Freedom of Information

[DaffyVina]

Posted at 5:405:40
Russian official lays out plan of Crimea-Mariupol-Donbass corridor
A Russian official has laid out their plans to connect the Crimea peninsula to the south-eastern Russian-occupied Donbas region "once the military takes control" of the key port city of Mariupol.

Kirill Stepanov is an adviser of Russia's Southern Federal District which includes Crimea - the Ukrainian territory annexed by Russia in 2014.

He told Russian news outlet RIA Novosti in recent hours that "taking control of the highway from Crimea to Mariupol... will reliably connect the peninsula with the Donbas by a transport corridor".

He added that this corridor and Crimea's land bridge would form a "transit territory" connecting the Caucusus region, the sea ports along the northern shores of the Black Sea, and the industrial centres of the Russian-occupied regions of Donetsk and Luhansk.

This military goal has long been pointed to as the reason why Russia wants Mariupol so badly.

Russian forces have incessantly shelled the city for weeks. Civilians there have suffered one of the worst bombardments in the whole of Ukraine, and over 80% of homes are now damaged.

Ukraine has asked for help for the city, and has refused to surrender it to the Russians. It is their last holdout in that part of the country.


6:12
'Demoralised' Russia trying to replenish troops: Ukraine army
The Ukrainian army has claimed in its morning update that Russia has resorted to getting former soldiers to join its war effort and make up for heavy losses.

Military officials have been actively recruiting former servicemen particularly “those who already have combat experience”, the Ukrainian military said in an operational update posted on Facebook.

It also claimed that Russian forces "in particular directions were demoralised", while Ukraine continues to hold the line in various parts of the country, including the eastern and southern regions. It added that it was conducting a “circular defence” in Mariupol - a strategic port city where over 100,000 residents are said to be trapped without access to food and medicines.

Western intelligence agencies have said that the Russian advance in Ukraine is continuing to stall, with troops digging in and reinforcing defensive positions. According to the latest assessment from the Institute for the Study of War, Russian forces have not staged any large assaults this week.

The Ukrainian army also said there were active efforts to increase Russian and Belarussian military equipment along the Ukrainian border, but gave no details. Belarus is backing Russia in the war.

It added that it was verifying reports that in Belarus, opponents of the war had partially removed the railway connection between their country and Ukraine.

The BBC has not been able to verify these claims yet.


7:06
About 100,000 still trapped in Mariupol 'hellscape'

Maxar satellite imagery of additional burning residential apartment buildings in Mariupol, Ukraine. 22march2022 Copyright: Getty Images
Image caption: Satelllite images show the smoking ruins of high-rise blocks in Mariupol

Mariupol has been the target of sustained attacks by Russian forces because of its strategic position along Ukraine's southern border.

For weeks now, the city has been shelled near-indiscriminately. One Human Rights Watch report released on Monday described the city as a "freezing hellscape riddled with dead bodies and destroyed buildings".

Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky has said about a quarter of the population - or 100,000 people - are still trapped in "inhumane conditions".

He described the horror endured by residents in his midnight address: "No food. No water. No medicine. Under constant shelling, under constant bombing."

These new satellite images from firm Maxar Technologies show the scale of the damage in the past day.

Maxar satellite imagery of the overview of fires burning in residential area, Livoberezhnyi District, Mariupol, Ukraine. 22march2022_ Copyright: Getty Images
Image caption: The pictures show fires spread out across the city

Maxar satellite imagery of destroyed residential apartment buildings in Mariupol, Ukraine. 22march2022
Copyright: Getty Images
Image caption: This image appears to show an entire section of a tower block reduced to rubble

Zelensky also said Ukraine officials and allies were doing their best to get aid into the city and more civilians out, he said. On Tuesday, about 7,000 people managed to escape the city.

But those fleeing have also been attacked along the negotiated humanitarian corridors, he said.

On Tuesday one humanitarian convoy was captured by Russian troops, he claimed.

He said state emergency workers and bus drivers were taken prisoner.

"We are doing everything we can to free our people and unblock the movement of humanitarian aid," he said.

[DaffyVina]

What impact could Ukraine's regaining of territory have?

As we've been reporting here, Ukrainian forces are said to have taken back some territory in the south of the country.

Justin Bronk from the UK defence and security think tank the Royal United Services Institute (Rusi), tells the BBC it's a strategy that could force Moscow to change its tactics.

"The Russians have quite visibly failed to take the whole of Ukraine across multiple positions of advance," he says. "So now they are trying to pull their resources back and consolidate them and concentrate them on one push at a time - in particular around Mariupol and the south."

He says if the Russians take Mariupol, which has been besieged for weeks and is getting low on supplies, then they may look to redistribute troops and ammunition, first to the Ukraine's eastern Donbas region and then perhaps to the north-eastern city of Kharkiv.

But, he says, as Ukraine pushes Russian troops back around Irpin and other suburbs along with Makariv to the west of Kyiv, it could hamper Moscow's plans to capture the capital.

"Essentially, what [Ukrainian forces] are trying to do is cut off an entire side of the attempted encirclement of Kyiv, which would force the Russians to either try to break north and abandon those positions, or for Russia to reroute significant combat power to try to break through and release their own forces there."



Russians are avoiding damaging Mariupol Port - official
Wyre Davies -BBC News, Zaporizhzhia

A senior management figure of Mariupol Port, who escaped from the besieged city yesterday, has told the BBC that much of the city has been completely destroyed, but the port area remains largely intact.

The man, who doesn’t want to be publicly identified due to safety concerns, said that six foreign-flagged ships had been trapped in the harbour since the start of the war but “unlike the rest of the city, the port had suffered relatively little bombing".

Mariupol is the biggest port on the Sea of Azov and one of Ukraine’s biggest ports for the export of agricultural products. Its capture would be strategically important for Russia.

The Kremlin has consistently denied deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure and buildings, like schools, hospitals and homes in Mariupol - many of which have been destroyed with large numbers of casualties.

But the fact the port area remains relatively unscathed may be an indication Russia values its strategic importance and has deliberately avoided targeting the port itself.



Nine humanitarian corridors agreed - Ukraine deputy PM

Nine "humanitarian corridors" have been agreed to evacuate civilians trapped in Ukrainian towns and cities, Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk says.

But in a Facebook post, she says a safe passage from Mariupol has not been agreed with Russia.

She says she hopes that people wishing to leave the city can make it to nearby Berdyansk, where humanitarian aid such as medicines are waiting. She adds that 24 buses are on standby to transport people.

Some of the previous attempts to evacuate people from Mariupol have failed after Russian forces continued to shell the Ukrainian port city despite an agreed temporary ceasefire.

[DaffyVina]

Children killed in Russian shelling of block of flats, says Ukraine
Photo: Damage from shell in Rubizhne Copyright: Luhansk regional military administration
Image caption: Military authorities said the block of flats was hit on Tuesday evening

Three people, two of them children, have been killed in an attack on a block of flats in the eastern town of Rubizhne, the head of the military authority in Luhansk says.

"The tragedy occurred in the evening, when the Russian army intensified shelling. A shell exploded on the fifth floor," said Serhiy Haidai, adding that fire broke out in a business and an education institution.

The Luhansk region is one of the Russian army's key targets as it tries to capture eastern areas that were not seized by Russian-backed separatists in the war that started in 2014.

At the weekend Haidai said more than 60 civilians had been killed in the region since the invasion began on 24 February.

One of the worst-hit towns is Severodonetsk and the regional military head said an evacuation corridor had been agreed both for that town and Rubizhne, but he warned people trying to leave of the danger of further shelling.



Aid worker describes dangers of fleeing Mariupol

The strategically important port city of Mariupol, in southern Ukraine, has become the most heavily bombed since the start of the invasion.

Pavol, who managed to leave Mariupol three weeks ago, is now part of a group which runs supplies into the city and helps people to get out.

He’s been telling BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that his team helped evacuate 96 people from the city yesterday.

During the operation he says one of their vehicles was destroyed when Russian forces started shelling - although luckily there were no passengers in it and the driver managed to get out.

Pavol's parents managed to escape from Mariupol separately a few days ago. He says his mum got caught up in a battle between Russian and Ukrainian tanks but managed to squeeze between them before they exchanged fire.

He says his dad had no fuel but was near a fire station that came under shelling. He managed to get some petrol from a fire engine and escape. They are both now in Chernobyl in northern Ukraine.

[DaffyVina]

12:58
Sumy is almost surrounded, says council member

Turning now to the north-eastern city of Sumy. A member of the city council there has told the BBC that approximately 100,000 residents have left.

"Our city is almost surrounded, we have one exit to Poltava through which women and children leave and medical supplies are brought," Andrii Baranov said.

There is a shortage of medical supplies and fuel in the city he added.

Baranov estimated that Ukraine could hold the city for another three or four weeks.

"We strongly need a no-fly zone," he said.

Baranov added that the situation in Sumy was nowhere near as bad as in Mariupol in the south-east - in Sumy only around 10 houses have been destroyed.

Sumy's critical infrastructure has been bombed but not civilians' houses, he said.

[DaffyVina]

A bomb hit this theatre hiding hundreds - here's how one woman survived
By Hugo Bachega & Orysia Khimiak
BBC News, Lviv, Ukraine
Published18 hours ago

Photo: Mariia pictured by the sea after the attack
Image caption, Mariia, who was volunteering at the Ukrainian Red Cross, tried to help those injured in the attack but her kit was inside the theatre.

As the port city of Mariupol was being razed to rubble by Russian bombs, hundreds of civilians, mostly women and children, went to hide in a theatre near the waterfront, a grand Soviet-era building. Last Wednesday, a bomb hit and - within seconds - the building had been split in two and left in ruins. We still do not know how many died, but the BBC has spoken to survivors who described for the first time what happened when the bomb fell.

All morning, Russian planes had been circling the skies above the city.

Mariia Rodionova, a 27-year-old teacher, had been living in the theatre for 10 days, having fled her ninth-floor apartment with her two dogs. They camped next to the stage in an auditorium near the back of the building.

That morning she had got some fish scraps from an outdoor field kitchen to feed her dogs, but then realised they had not drunk any water. So at about 10:00, she tied her dogs to her luggage and made her way towards the main entrance where a queue was forming for hot water.

And then the bomb fell.

There was the sound of a clap, thunderous and loud. Then the sound of broken glass. A man came from behind and pushed her to a wall, protecting her with his own body. The blast was so loud that she felt intense pain in one of her ears, so intense she thought her eardrum must have split. She only realised it had not because she could hear the screams of people. The screams were everywhere.

The force of the blast threw another man against a window. He fell on the ground, his face covered with broken glass. A woman, who also had a wound on her head, tried to help him. Mariia, who had been volunteering at the Ukrainian Red Cross in Mariupol, gathered her senses enough to shout over, telling her to stop.

Five-year-old screaming
"I said 'Wait, don't touch him. I'll bring my first aid kit and I'll help you both'," she recalled. But her kit was inside the theatre, and that part of the building had collapsed.

"There was only rubble," she said. It was impossible for her to get in.

"For two hours, I couldn't do anything," she said. "I just stayed there. I was in shock."

Vladyslav, a 27-year-old locksmith who does not want to use his full name, had also wandered into the building that morning. He had some friends there and went to look for them. He was near the main entrance when the explosion hit. He ran with others into a basement and, 10 minutes later, heard the building was on fire and emerged to a scene of chaos.

"Terrible things were happening," he said.

He saw plenty of people bleeding. Some had open fracture wounds. "One mother was trying to find her kids under the rubble. A five-year-old kid was screaming: 'I don't want to die'. It was heartbreaking."

It is likely to have been just one bomb that fell on the theatre that morning, bringing all that destruction with it, analysis by McKenzie Intelligence Services for the BBC has concluded.

"Due to the missile appearing to accurately hit the centre of the building, we believe it is a laser-guided bomb, likely the KAB-500L or similar variant, launched from an aircraft," the London-based group said.

Illustration depicting KAB 500-L Laser-guided bomb
Source: tactical missiles corporation, globalsecurity.org

"The nature of the explosion indicates it was armed with an instantaneous fuse, so was unable to penetrate the ground floors."

From the accuracy of the strike it is very likely that the theatre was the chosen target.

Satellite imagery released by the US company Maxar, from the days before the attack, show the word "children" in Russian was clearly painted on the lawn in front of the theatre, visible to any passing bomber.

Photo: A satellite image from Maxar Technologies taken on 14 March shows an aerial view of the Mariupol Drama Theatre which was bombed on 16 March. The word "children" (in Russian) can be seen written in large white letters visible from above outside the building

Russia denies attacking the theatre. It has also denied hitting civilian sites in Ukraine, although its attacks on countless residential buildings and other non-military facilities have been well documented across the country and nowhere more brutally than in Mariupol.

Andrei Marusov, an investigative journalist from Mariupol, had visited the theatre two days before the attack. "Everybody knew that it was a focal point for many women and children," Marusov, who is a former chairman of the advocacy group Transparency International Ukraine, said. "There were only civilians there."

That Wednesday, the day of the bombing, he had gone up to the top of his building at 06:00 to survey the city. The planes were still buzzing through the air. He said Russian planes had been shelling and bombarding the area where the theatre was, that Sea of Azov waterfront all morning.

"I saw that the city centre was covered by fire and constant explosions," he said.

Mariia also remembers military planes "making circles" near the theatre that morning, and "throwing bombs somewhere else". But it was not unusual for her to spot military planes flying in the area. She had got used to their sound.

There are still many details that remain unclear about the attack. It is thought that up to 1,000 people were sheltering in the drama theatre. Some appeared to have based themselves in its underground bunker or bomb shelter, according to others who hid in the building and city authorities. Mariia saw others living in crowded corridors on overground floors.

One thing which is clear from the accounts of the people the BBC spoke to, is that people would wander around the complex, its corridors and grounds, and others would come and go.

Photo: A view of destroyed theatre hall, which was used as a shelter by civilians, after Russian bombardment in Mariupol, Ukraine on March 18, 2022. IMAGE SOURCE,ANADOLU AGENCY / GETTY IMAGES
Image caption, The destroyed theatre that Mariia walked away from

The day after the attack, the city council said 130 people had been rescued. A further update said it was possible that many had survived. But there has been no news since then. The city is in such a desperate state that there may never be a clear picture of how many were there and how many survived.

Mariia's home inside the theatre for the days she was there was in an auditorium hall with a chandelier, and she nestled right next to the stage because her dogs had drawn some complaints. She said there were about 30 people in that hall and it is her belief that they must have all perished when the bomb hit. It was sheer luck that she had stepped outside at that moment.

After the blasts she was unable to find her dogs and it was a moment of desperation: "For me," she said, "my dogs were more important than anything."

Vladyslav said he saw many people coming out of the building, something that Mariia saw as well.

Escaping the city
"Some were with their luggage," she said. "No-one knew what to do, and the area was still being shelled."

Standing outside the theatre, she too looked at the damage. She realised it made no sense to look for another shelter. It had been a few stunned hours and she eventually left.

Map of Mariia's journey on foot from the theatre to Berdyansk

She tried to stop any car leaving the city. "People were in panic," she said, "no-one took me in their car." She started to walk along the coast.

"I needed to get out of the city."

First, she got to the village of Pishchanka. "I met a woman," she said, "who asked if I was OK. I started to cry." She was offered tea and food, and invited to spend the night. The next morning, she kept walking, until she reached Melekyne. A curfew meant she had to stop at 20:00. A day later, she walked to Yalta. The following one, to Berdyansk. "I walked all that time," she said.

Mariupol has seen the worst horrors of Russia's aggression on Ukraine. The invading troops have surrounded the city and attacked it relentlessly for almost a month, from the air, land and, in recent days, also from the sea. About 100,000 people remain trapped, subjected to a medieval-like siege. No electricity, no gas, no running water.

When Mariia left her flat for the theatre, her grandmother, who lived with her, refused to go. "She just said: 'It's my apartment, my home. I'm going to die here'."

Mariia is still waiting to hear whether she is alive.

[DaffyVina]

We must ensure war doesn't escalate beyond Ukraine - Nato chief
To Brussels now, where Nato's Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg is speaking to reporters ahead of US President Joe Biden's visit for talks with fellow leaders of the military alliance.

Stoltenberg says Russia's invasion of Ukraine is brutal, and the human suffering is terrible to watch.

"We are determined to do all we can to support Ukraine," Stoltenberg says, but Nato has a "responsibility" to ensure the war does not escalate beyond Ukraine, he adds.


Nato to discuss role of China - Stoltenberg
Photo: Jens Stoltenberg speaks during a press conference previewing an extraordinary NATO Summit at the Alliance headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, 23 March 2022. Copyright: EPA

Nato members face a fundamentally changed security environment where authoritarian governments are prepared to use force, Mr Stoltenberg says.

"I expect we will address the role of China in this crisis," the Nato secretary-general goes on to say.

China has provided Russia with political support including by spreading "blatant lies and misinformation," he says.


Russia must stop nuclear sabre-rattling - Stoltenberg
Russia must stop "nuclear sabre-rattling," Nato's Stoltenberg says, in response to a question from a reporter, describing Russia's comments on the use of such weapons as "dangerous and irresponsible".

He says he has a clear message for Russia - that nuclear war cannot be won and should never be fought.

A Kremlin spokesman has said Russia could use nuclear weapons if it faced "an existential threat".

[DaffyVina]

No humanitarian corridor for Mariupol
Lyse Doucet-Chief International Correspondent, Kyiv

Every morning, for weeks, Ukraine has announced that humanitarian corridors will open into a number of cities to bring in desperately needed supplies, and bring out civilians trapped by the fighting.

But by the end of each day, it’s a story of ceasefires which break in some places, of channels blocked by Russian bombardment.

And now the besieged southern city of Mariupol isn’t even included on this list – a place where shelling never stops, and residents have run out of water and food.

Russia offered a way out this week – but only if the city surrendered.

In some parts of Ukraine, including around the capital Kyiv, Ukrainian forces are now recapturing areas.

But Russia is still attacking on frontlines, especially in the south where it wants to seize a land corridor between the Crimean Peninsula and eastern Ukraine, areas it’s controlled since 2014.



Russian veteran reformer Chubais quits job as Putin envoy
Published26 minutes ago

Photo: Anatoly Chubais, former special representative of Russian President Vladimir Putin, pictured attending a session of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) in Saint Petersburg, Russia IMAGE SOURCE,REUTERS
Image caption, Mr Chubais was made a special representative to Mr Putin in December 2020

Anatoly Chubais has stepped down from his role as an international envoy for President Vladimir Putin, the most senior official to resign since Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Russian reports said he was currently in Turkey with his wife.
Mr Chubais was given the job of coordinating Russia's sustainable development goals internationally.

After the war began he posted a picture of a murdered opposition figure, in what was seen as a critical gesture.
There was no comment to accompany his Facebook photo of Boris Nemtsov, on the anniversary of his killing in view of the Kremlin. He has also made no comment yet on his resignation.

A source told the Tass news agency that he had left Russia as well as resigning as a special representative to President Putin.
"Yes, Chubais has resigned of his own will. But whether he has left [Russia] or stayed, that's his personal affair," said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov.

Other than Mr Peskov and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, few members of the president's circle have appeared in public in recent weeks.

Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhaylo Podolyak said on Wednesday that it was interesting that the two top security figures, Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of Staff Valery Gerasimov, were "nowhere to be seen", along with the heads of Russia's secret services.

Chubais was not seen as a Kremlin insider, despite having the post of special representative for ties with international organisations.

He is best known for his controversial role in helping to reform Russia's economy in the 1990s after the fall of the Soviet Union. The raft of privatisations under President Boris Yeltsin helped create a large number of very wealthy oligarchs.

Opposition figures were unimpressed by Mr Chubais's resignation. Jailed leader Alexei Navalny's spokeswoman, Kira Yarmysh, cast doubt on claims that it was an anti-war protest, rather than "out of fear for his own skin and his own money".

Russia has clamped down on criticism of the invasion, which began on 24 February, requiring state-run media to describe it as a "special military operation".

A new law bans the dissemination of "false news" about the war and political journalist Alexander Nevzorov became the most prominent figure yet to be prosecuted, after he posted details on social media about Russia's deadly attack on a maternity hospital in the southern Ukrainian city of Mariupol.

[DaffyVina]

22:57 23 Mar
No sign of Moscow changing course
Nada Tawfik -BBC News, New York

It’s getting harder and harder for Russia to deny its isolation on the international stage.

Besides its ally, China, all 13 members abstained from voting on Moscow’s draft.

The common message from most members was if Russia cared, and wanted to relieve the suffering of the Ukrainian people, it could end its war now.

Instead, Russia’s draft does not even recognise it is the sole cause of the humanitarian disaster or respond to the realities on the ground.

Ukraine has its own humanitarian resolution set for a vote in the General Assembly, where Russia cannot wield its veto.

Still, Moscow doesn’t show any sign of changing course.

It denounced the latest General Assembly vote as another anti-Russian show and blamed the humanitarian devastation on Ukrainian "nationalists and radicals".

As British diplomat Barbara Woodward told me after the vote: "I think Russia has consistently misplayed its hand here, and seriously underestimated the consequences of what it's done and the international perception of what it's done.

"They tabled this resolution over a week ago and they kept it on the table and rolled it forward. And, we saw the result today. Only one country supported Russia."



0:42 24 Mar
Russia has destroyed key bridge, say Ukraine

Officials in Ukraine say Russia has destroyed a key bridge over the Desna river, cutting off a vital route between the northern city of Chernihiv and the capital Kyiv.

Ukraine's ombudsman for human rights, Lyudmyla Denisov, said the bridge had been used to bring humanitarian aid to the city and evacuate civilians.

"The city has no electricity, water, heat and practically no gas, and the infrastructure has been destroyed," she said.

The head of the regional administration, Viacheslav Chaus, said in a video statement that aid would still be delivered, and a new bridge would be built "after our victory".



1:00 24 Mar
Ukraine uses facial recognition to ID Russian dead

Ukraine is using facial recognition software to identify the bodies of dead Russian soldiers and inform their families, Ukraine's vice-prime minister told Reuters on Wednesday.

Mykhailo Fedorov, who also runs Ukraine's ministry of digital transformation, said the country is using technology provided by New York-based company Clearview AI.

According to Clearview's founder, the company has access to more than two billion images from the Russian social media service VKontakte.

The service is being provided for free to Ukraine, and is not being provided to Russia, Reuters reported.

Ukraine has set up an online form for Russians seeking to claim the bodies of their dead. Ukraine claims that over 14,000 Russian troops have died, but those numbers have not been verified.


1:14 24 Mar
Tributes paid to journalist with 'moral clarity'
More now on the death of journalist Oksana Baulina, who's been killed by Russian fire in Kyiv.

A former magazine journalist turned opposition activist, she had to leave Russia after working for several years with the now jailed anti-corruption campaigner Alexei Navalny on his YouTube channel.

Fellow Russian journalist Alexey Kovalyov - who recently fled Russia himself -described Baulina as someone with a "phenomenal sense of moral clarity".

US journalist Lucian Kim also paid tribute to her.

[DaffyVina]

2:53 24 Mar
Up to 15,000 Russians have died, says Nato

Between 7,000 and 15,000 Russian troops have died after one month in the invasion of Ukraine, a senior Nato official told AP News on Wednesday.

The official added that 30,000 to 40,000 Russians are thought to have been killed or wounded in the fighting.

Russia has not provided an official death toll since 2 March, when it said that 500 of its troops had died.

For context, Russia lost about 15,000 troops in its 10-year occupation of Afghanistan.

Ukraine has also been vague about its own dead, with Ukraine's president saying about two weeks ago that 1,300 Ukrainian troops had died.


6:53 24 Mar
What's happening in Mariupol?

We've been reporting for days now about the desperate situation in the southern port city of Mariupol, where 100,000 people remain trapped without food, water or power and enduring fierce shelling by Russian forces.

Many people have been hiding in basements and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky said earlier this week that there was "nothing left" of the city.

Efforts to establish humanitarian corridors to allow civilians to leave and for aid to be delivered have repeatedly failed.

Mariupol has become the most heavily bombed and damaged city in Ukraine's war with Russia. It's key to Moscow's military campaign in Ukraine.

Geographically, the city occupies only a tiny area on the map, but it now stands obstinately in the way of Russian forces who have burst out of the Crimean peninsula.

They are pushing north-east to try to link up with their comrades and Ukrainian-separatist allies in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine.

But Ukrainian forces have been holding firm.


7:20 24 Mar
Ukrainians queue for food in besieged Mariupol
Photo: Local residents queue for humanitarian aid in the besieged southern port of Mariupol, 23 March 2022 -Copyright: Reuters
Image caption: Dozens of Ukrainians queue for food and other supplies in a Russian-controlled part of Mariupol

While numerous attempts to create corridors and agree to temporary ceasefires that allow Ukrainians to evacuate Mariupol have failed, some aid and supplies reached part of the city controlled by Russian forces yesterday.

More than 100 people waited patiently in line for boxes of food and humanitarian supplies being distributed from a lorry, Reuters news agency reported.

A young mother of two, Angelina, said she had received bread and food, adding that she felt lucky to reach the supplies in time. "You don't always find out... and then you arrive too late," she said.

"It's difficult to leave by bus now. We hope the number of people trying to get out will go down and it will get easier for us to leave," she added.


8:11 24 Mar
Russian Navy ship destroyed at southern port - Ukraine military
Photo: A fire said to be at the Ukrainian port of Berdyansk - Copyright: Ukrainian Navy/Facebook

The Ukrainian military says a large Russian ship has been destroyed near the southern port city of Berdyansk.

In a post on Facebook, Ukraine's Navy says a large landing vessel - the "Orsk" - was hit and set ablaze in the Sea of Azov this morning.

"The Orsk large landing ship of the Black Sea Fleet of the occupiers has been destroyed in the port of Berdyansk captured by Russia," the post says.

Ukrainian media report that one Russian ship has sunk and two others are on fire, and that an ammunition depot and a fuel warehouse were hit.

It is not possible to confirm this information from other sources.

Russia captured Berdyansk weeks ago and has been using the port for refuelling. It lies between Crimea and the besieged city of Mariupol.

[DaffyVina]

9:47 24 Mar
Russia claims capture of Ukrainian city of Izyum
Photo: A damaged vehicle is seen outside a destroyed hospital building, amid Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine, in Izyum, Ukraine, on 8 March 2022 - Copyright: Volodymyr Matsokin/Reuters

Russia says it has gained control of the city of Izyum in the Kharkiv Region of eastern Ukraine, Russia's state-owned Rossiya 24 news channel reports.

"The Russian armed forces continue to carry out the missions of a special military operation. By the morning of 24 March, units of the Russian army had taken full control of the town of Izyum in the Kharkiv region," Russian defence ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said.

The Ukrainian administration of the city, however, says the fighting continues.

Earlier this week, a senior Pentagon official, speaking on grounds of anonymity, said the Ukrainian army had launched a counter-attack in the small city south-east of Kharkiv.

"What we're seeing today is some significant fighting there by the Ukrainians, and an effort to take it back," the official is quoted by the AFP news agency as saying.

Izyum is on a key route to the eastern Donbas region that would potentially allow Russian forces in the north-east and south-east to link up. It is a regional centre in the Kharkiv region with a population of about 50,000 people, and an important railway junction.


10:28 24 Mar
What is the Wagner Group?
As we've been reporting, the UK has announced it will be sanctioning the Wagner Group.

The organisation is a group of mercenaries that was first identified in 2014 when it was backing pro-Russian separatists in the conflict in eastern Ukraine.

Since then, it has been involved in other regions too, including Syria, Mozambique, Sudan, and the Central African Republic. The paramilitary group has been described as Vladimir Putin's private army.

It's been warned that the group has been tasked with assassinating Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Foreign Secretary Liz Truss described the group as "hired thugs" in her statement on the new sanctions - saying they, alongside oligarchs and businesses, are "complicit in the murder of innocent civilians and it is right they pay the price".

Officially there are no ties between the Wagner Group and the Russian government - it denies any state involvement with the group, while also maintaining it does not legally exist because private military contractors are illegal in Russia.

It is believed to be funded by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a rich businessman with links to Putin. But Prigozhin has always denied any connection with Wagner.


11:09 24 Mar
Ukraine fighting on unequal terms, says Zelensky

Zelensky says he has been asking for air support "to help shield our sky" from the very beginning as Ukraine has no powerful anti-aircraft defences.

He said Russia was using weapons of mass destruction and the consequences were clear to see.

"We are on unequal terms for over a month," he said, calling for military support without limitation in order to save Ukraine's people and towns.

He says Russia is using all its arsenal with no limits - targeting residential towns, hospitals and bridges.

So far Ukraine has not received a single plane, says the president. He also says he has been appealing for tanks - "give them to us, sell them to us" - but is yet to get a clear answer about these from Nato members.

"Ukraine doesn't want to wage wars for years and years," he says. "We simply want to survive, to save our people."

But he says he is not blaming Nato. It's not their missiles destroying cities, he adds. The alliance can still help avoid further deaths by providing Ukraine with more munitions, says Zelensky.

It is a matter of life and death, he says.

11:10 24 Mar
BREAKING
Russia has used phosphorus bombs, Zelensky says
Zelensky accuses Russia of using phosphorus bombs this morning. "Again, children were dying, people were dying," he told Nato.

He did not provide any evidence or say where the attack took place.

12:15 24 Mar
What is Nato and how has it responded to Russia's invasion?
While we wait for the Nato news conference, here's a reminder of how the military alliance works.

The organisation was originally formed in 1949 by 12 countries but has grown to a club of 30 – including former communist countries in eastern Europe.

The key element of the alliance is that members agree to come to one another's aid in the event of an armed attack on individual member state.

Nato originally offered Ukraine a path towards membership in 2008 – but this hasn't happened, mainly because of Russia's opposition.

In fact, one of Moscow's demands before the invasion was that Ukraine should never be allowed to join.

As Ukraine isn't a Nato member, the alliance is not obliged to come to the country's defence. Members don't want to send troops to Ukraine, but have sent arms to the country – and are also planning to bolster forces in eastern Europe.