Zelensky calls for fresh talks, Russia says entered Mariupol centre
The entire global economy will feel the effects of the crisis through slower growth, trade disruptions, and steeper inflation,” the lenders said.
KYIV, March 19, ( AFP) - Ukraine's leader Volodymyr Zelensky made a fresh appeal for talks with Moscow Saturday, while Russia said its soldiers had entered the centre of besieged port city Mariupol.
As bitter fighting between local forces and Russian troops rages across the country more than three weeks into the invasion, the two sides are already holding negotiations remotely.
But so far, as in previous rounds, the talks have yielded little progress, with both sides blaming the other, and none have been at the presidential level.
“This is the time to meet, to talk, time for renewing territorial integrity and fairness for Ukraine,” Zelensky said in a video posted to Facebook.
“Otherwise, Russia's losses will be such, that several generations will not recover.” Russia's offensive remains largely stalled, a US defence official said, with troops about 30 kilometres (20 miles) east of the capital Kyiv and facing heavy resistance.
The official added that Russian forces had made no further progress into the northeastern city of Kharkiv, which they have encircled, and that Ukrainians were also defending the northern city of Chernihiv.
Britain's defence ministry said Russia was struggling to provide its forward troops “with even basic essentials such as food and fuel” because of Ukrainian attacks on their supply lines.
But Russia's defence ministry said Friday that the army and its separatist allies had made a breakthrough in Mariupol,
which has been under Russian shelling for days, and were now inside the city. The mayor of the city confirmed to the BBC that gun battles had reached the heart of Mariupol.
On Friday rescuers were still searching for hundreds of people trapped under the wreckage of a bombed theatre there. At the time of the attack,
Mariupol's city council said that over 1,000 people were sheltering in the theatre's basement when it was hit. There was still no information about potential fatalities, Zelensky said, but 130 people had been saved so far -some “heavily injured”.
As Putin's ground offensive has met with fierce Ukrainian resistance, Moscow has increas
ingly turned to indiscriminate air and long-range strikes.
In the south of Ukraine, the mayor of Mykolaiv Oleksandr Senkevich said on Facebook that several villages in the region had been occupied and the city had been under heavy fire, calling it a “difficult day”.
Ukrainian media reported that Russian forces had carried out a large-scale air strike on Mykolaiv, killing at least 40 Ukrainian soldiers at their brigade headquarters. Earlier Russian missiles had struck an aircraft repair site close to Lviv's airport in Ukraine's far west, extending the war to a relatively unscathed region near the border with NATO member Poland.
The International Monetary Fund, World Bank and other top global lenders warned on Friday that the “devastating human catastrophe” unfolding in Ukraine risks “extensive” economic fallout around the globe.
Historically, Ukraine has been a grain-exporting breadbasket for the world.
“The entire global economy will feel the effects of the crisis through slower growth, trade disruptions, and steeper inflation,” the lenders said.
Undeterred by reports of military setbacks or international condemnation, Putin held a large triumphalist rally in a Moscow football stadium on Friday featuring a sea of Russian flags, pro-Kremlin pop stars and chants of “Russia! Russia! Russia!”