Russian forces have launched their long-anticipated offensive in eastern Ukraine, attempting to push through defences along almost the entire front line in what Ukrainian officials described as the second phase of the war.
Ukraine says no safe corridors agreed for third successive day
Ukraine was for the third successive day unable to secure Russia’s agreement to establish any humanitarian corridors to evacuate civilians trapped in cities and towns, Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said on Tuesday. “Today, April 19, unfortunately, there are no humanitarian corridors,” Vereshchuk wrote on Facebook. She said intensive shelling continued in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine, where President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Russia has launched a new offensive.
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UK not looking to help Russia, minister says on swapping Putin ally for captured Britons
Britain is not going to be looking at how to help Russia, a senior minister said Tuesday when asked about the prospect of swapping pro-Russian politician Viktor Medvedchuk for two British fighters who were captured in Ukraine by Russian forces. The Britons appeared on Russian state TV on Monday and asked to be exchanged for Medvedchuk, a Ukrainian ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin who is being held by the Ukrainian authorities.
Russia focuses on Donetsk, Luhansk regions
The Ukrainian military’s General Staff said Tuesday that Russian forces are focusing their efforts on taking full control over the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in the east. It noted that a “new phase of war” began Monday when “the occupiers made an attempt to break through our defenses along nearly the entire frontline in the Donetsk, Luhansk and Kharkiv regions.” It said in a statement issued early Tuesday that “the Russian military has continued to blockade and shell Mariupol and to deal missile strikes on other cities.”
Here are a few more key updates:
➡️ Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia had begun the “Battle of Donbas” in the east and a “very large part of the entire Russian army is now focused on this offensive”.
➡️ Ukrainian media reported explosions along the front line with shelling in Marinka, Slavyansk and Kramatorsk, and also in Kharkiv in the northeast, Mykolaiv in the south and Zaporizhzhia in the southeast. Air raid sirens were also going off in main centres near the front.
➡️ Ukrainian forces have struck a Russian village near the border with Ukraine, wounding one resident, the governor of the Russian province of Belgorod said.
➡️ US President Joe Biden will hold a call with allies on Tuesday to discuss Ukraine, including on how to coordinate on holding Russia accountable, the White House said.
➡️ French President Emmanuel Macron said that his dialogue with Russian President Vladimir Putin stalled after mass killings were discovered in Ukraine.
➡️ Zelenskyy formally submitted a completed questionnaire on European Union membership and said he believed it would lead to his country gaining candidate status within weeks.
➡️ Russia’s invasion has damaged or destroyed up to 30% of Ukraine’s infrastructure at a cost of $100 billion, a Ukrainian minister said, adding reconstruction could be achieved in two years using frozen Russian assets to help finance it.
➡️ Russia flagged a likely further cut in interest rates and more budget spending to help the economy adapt to biting Western sanctions as it heads for its deepest contraction since 1994.
(Compiled from Reuters and Associated Press reports)
