Russia bombs Ukraine cities, carries on votes
Putin stiffens penalty for surrender, fires top general; Kremlin arrests hundreds of protesters over army mobilisation as Russians flee to Istanbul after the call.
Russian forces launched new strikes on Ukrainian cities on Saturday as Kremlin-orchestrated votes took place in occupied regions to create a pretext for their annexation by Moscow, while hundreds of people were arrested in Russia for trying to protest a mobilisation order that commits more troops to the fight in Ukraine.
Ukraine’s presidential office said the latest Russian shelling killed at least three people and wounded 19.
Oleksandr Starukh, the Ukrainian governor of Zaporizhzhia, one of the regions where Moscow-installed officials organised referendums on joining Russia, said a Russian missile hit an apartment building in the city of Zaporizhzhia, killing one person and injuring seven others.
Ukraine and its Western allies say the referendums underway in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia in the south and the eastern Luhansk and Donetsk regions have no legal force. They alleged the votes were an illegitimate atempt by Moscow to seize Ukrainian territory stretching from the Russian border to the Crimean Peninsula.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky urged Ukrainians in occupied regions to undermine the referendums and to share information about the people conducting “this farce.”
He also called on Russian recruits to sabotage and desert the military if they are called up under the partial troop mobilization President Vladimir Putin announced on Wednesday.
Putin on Saturday signed a hastily approved bill that toughens the punishment for soldiers who disobey officers’ orders, desert or surrender to the enemy.
“Army General Dmitry Bulgakov has been relieved of the post of deputy minister of defence” and will be replaced by Colonel General Mikhail Mizintsev, aged 60, the Russian defence ministry said.
Russian police moved quickly to break up demonstrations against the mobilisation that were held in several cities across Russia on Saturday, arresting about 500 people.
The Russian leader and Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said the order applied to reservists who had recently served or had special skills, but almost every man is considered a reservist until age 65 and Putin’s decree kept the door open for a broader call-up. The Russian Ministry said that the partial mobilisation initially aimed to add about 300,000 troops to beef up its outnumbered volunteer forces in Ukraine.
A stream of Russians flocking to Istanbul on Saturday expressed personal relief but concern for the safety of loved ones ater the Kremlin announced a partial mobilisation for the war in Ukraine.
The price of some tickets from Moscow shot up 10-fold ater President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday announced Russia’s first call-up of fighting-age men since World War II.
All those carrying hurriedly-packed belongings refused to give their full names for fear of retribution by Russian police against those still at home.
The Ukrainian government stopped allowing most men ages 18-60 to leave the country immediately ater Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion under a general mobilization order intended to build a 1 million-strong military.
Across Russia’s 11 time zones, men hugged their weeping family members before being rounded up for service amid fears that a wider call-up might follow. Some media reports claimed Russian authorities planned to mobilise more than 1 million recruits, which the Kremlin denied.
Moving to assuage public fears over the call-up that could erode Putin’s grip on power, authorities announced that many Russians working in high tech, communications or finance would be exempt.
Ater some of the pilots of the Russian flag carrier Aeroflot and other airlines reportedly received call-up notices, pilots and traffic controllers unions moved quickly to secure a government promise that they, too, would be excluded from the mobilisation. Many Russian men bought up scarce and exorbitantly priced airline tickets out of the country as as rumors swirled about a pending border closure.
In a sign the Kremlin was starting to worry about a backlash, the head of a top statecontrolled TV station harshly criticised military authorities for hastily sweeping up random people to meet mobilisation targets instead of calling up people with specific skills and recent military service, as Putin promised.