Russian armed forces and associated groups systematically use torture in occupied areas of Ukraine, pointing to a “deliberate policy”, a United Nations expert said. Alice Jill Edwards said on Friday she had drawn that conclusion after a visit to Ukraine in September. Edwards, the UN special rapporteur on torture, said Ukrainian prosecutors had told her there were about 103,000 open cases related to war crimes and crimes against humanity, of which 90% were registered as torture cases.
Two people were killed and 26 injured in a Russian missile attack on the northern Ukrainian city of Sumy, the regional administration said on Friday. “The premises of the school, the central city hospital, the regional emergency medical care centre and the water utility were damaged,” it posted on Facebook.
Two people were killed in Ukrainian drone attacks in Russia’s Belgorod region, the governor said. A third person was seriously wounded, Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Telegram.
Three people have been killed by Russian shelling in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region, the head of the regional military administration said. About 18 settlements in the region were hit by Russian artillery and mortar attacks, Oleg Sinegubov said on social media on Friday, adding that a 64-year-old woman, a 58-year-old man and a 40-year-old woman died.
Turkey is ready to host a summit between Ukraine and Russia to end the war, President Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday after talks with Volodymyr Zelenskiy, his Ukrainian counterpart, in Istanbul. The two discussed developments in the Ukraine-Russia war, shipping security in the Black Sea including the defunct grain deal, and defence industry cooperation, according to the two sides. The trip comes before an expected visit by the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, following elections in Russia on 15-17 March.
In Istanbul, Zelenskiy said Russia would not be invited to the first peace summit due to be held in Switzerland in the coming months, but that a Russian representative could be invited to the next meeting after a roadmap for peace had been agreed upon with Ukrainian allies.
Safety at the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine is worsening daily, Ukraine’s energy minister said on Friday, pledging to keep pressuring Russia at the UN nuclear watchdog to withdraw from the site. The International Atomic Energy Agency’s 35-nation board of governors passed a resolution late on Thursday condemning Russia’s occupation of Europe’s biggest nuclear power plant and expressing “grave concern” at lack of staffing and maintenance two years after its capture.
Ukrainian air defenders shot down 33 of 37 Russian “Shahed” drones launched overnight to Friday, Ukraine’s defence ministry said.
The British defence secretary has visited Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, “to raise the alarm”. Grant Shapps added on Friday: “Let’s make sure Ukraine wins this war.”
A Czech Republic-led initiative to buy ammunition for Ukraine has already raised “enough money to buy the first batch of 300,000 artillery shells”, the Czech prime minister, Petr Fiala, said.
Ukraine’s foreign minister has warned western allies against the slow delivery of aid to Kyiv, saying timely transfers of military supplies would ensure the war “does not spill over”. “The strategy of dripping aid to Ukraine drop by drop doesn’t work any more,” Dmytro Kuleba said on a visit to Lithuania. “It’s over and, if things continue as they currently happen, it’s not going to end well for all of us.”
A Chinese delegation has met a senior Ukrainian official in Kyiv. Andriy Yermak, the head of Zelenskiy’s office, held talks with a delegation headed by Li Hui, the Chinese government’s special representative for Eurasian affairs.
After a public outcry, Serbia’s authorities have revoked an expulsion order for a Russian woman who signed an open letter denouncing the invasion of Ukraine, a pro-democracy Russian group in Serbia said on Friday. Police told Elena Koposova that her appeal has been granted and she could stay in Serbia, where she has lived with her family since 2019, the Russian Democratic Society group said.
The exiled Belarusian opposition leader, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, said on Friday that she has not heard from her jailed husband for a year and described the lack of communication as “a form of torture.”
The Latvian prime minister has compared Russia to an unpredictable “alcoholic” during a discussion on security threats from Moscow. Evika Silina said on Friday that Latvia – a former Soviet republic – was “strengthening the military capabilities” on its eastern border with Russia. “We live next to a neighbour who, you could say, is like an alcoholic or an addict, whose actions we cannot predict,” she told Latvian Radio.
