downing Street on Friday, with a press conference planned for the afternoon, PA Media reports.
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said that the situation in the town of Borodyanka was “much worse” than in nearby Bucha, where Russian forces’ suspected killings of civilians received global condemnation. Ukraine’s prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova, added: “Borodyanka is the worst in terms of destruction and in terms of the uncertainty about [the number of] victims.”
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The Kremlin has admitted suffering “significant losses” of troops since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, in a rare admission of how badly the war has gone. In an interview with Sky News, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov asked whether the war had amounted to a humiliation for Russia given the number of troops lost. He replied: “We have significant losses of troops. And it’s a huge tragedy for us.”
- Russian forces have now fully withdrawn from Ukraine’s north to Belarus and Russia, the UK’s ministry of defence has said. “At least some of these forces will be transferred to East Ukraine to fight in the Donbas,” the report added.
- The Sumy region in north-eastern Ukraine is now free of Russian forces, according to the city’s mayor. Dmytro Zhyvytsky said the region is free of Russian forces but explosions may still be heard as rescue service workers dispose of ammunition left by the Russian military in an update posted to his official Telegram channel.
- The European Union approved an embargo on Russian coal imports and the closing of the bloc’s ports to Russian vessels over the Ukraine war. The measure will take effect from mid-August.
- In addition to the sanctions, the EU also backed a proposal to boost its funding of arms supplies to Ukraine by 500 million euros, taking it to a total of 1.5 billion euros.
- Britain is preparing to announce a fresh package of military aid for Ukraine and has demonstrated new missile systems and armoured vehicles that it believes can help Kyiv in the next phases of fighting.
- The World Health Organization (WHO) said it had confirmed more than 100 attacks on health services in Ukraine, as it called for humanitarian access to the besieged city of Mariupol.
- The United Nations general assembly voted to suspend Russia from the UN human rights council over reports of “gross and systematic violations and abuses of human rights” by invading Russian troops in Ukraine. Ninety-three countries voted in favour of the US-led motion, while 24 countries voted against and 58 countries abstained.
- The prospect of Finland and Sweden joining Nato was part of the discussion between foreign ministers from the military alliance in Brussels this week, a senior US State Department official said.
- Russia has imposed sanctions on Australian and New Zealand citizens, including their prime ministers, the Russian foreign ministry announced.
- Fox News correspondent Benjamin Hall, who was wounded in Ukraine during an attack that killed two of his colleagues, said on Thursday that he had sustained serious injuries but felt “pretty damn lucky” to have survived.
The President of the European Commission and EU representative Josep Borrell appear to be on their way to Kyiv this morning.
Ursula von der Leyen shared a photo of herself stepping off a Ukrainian train alongside the caption “looking forward to Kyiv”.
Similarly, Borell shared a snap writing: “Going to Kyiv”.
Looking forward to Kyiv.@JosepBorrellF @eduardheger pic.twitter.com/YFAgGr5Tlc
— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) April 8, 2022
На шляху до Києва!
— Josep Borrell Fontelles (@JosepBorrellF) April 8, 2022
Going to Kyiv. #StandWithUkraine @vonderleyen @eduardheger pic.twitter.com/Lw8UaQUZgB
Kremlin admits 'significant losses' of troops
In case you missed our earlier report, Russia has given the most sombre assessment so far of its invasion of Ukraine, describing the “tragedy” of mounting troop losses.
Moscow has previously acknowledged its attack has not progressed as quickly as it wanted, but on Thursday Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov lamented the rising death toll.
In an interview with Sky News, Peskov was asked whether the war had amounted to a humiliation for Russia given the number of troops lost.
Peskov replied:
We have significant losses of troops. And it’s a huge tragedy for us.
He did not specific a casualty toll. In late March, Russia said it had lost 1,351 soldiers, with another 3,825 wounded. By contrast, a senior Nato official estimated in late March that between 7,000 and 15,000 Russian soldiers had been killed in four weeks of fighting in Ukraine.
"We have significant losses of troops".
— Sky News (@SkyNews) April 7, 2022
Vladimir Putin's press secretary Dmitry Peskov says it's a "huge tragedy to us" to have lost Russian troops during the war in Ukraine.https://t.co/X3flQUBL0r
📺 Sky 501, Virgin 602, Freeview 233 and YouTube pic.twitter.com/PGHoFvdewb
Sumy free of Russian forces, mayor says
The Sumy region in north-eastern Ukraine is now free of Russian forces, according to the city’s mayor.
Dmytro Zhyvytsky said the region is free of Russian forces but explosions may still be heard as rescue service workers dispose of ammunition left by the Russian military in an update posted to his official Telegram channel.
“If you hear explosions (and there have been many in recent days) - it’s rescuers and explosives. They are neutralising the ammunition left by the Russian military on our land,” he said, adding that the region is still not safe.
“There are a lot of mined and unexplored areas. Do not drive on the roadsides and do not use forest roads. Do not approach destroyed equipment,” he said.
⚡️Sumy region completely free of Russian forces.
— The Kyiv Independent (@KyivIndependent) April 8, 2022
Sumy Oblast Governor Dmytro Zhyvytsky announced on Facebook that the region is clear of Russia's forces, but that explosions may still be heard as rescue service workers dispose of ammunition left by the Russian military.
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More devastating images are surfacing highlighting the destruction inflicted on the northern Ukrainian town of Bucha.
Buildings lie destroyed and in disrepair, soldiers walk by children playing amid the wreckage of war in the streets and firefighters are seen cleaning debris of a collapsed building in search of the dead bodies of those killed by collapsed buildings.
EU approves embargo on Russian coal imports
The European Union has approved an embargo on Russian coal imports and the closing of the bloc’s ports to Russian vessels over the Ukraine war.
The measure will take effect from mid-August, a month later than originally planned, following pressure from Germany to delay, reports Reuters news agency.
That package also includes a 10 billion euro ban on exports to Russia, including high-tech goods, and the freezing of several Russian banks’ assets.
The French presidency of the European Council said the sanction was estimated to be worth 4bn euros ($4.4bn) per year.
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that, if not natural gas, oil would follow soon.
The new coal sanction had to be agreed by all 27 member states and there had been concerns from some members about the impact. The EU nations import 45% of their coal from Russia, worth 4 billion euros a year.
In addition to the sanctions, the EU also backed a proposal to boost its funding of arms supplies to Ukraine by 500 million euros, taking it to a total of 1.5 billion euros.
It is the first time the Europeans have targeted the Russian energy sector, on which they are heavily dependent.
In addition to the sanctions, the EU also backed a proposal to boost its funding of arms supplies to Ukraine by 500 million euros, taking it to a total of 1.5 billion euros.
“Once swiftly approved this will bring to 1.5 billion euros the EU support already provided for military equipment for Ukraine,” European Council chief Charles Michel tweeted, also thanking EU diplomatic chief Josep Borrell for proposing the extra funding.
Johnson and Scholz to discuss reducing dependence on Russian gas
Boris Johnson is set to meet the German Chancellor as they look to discuss how to help European countries wean themselves off Russian gas following the attack on Ukraine.
The prime minister will host Olaf Scholz at Downing Street on Friday, with a press conference planned for the afternoon, PA Media reports.
Johnson is expected to offer assistance to Berlin, which is still heavily reliant on Russian gas, to reduce its dependence on Moscow’s energy exports in a bid to starve Vladimir Putin’s war machine of funds.
It comes after UK foreign secretary Liz Truss, following a meeting of Nato counterparts in Brussels on Thursday, said she hoped to see “more countries” commit to banning Russian energy imports.
The UK has pledged to end all imports of Russian coal and oil by the end of 2022, with gas to follow as soon as possible.
Germany has faced criticism from Ukraine and other European nations, including Poland, with claims it has been too slow to phase out Russian energy.
Robert Habeck, the German economy and energy minister, has announced plans to stop importing oil and coal from Russia this year, and gas by mid-2024.
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Situation in Borodianka 'much worse' than Bucha, Zelenskiy says
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Thursday that the situation in the town of Borodianka was “much worse” than in nearby Bucha, where Russian forces’ suspected killings of civilians received global condemnation.
Officials believe more than 300 people were killed by Russian forces in Bucha, 35km north-west of the capital Kyiv, and around 50 of them were executed.
Moscow has denied targeting civilians and says images of bodies in Bucha were staged by the Ukrainian government to justify more sanctions against Moscow and derail peace negotiations.
“The work on dismantling the debris in Borodianka began... It’s much worse there,” Zelenskiy said in a late-night national address.
The town is about 25 km from Bucha.
Zelenskiy did not provide any further detail or evidence that Russia was responsible for civilian deaths in the town.
Earlier on Thursday, Ukraine’s prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova, said 26 bodies had been found under two ruined buildings in Borodianka.
She did not say if the authorities had established the cause of death, but accused Russian troops of carrying out airstrikes on the town, which is being searched by Ukrainian authorities after Russian troops occupying it withdrew.
Speaking in a televised briefing, Venediktova said:
Borodianka is the worst in terms of destruction and in terms of the uncertainty about [the number of] victims.”
On Tuesday, Venediktova said the number of victims in Borodianka would be higher than anywhere else, but did not provide further details.
Updated
Russian forces fully withdrawn from Ukraine’s north, UK MoD says
Russian forces have now fully withdrawn from Ukraine’s north to Belarus and Russia, the UK’s ministry of defence has said.
The latest intelligence report, released just after 6am, reads:
In the north, Russian forces have now fully withdrawn from Ukraine to Belarus and Russia. At least some of these forces will be transferred to East Ukraine to fight in the Donbas.
At least some of these forces will be transferred to East Ukraine to fight in the Donbas.
Many of these forces will require significant replenishment before being ready to deploy further east, with any mass redeployment from the north likely to take at least a week minimum.
Russian shelling of cities in the east and south continues and Russian forces have advanced further south from the strategically important city of Izium which remains under their control.”
Latest Defence Intelligence update on the situation in Ukraine - 8 April 2022
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) April 8, 2022
Find out more about the UK government's response: https://t.co/lrfW1pqwQe
🇺🇦 #StandWithUkraine 🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/WPHtWTQEnp
Fox News correspondent 'pretty damn lucky' to survive attack in Ukraine
We have a little more detail on the Fox News correspondent who was wounded in Ukraine.
Benjamin Hall said he sustained serious injuries in the attack that killed two of his colleagues but felt “pretty damn lucky” to have survived.
Benjamin Hall was riding in a vehicle with Fox News cameraman Pierre Zakrzewski and Ukrainian journalist Oleksandra “Sasha” Kuvshynova last month when it was struck by incoming fire near Kyiv. Zakrzewski, 55, and Kuvshynova, 24, were killed.
“To sum it up, I’ve lost half a leg on one side and a foot on the other. One hand is being put together, one eye is no longer working, and my hearing is pretty blown,” Hall said in a Twitter post along with a photo of himself on a stretcher, wearing an eye patch.
Its been over three weeks since the attack in Ukraine and I wanted to start sharing it all. But first I need to pay tribute to my colleagues Pierre and Sasha who didnt make it that day. Pierre and I traveled the world together, working was his joy and his joy was infectious. RIP pic.twitter.com/gbHduLmd5e
— Benjamin Hall (@BenjaminHallFNC) April 8, 2022
“But all in all I feel pretty damn lucky to be here - and it is the people who got me here who are amazing!,” Hall said.
In an earlier tweet, his first since the attack, Hall paid tribute to his two fallen colleagues.
Zakrzewski was a veteran war-zone photographer who had covered multiple conflicts for Fox News, including in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria. Based in London, he had been working in Ukraine since February.
Kuvshynova had been helping Fox’s crews navigate Kyiv and the surrounding area while gathering information and speaking with sources.
To sum it up, I've lost half a leg on one side and a foot on the other. One hand is being put together, one eye is no longer working, and my hearing is pretty blown… but all in all I feel pretty damn lucky to be here - and it is the people who got me here who are amazing! pic.twitter.com/HNjO6PbdGf
— Benjamin Hall (@BenjaminHallFNC) April 8, 2022
Updated
Summary
Welcome back to our live coverage of the war in Ukraine.
I’m Samantha Lock and I will be bringing you all the latest developments. Here is a comprehensive rundown of where the situation currently stands:
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said that the situation in the town of Borodianka was “much worse” than in nearby Bucha, where Russian forces’ suspected killings of civilians received global condemnation. Ukraine’s prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova, added: “Borodianka is the worst in terms of destruction and in terms of the uncertainty about [the number of] victims.”
- Ukraine’s prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova, said 26 bodies had been found under two ruined buildings in Borodianka, a town about 25km west of Bucha. She did not say if the authorities had established the cause of death, but accused Russian troops of carrying out airstrikes on the town, which is being searched by Ukrainian authorities after Russian troops occupying it withdrew.
- The Kremlin has admitted suffering “significant losses” of troops since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, in a rare admission of how badly the war has gone. The Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said he hoped the besieged city of Mariupol would be “liberated from nationalistic battalions” sooner rather than later.
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Zelenskiy highlighted the bravery of his nation in his latest late-night national address. “Being brave is our brand,” he said, while calling for bolder sanctions on Russia. He also claimed Russian troops were preparing “elaborate propaganda scenarios” to make it look like civilians they had killed in Mariupol were killed by Ukrainian soldiers.
- Boris Johnson is set to meet the German Chancellor as they look to discuss how to help European countries wean themselves off Russian gas following the attack on Ukraine. Johnson will host Olaf Scholz at Downing Street on Friday, with a press conference planned for the afternoon, PA Media reports.
- Britain is preparing to announce a fresh package of military aid for Ukraine and has demonstrated new missile systems and armoured vehicles that it believes can help Kyiv in the next phases of fighting.
- The European Union approved an embargo on Russian coal imports and the closing of the bloc’s ports to Russian vessels over the Ukraine war. The measure will take effect from mid-August.
- In addition to the sanctions, the EU also backed a proposal to boost its funding of arms supplies to Ukraine by 500 million euros, taking it to a total of 1.5 billion euros.
- Ukraine is bracing for a renewed Russian offensive on its eastern front, as Russian forces withdraw from the shattered outskirts of Kyiv to regroup and intensify their attacks across the Donbas region. Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych said the besieged southern city of Mariupol was holding out and that he believed the Russian efforts to surround Ukrainian troops in the east would be in vain. The mayor of Dnipro, a city in central-eastern Ukraine, urged women, children and elderly people to leave. Similar calls were made by authorities in the Luhansk region, east of Dnipro.
- The mayor of Mariupol, Vadym Boichenko, says more than 100,000 people still urgently need to be evacuated from the city. Speaking on national television, he described the situation in the Russian-besieged Ukrainian port city as a humanitarian catastrophe.
- The World Health Organization (WHO) said it had confirmed more than 100 attacks on health services in Ukraine, as it called for humanitarian access to the besieged city of Mariupol.
- The United Nations general assembly voted to suspend Russia from the UN human rights council over reports of “gross and systematic violations and abuses of human rights” by invading Russian troops in Ukraine. Ninety-three countries voted in favour of the US-led motion, while 24 countries voted against and 58 countries abstained.
- Russia will probably renew its attack on Kyiv if it succeeds in taking full control of the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, the deputy chief of staff of Ukraine’s ground forces, Oleksandr Hruzevych, said. The Ukrainian deputy defence minister, Hanna Malyar, earlier warned that Russian forces were biding their time as Moscow ramped up intelligence operations there and learned how best to fight Ukrainian troops.
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US defence secretary Lloyd Austin contradicted these claims, saying he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin has given up on conquering Kyiv after his forces were beaten back by the Ukrainian military.
- General Mark Milley, chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, said the war would be a “long slog” at the US Senate armed services committee in a hearing in Washington DC.
- Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, said allies had agreed to strengthen support for Ukraine, and were providing “a wide range” of weapon systems, as well as cybersecurity assistance and equipment to protect against chemical and biological threats. There was no sign Vladimir Putin intended to pull back, he added.
- The prospect of Finland and Sweden joining Nato was part of the discussion between foreign ministers from the military alliance in Brussels this week, a senior US State Department official said.
- Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, called for more heavy weaponry from western allies and “ruinous” sanctions against Moscow, warning: “Either you help us now – and I’m speaking about days, not weeks – or your help will come too late, and many people will die.”
- German intelligence agencies have intercepted radio messages from Russian soldiers discussing the killings of civilians in Ukraine, according to reports. Two separate communications are said to have been intercepted in which Russian soldiers describe how they question soldiers as well as civilians, and then proceed to shoot them, the Washington Post cited an intelligence official as saying.
- Russia has imposed sanctions on Australian and New Zealand citizens, including their prime ministers, the Russian foreign ministry announced.
- Fox News correspondent Benjamin Hall, who was wounded in Ukraine during an attack that killed two of his colleagues, said on Thursday that he had sustained serious injuries but felt “pretty damn lucky” to have survived.
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