Shelling hits Kyiv, 3 million flee Ukraine
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said barrages hit four buildings in the capital and caused dozens of deaths
KYIV: Russia’s relentless bombardment of Ukraine edged closer to the capital as a series of strikes hit a residential neighbourhood Tuesday, while the prime ministers of three European Union countries planned a bold visit to Ukraine’s capital and the number of people the war has driven from the country passed 3 million.
Shortly before dawn, large explosions thundered across Kyiv from what Ukrainian authorities said were artillery strikes. President Volodymyr Zelensky said barrages hit four multi-storey buildings in the city and caused dozens of deaths.
The strikes targeted a western district of Kyiv, disrupting a relative calm that returned after an initial advance by Russian forces was stopped in the early days of the war.
Tuesday’s shelling ignited a huge fire in a 15-storey apartment building and spurred a frantic rescue effort.
Zelensky is seeking to extend martial law until April 24 and to require men ages 18 to 60 to stay in the country to fight. He submitted the extension in a bill to parliament, which is expected to vote on it this week.
As Russia stepped up its assault on Kyiv, the leaders of Poland, the Czech Republic and
Slovenia announced they would travel to Ukraine’s embattled capital Tuesday to show support for the country.
“The aim of the visit is to express the European Union’s unequivocal support for Ukraine and its freedom and independence,” Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said in a tweet.
He will be joined by Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Janša, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who is Poland’s deputy prime minister for security and the leader of the conservative ruling party.
More than 3 million flee
The International Organization for Migration said the number of people who have fled Ukraine since Russia invaded the country on February 24 passed 3 million on Tuesday.
The United Nations has described the flood of people crossing into Poland and other neighbouring countries as
Europe’s biggest refugee crisis since World War II. This came as Russian and Ukrainian negotiators also planned to hold a second day of talks as the invasion of Ukraine entered its 20th day.
The Red Cross and the United Nations refugee agency say millions of people face food and medicine shortages along with the immediate conflict threats of shelling and air attacks.
The Ukrainian government said new aid and evacuation efforts would take place on Tuesday along nine corridors around the country, including the Kyiv region. But past evacuation attempts have repeatedly failed amid continued fighting.
The International Committee of the Red Cross said an evacuation involving 30 buses was planned from Sumy in northeast Ukraine.
The organization said it still had not gotten aid to Mariupol, an encircled port city of 430,000 where local officials estimate a lethal siege has killed more than 2,300 people and left residents desperate for food, water, heat and medicine.
‘Kherson region falls’
Russia claimed on Tuesday that its armed forces had taken full control of Ukraine’s southern region of Kherson, although Reuters could not independently verify the statement by defence ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov.
The city of Kherson, a provincial capital of about 250,000 people, was the first key urban centre to fall into the hands of Russian troops after Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24. US defence officials have said Russia could use Kherson as part of a strategy for potentially moving to Mykolaiv and then on to Odessa, other strategic cities in the country’s south.
“The armed forces of the Russian Federation have taken full control of all the territory of Kherson region,” Konashenkov told a briefing, without elaborating. On Monday, Russian forces seized 10 American-made Javelin anti-tank missile systems and a number of other weapons supplied by Western countries to Ukraine, he added.
US warns China over help
The United States warned China against providing military or financial help to Moscow after its invasion of Ukraine, as sanctions on Russian political and business leaders mounted and civilians sought to flee intense fighting on the ground.
According to US officials, Russia has asked for military and economic support from Beijing, which signalled a willingness to provide aid. Moscow denies that, saying it has sufficient resources to fulfil all of its aims. China’s foreign ministry has labelled the reports on assistance as “disinformation”.
“We have communicated very clearly to Beijing that we won’t stand by,” state department spokesperson Ned Price told reporters after US national security adviser Jake Sullivan met with China’s top diplomat Yang Jiechi in Rome.
“We will not allow any country to compensate Russia for its losses,” he said.
China wants to avoid being impacted by US sanctions over Russia’s war, foreign minister Wang Yi said, in one of Beijing’s most explicit statements yet on American penalties that are contributing to a historic market sell-off.
“China is not a party to the crisis, nor does it want the sanctions to affect China,” Wang said in a phone call on Monday with Spanish counterpart Jose Manuel Albares to discuss the war in Ukraine.