Russia-Ukraine war: US damns Putin’s ‘cruelty and depravity’; Zelenskiy questions lack of powerful response to ‘humiliation’ of UN in Kyiv – live | Ukraine

Russia’s foreign minister doubled down on his assertions against the west, claiming “the sooner” the west comes to terms with “new geopolitical realities” the better it will be for itself and the international community.

Today we are not talking about a new ‘cold war’, but, as I have already noted, about the persistent desire of Washington and its satellites, who imagine themselves to be ‘arbiters of the fate of mankind’, to impose an American-centric model of the world order.

It has gotten to the point that the western minority is trying to replace the UN-centric architecture and international law formed after the Second World War with their own ‘rule-based order’. These rules are written by Washington and its allies themselves and then imposed on the international community as binding.

Lavrov continued to argue that those “who pursue an independent course in domestic and foreign policy” are suppressed by the west “by the most brutal methods”.

Obviously, the attempts of the ‘collective west’ to impede the natural course of history, to solve their problems at the expense of others, are doomed. Today’s world has several decision-making centres, it is multipolar. We see how the states of Asia, Africa and Latin America are developing dynamically. Everyone has a real freedom of choice, including ways of development and participation in integration projects.

Our special military operation in Ukraine also contributes to the process of freeing the world from the neo-colonial oppression of the west, heavily mixed with racism and an exclusiveness complex.”

The sooner the West comes to terms with the new geopolitical realities, the better it will be for itself and for the entire international community.”

More than 1 million people have been “evacuated from Ukraine” into Russia since 24 February, Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov claimed in remarks published by the ministry early on Saturday.

Lavrov claimed the hotline of Russia’s interdepartmental coordination headquarters for humanitarian response received requests for assistance in evacuating 2.8 million people to Russia, of which 16,000 were foreign citizens and employees of UN and OSCE international missions.

“In total, 1.02 million people were evacuated from Ukraine, the DPR and the LPR, of which over 120 thousand citizens of third countries,” the foreign minister said in comments made to China’s Xinhua news agency.

Ukraine has said that Moscow has forcefully deported thousands of people to Russia with humanitarian corridors repeatedly breaking down.

According to data from the United Nations, more than 5.4 million people have fled Ukraine since the start of the invasion.

Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov has had some stern words to say about the west’s involvement in Ukraine in a rare interview with China’s official Xinhua news agency.

The transcript from the interview was published on the Russian foreign ministry’s website early Saturday morning.

Among a string of assertions, the foreign minister accused the United States and Nato countries of using Ukraine as “one of the tools to contain Russia” while maintaining that prior to Russia’s invasion on 24 February they were “forcing Kyiv to make an artificial, false choice: either with the West or with Moscow.”

Over the past years, the United States and its allies have done nothing to stop the intra-Ukrainian conflict … they ‘pumped up’ the Kyiv regime with weapons, trained and armed the Ukrainian army and nationalist battalions, and generally carried out the military-political development of the territory of Ukraine. They encouraged the aggressive anti-Russian course pursued by the Kyiv authorities.”

It was these conditions that gave Russia “no other choice” but to recognise the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics and launch a “special military operation” to demilitarise and denazify Ukraine, Lavrov continued.

In fact, Nato countries are “doing everything to prevent” a negotiated cease fire with Ukraine, Lavrov maintained.

By publicly expressing support for the Kyiv regime, Nato countries are doing everything to prevent the completion of the operation by reaching political agreements.

Various weapons are sent to Ukraine through Poland and other Nato countries in an endless stream.

All this is done under the pretext of ‘fighting the invasion’, but, in fact, the US and the EU intend to fight Russia ‘to the last Ukrainian’, and they are absolutely indifferent to the fate of Ukraine as an independent subject of international relations.”

If the US and Nato are really interested in resolving the Ukrainian crisis, then, firstly, they should change their minds and stop supplying arms and ammunition to Kyiv, Lavrov said, adding that Russia is “in favour” of continuing the negotiations, although “they are not going well”.

These are militant rhetoric and inflammatory actions of Kyiv’s Western backers. They actually encourage him to ‘fight to the last Ukrainian’, pumping up the country with weapons and sending mercenaries there. I note that the Ukrainian special services, with the help of Westerners, staged a crude bloody provocation in Bucha, including to complicate the negotiation process.”

Lavrov said it would only be possible to reach agreements when Kyiv begins to be guided by the interests of the Ukrainian people, and not “advisers from afar”.

The “special military operation” launched on 24 February is “developing strictly according to plan” and all its goals “will be surely achieved, despite the opposition of our opponents,” the foreign minister concluded.

The Australian Olympic Committee (AOC) will support Ukrainian athletes seeking to resettle in Australia on humanitarian grounds amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, outgoing AOC President John Coates said on Saturday.

Coates told the AOC’s annual general meeting in Sydney that it was “sad” young Ukrainian athletes were swapping sports equipment to take up arms against Russia’s forces, Reuters reports the president as saying.

“Today I announced that the AOC executive has by circular resolution last week, determined that the AOC will support humanitarian visa applications by Ukrainian athletes and will seek the assistance of you, our member sports, in their settlement requirements,” said Coates, who is also a vice president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

Coates added that the AOC would contribute $100,000 to the IOC’s “Solidarity Fund” for the Ukrainian Olympic community.

As Ukrainians are forced to defend their families and homes, Ukrainian athletes are amongst them.

Many have returned home for this purpose, and how sad it is that young men and women just swapped their rackets and running spikes for rifles and flak jackets.”

“They have lost their right to membership of the international Olympic community. There are no stadiums for their colours, no poles for their flags, no music for their songs and no dais for their athletes,” Coates added.

Russia’s “special military operation” in Ukraine will be finished as soon as its objectives are achieved, Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov has said in an interview with Al Arabiya television channel, as cited by RIA Novosti.

“It will be completed as soon as the goals, which I have already described, are accomplished and achieved,” he said.

In Lavrov’s view, any weapons shipment to Ukraine is a legitimate target, RIA reported.

Because those weapons are to be handed to the regime that is waging a war against its own population, against civilians in the country’s east,” he said.

The minister emphasised that the special operation was a response to what Nato was doing in Ukraine to prepare it for an aggressive stand against Russia.

They were provided with offensive weapons, including the weapons capable of reaching Russian territory. Military bases were built, including at the Sea of Azov. Dozens of military exercises were conducted, and many of them on Ukrainian soil with Nato assistance. And most of those drills were aimed against Russia’s interests. Therefore, the goal of this operation is to make sure that those plans do not materialise,” the Russian foreign minister said.

“It has become evident that the goals of the military operation, which I have described, must be accomplished. I can assure you that during this military operation the Kiev regime’s escapades have been taken care of,” the foreign minister added.

Shipments of new US military aid are en route to Ukraine after President Joe Biden asked Congress on Thursday for $33bn to bolster Ukraine’s fight against Russia.

In the images below, airmen and women with the 436th Aerial Port Squadron place 155mm shells, fused and helmets on aircraft pallets ultimately bound for Ukraine on a C-17 cargo aircraft on Friday at Dover Air Force Base, Delaware.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said there is a big risk that peace talks with Moscow would end and blamed public anger over what he said were atrocities by Russian troops.

“People [Ukrainians] want to kill them. When that kind of attitude exists, it’s hard to talk about things,” Interfax news agency quoted the president as telling Polish journalists.

Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has described Russian missile attacks on Kyiv during UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ visit as a “deliberate and brutal humiliation” that was “left without a powerful response”.

The dismantlement of debris in Kyiv, where Russian missiles hit on Thursday continues, he said in his latest national address late on Friday.

Unfortunately, such a deliberate and brutal humiliation of the United Nations by Russia was left without a powerful response.”

Zelenskiy continued to provide an operational update as to Russia’s advances, describing the city of Mariupol as a “Russian concentration camp in the middle of ruins”.

The city, which was one of the most developed in the region, is simply a Russian concentration camp in the middle of ruins. And the order of the occupiers in that part of Mariupol which they unfortunately still control differs insignificantly from what the Nazis did in the occupied territory of Eastern Europe.

But the Russian troops manage to be even more cynical than the Nazis 80 years ago. At that time, the invaders did not say that it was the Mariupol residents and the defenders of the city who shelled and killed themselves.”

The situation in the Kharkiv region is tough. But our military, our intelligence, have important tactical success.

In Donbas, the occupiers are doing everything to destroy any life in this area. Constant brutal bombings, constant Russian strikes at infrastructure and residential areas show that Russia wants to make this area uninhabited. “

Describing the situation in the temporarily occupied areas of the Kherson region, Zelenskiy said Russian forces are allegedly preparing for the transition to the “ruble zone”.

“Any attempt to transfer our territory to Russia’s administrative, monetary, or any other system will mean only one thing: Russia itself will suffer from that,” he said. “Our responses, sanctions and other reactions of the free world to Russia’s aggressive actions will not be delayed.”

The United States said that the world cannot deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin as before after Indonesia invited him to the upcoming Group of 20 summit in November.

President Joe Biden “has expressed publicly his opposition to President Putin attending the G20. We have welcomed the Ukrainians attending,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters.

We have conveyed our view that we don’t think they should be a part of it publicly and privately.”

Psaki indicated that the United States was in touch with the Indonesians and that the invitation to Russia came before its invasion of Ukraine.

State Department spokeswoman Jalina Porter said separately that the United States did not believe it could be “business as usual” with Russia on the international stage, AFP reported.

She did not comment on whether the United States would still attend the summit in Bali.

Pentagon spokesman John Kirby called Putin’s justifications for the invasion – that he is protecting Russians and that Ukraine was a font of Nazism – “BS”, during an emotional press briefing.

It’s hard to square that rhetoric by what he’s actually doing inside Ukraine to innocent people, shot in the back of the head, hands tied behind their backs, pregnant women being killed, hospitals being bombed,” Kirby said.

I mean, it’s just unconscionable and I don’t have the mental capacity to understand how you connect those two things.”

Before the war, Kirby said, “I don’t think we fully appreciated the degree to which (Putin) would visit that kind of violence and cruelty and depravity on innocent people, on non-combatants, on civilians, with such utter disregard for the lives he was taking.”

He then apologised for the rare show of emotion.

“I don’t want to make this about me. But I’ve been around the military a long, long time, and I’ve known friends who didn’t make it back. It’s just hard,” Kirby said.

Kirby lashed out at Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “depravity” in Ukraine, questioning how any moral person could defend bombing hospitals and summary executions of innocent people.

It’s hard to look at what he’s doing in Ukraine, what his forces are doing in Ukraine, and think that any ethical, moral individual could justify that.

I can’t talk to his psychology. But I think we can all speak to his depravity.”

Kirby also hit back at Putin’s justifications for war.

It’s hard to square his … BS that this is about Nazism in Ukraine, and it’s about protecting Russians in Ukraine, and it’s about defending Russian national interests, when none of them, none of them were threatened by Ukraine.

It’s brutality of the coldest and the most depraved sort.”

• The mayor of Kyiv, Vitali Klitschko, however, said a 25-storey residential building in the capital’s Shevchenkivskyi district was hit in the strike. Klitschko said one body had been recovered. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty said one of its staff, the journalist and producer Vera Gyrych, had died “as a result of a Russian missile hitting the house where she lived” during Guterres’ visit.

• The situation inside the besieged Azovstal steel plant in the city of Mariupol is “beyond a humanitarian catastrophe”, a Ukrainian commander inside the facility has said. Serhiy Volyna, from the 36th separate marine brigade, said there were hundreds of people in the steelworks, including 60 young people, the youngest of whom is four months old. Ukraine hopes to evacuate civilians who are holed up in the steel plant with the last fighters defending the southern city, Zelenskiy’s office said.

• Two British aid workers who have reportedly been captured by Russian forces in Ukraine have been named. Presidium Network, a UK-based NGO that says it carries out evacuations of families and individuals from war zones, identified Paul Urey and Dylan Healy as the captured men. The Foreign Office said it was seeking further information about claims the two men who went to Ukraine to provide humanitarian aid have been captured.

• The US has begun training Ukrainian armed forces at US sites located outside of Ukraine. A Pentagon spokesperson said that there are three sites outside of the US where Ukrainians are receiving training, including one in Germany.

• Vladimir Putin could announce the mass mobilisation of Russians on 9 May, Ben Wallace, the UK defence secretary, has said. Wallace said that Putin could declare that “we are now at war with the world’s Nazis and we need to mass mobilise the Russian people”.

• In an interview with Polish journalists, Volodymyr Zelenskiy said that since Russia’s withdrawal from Kyiv, 900 bodies have been uncovered in mass graves. The Guardian’s Lorenzo Tondo confirmed with the deputy head prosecutor of Kyiv’s region that 900 bodies have been found so far, buried in several mass graves around the region.

• In his latest address, Zelenskiy thanked the US for its support via a revived second-world-war-era lend-lease program. He also thanked countries that have resumed diplomatic operations in Kyiv, saying: “Such gestures, together with strong defensive, financial and political support from the free world, mean that the need to end the war is becoming more and more obvious to Russia.”

– Léonie Chao-Fong, Gloria Oladipo, Maanvi Singh

Despite saying it would only repay loans in roubles, Russia made overdue interest payments in dollars, Reuters reports:

Russia made what appeared to be a late U-turn to avoid a default on Friday, as it made a number of overdue interest payments in dollars on its overseas bonds, despite previously vowing to pay only in roubles as long as its reserves remained frozen.

Russia’s $40b of international bonds have become the focus of a game of financial chicken amid sweeping Western sanctions – and speculation about a default is likely to revive in less than four weeks, when a U.S. license allowing Moscow to make payments is due to expire.

Russia’s finance ministry said it had managed to pay $564.8m in interest on a 2022 Eurobond and $84.4m on another 2042 bond in dollars – the currency specified on the bonds.

A senior US official confirmed Moscow had made the payment without using reserves frozen in the United States, adding that the exact origin of the funds was unclear.

Deputy U.S. Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo told Reuters that the payments siphoned funds away from Russia’s Ukraine war effort and were a “sign of success” for US sanctions policy.

He declined to comment on the future of a Treasury general license due to expire on May 25 that allows banks to process Russian debt payments.

“Our overarching goal is to try to starve Russia of the resources that they’re using to both prop up their economy and finance their war effort, and to stop their invasion of Ukraine. So we’re going to keep making policy decisions with that in mind,” Adeyemo said.

Russia said it had channelled the required funds to the London branch of Citibank, one of the “paying agents” whose job it is to disburse them to the bondholders.

Citibank declined to comment.

In his latest address, Volodomyr Zelenskiy thanked the US for its support via a revived second-world-war-era lend-lease program:

United States, President Biden and Congress for an analogue of the famous Lend-Lease program, which will be very helpful in the fight against Russia, against the Russian invaders. Which helped a lot in the fight against the Nazis during World War II.

I am sure that now the Lend-Lease will help Ukraine and the whole free world beat the ideological successors of the Nazis, who started a war against us on our land. Lend-Lease and other programs in support of Ukraine are concrete proof that freedom is still able to defend itself against tyranny.

He also thanked countries that have resumed diplomatic operations in Kyiv:

Ambassador of the United Kingdom to Ukraine Melinda Simmons returned to Kyiv today.

Currently, 27 foreign diplomatic missions operate in the capital of our country. And this is an extremely important gesture of support for Ukraine, for which we are grateful to all of them.

Such gestures, together with strong defensive, financial and political support from the free world, mean that the need to end the war is becoming more and more obvious to Russia. The defeat of the occupiers is unalterable.

War threatens to enter dangerous new phase

Analysis by Julian Borger explained how a series of mysterious explosions in Moldova has raised the threat of Russia’s war in Ukraine spilling over into new territory, with unpredictable consequences.

Russia turns off the gas

Dan Boffey in Brussels, Philip Olterman in Berlin and Rob Davies in London wrote about the consequences for Europe after Russia halted gas supplies to two EU countries and threatened others, in a move condemned by European leaders as blackmail.

On the ground in ‘Fortress Zaporizhzhia’

Isobel Koshiw visited Zaporizhzhia, the only large city in south-east Ukraine under Ukrainian control. It has become a destination for the hundreds of thousands of people who fled Russian occupation, but with 70% of the wider region under Russian military control, there are fears that Moscow’s forces will attempt to take it.

Metal darts out to kill

Fléchettes are rarely used in modern warfare. Small, metal and sharp like a dart, thousands can be stored inside each shell. Lorenzo Tondo reported on the discovery of the tiny metal arrows in bodies of men and women in mass graves, allegedly killed during the Russian occupation of Bucha, Ukraine.

In an interview with Polish journalists, Volodymyr Zelenskiy said that since Russia’s withdrawal from Kyiv, 900 bodies have been uncovered in mass graves.

The Guardian’s Lorenzo Tondo confirmed with the deputy head prosecutor of Kyiv’s region that 900 bodies have been found so far, buried in several mass graves around the region.

Zelenskiy previously misspoke, implying that a new mass grave of 900 was found. The UN secretary general, António Guterres, was visiting the site of some of these mass graves yesterday.

Here’s more information on what it looks like for residents in Ukraine’s besieged Mariupol, from AFP.

Charred buildings, sunken ships and scattered shrapnel in the port of Mariupol remain a stark reminder of a siege endured by the Ukrainian city recently captured by Moscow during a military campaign in its pro-Western neighbour.

After nearly two months, the fighting in the battered city and its strategic port has mostly stopped, but the sound of explosions still echoes from the Azovstal steel plant: the last stronghold of Ukrainian forces in the city.

President Vladimir Putin last week ordered a blockage of the steelworks, where several hundred Ukrainian solider and civilians remain sheltered in a maze of Soviet-era underground tunnels, including those requiring medical attention.

From Mariupol’s port, AFP heard heavy shelling coming from Azovstal on Friday morning and mid-afternoon, during a media trip organised by the Russian army.

In the early afternoon, explosions were only a few seconds apart – some more powerful than others – and grey smoke occasionally rose into the sky above the huge industrial zone.

– De-mining –

Life appears to have come to a halt in Mariupol’s once bustling port, which bears the scars of some of the heaviest fighting seen in Ukraine since the start of Russia’s military operation on February 24.

In the port area on the shores of the Sea of Azov, the majority of administrative buildings have been severely damaged, their walls charred and crumbling.

Rolls of copper that according to their export labels were bound for Israel, lie abandoned. A few steps away, shipping containers lie ripped open – their cargo spilling out onto the ground.

But the danger is far from over for the city that was once home to around half a million people, as de-mining operations are underway in the port, with missile fragments scattered on the ground.

“The waters of the port and the port itself have been mined. We are carrying out de-mining operations to secure them,” said Sergei Neka, a senior official with the Emergency Situations Ministry of the pro-Russian separatist authorities.

At the end of the dock, two men in heavy suits work to disarm underwater mines and rockets brought up by divers. Once they are neutralised, they are taken away by a military truck.

A little further on, a few men with shovels walk alongside an excavator towards one of the many destroyed buildings.

Several ships have sunk and remain stranded in the port, including a cargo boat and a Ukrainian military command ship, destroyed in the siege.

Following up on earlier reports of air raid alerts in Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities, those alerts have reportedly ended.

From Iuliia Mendel: