Poland: Sanction Russian fuel

Nation calls on EU for ‘urgent’ disruption of oil, natural gas

BRUSSELS — Poland urged its European Union partners on Monday to unite and impose sweeping sanctions on Russia’s oil and natural gas sectors over the war in Ukraine, and not to cave in to pressure to pay for their gas in Russian rubles.

The appeal came as EU ministers met in Brussels to discuss their response to Russia’s decision last week to cut gas supplies to Bulgaria and Poland. Energy giant Gazprom says the two countries failed to pay their bills in April.

The EU has hit Russian officials, oligarchs, banks, companies and other organizations with rafts of sanctions since Moscow ordered an invasion of Ukraine in February.

In a move last week branded in Europe as “blackmail,” Russian energy giant Gazprom cut supplies to Bulgaria and Poland. It came after Russian President Vladimir Putin said that “unfriendly” countries must start paying for gas in rubles, Russia’s currency.

Bulgaria and Poland have refused to do so, like most EU countries. More Gazprom bills are due on May 20, and the bloc is wary that Russia might turn off more taps then. Russia rejects the claims of blackmail.

In other developments:

■ Russia resumed pulverizing the Mariupol steel mill that has become the last stronghold of resistance in the bombed-out city, Ukrainian fighters said Monday, after a brief cease-fire over the weekend allowed the first evacuation of civilians from the plant.

■ A senior U.S. official says the United States believed Russia is planning this month to annex large portions of eastern Ukraine and recognize the southern city of Kherson as an independent republic.

■ Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says that half a million Ukrainians have been “illegally taken to Russia, or other places, against their will.”

■ Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba says his Russian counterpart’s recent remarks about Adolf Hitler and Jews demonstrate “the deeply-rooted antisemitism of the Russian elites.”

■ U.S. diplomats have made a day trip back into Ukraine amid that country’s grinding war with Russia. Kristina Kvien, U.S. Embassy charge d’affaires, attended a news conference Monday in Lviv to highlight the diplomatic return.

■ House Speaker Nancy Pelosi arrived Monday at the Capitol after leading a surprise delegation trip to Ukraine, vowing the U.S. Congress has “more to do” to help the country fight the Russian invasion.

■ Authorities say a Russian missile attack struck the Black Sea port of Odessa on Monday evening.