The footage shows how civilians are being evacuated in Sumy.
Kyrylo Tymoshenko, adviser to Ukrainian President Zelensky, shared footage of the evacuation of civilians from Sumy on Tuesday.
Sumy, a city in northeastern Ukraine, has been the scene of heavy shelling in recent days, with an airstrike killing 18 civilians overnight, including two children.
Oleg Nikolenko, a spokesman for the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry, said on Tuesday that a humanitarian corridor from Sumy would be open from 10:00 to 21:00 local time to evacuate local residents and foreign students.
— Chloe Taylor
2 million people left Ukraine, UN says
Two million people have left Ukraine, said UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi.
— Chloe Taylor
The mayor of Irpin said that the Russians threatened his life and demanded surrender
Abandoned strollers under a collapsed bridge as people walk across collapsed concrete to leave Irpen, a northwestern suburb of Kyiv, on March 7, 2022.
Dimitar Dilkoff | AFP | Getty Images
Alexander Markushin, the mayor of Irpin, a city on the outskirts of Kyiv, said on Tuesday that Russian forces had contacted him to threaten his life and demand his surrender.
“Yesterday at 17:58 I received a message from the occupiers threatening my life and health,” Markushin said, according to the translation.
He added that the message contained demands for “the complete surrender of Irpin.”
“I’m surprised that these monsters still haven’t understood – Irpin doesn’t give up, Irpin doesn’t sell, Irpin fights,” he said.
In recent days, fierce battles have been going on in Irpin. On Sunday, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russian troops opened fire on civilians trying to leave the city, killing a family of four. “How many such families died in Ukraine? We will not forgive. We will not forget,” he said.
— Chloe Taylor
Russian state media are reporting that the new ceasefire will lead to the evacuation of Ukrainian civilians to Russia.
Smoke rises after Russian troops shelling Mariupol, Ukraine, Friday, March 4, 2022.
Eugene Maloletka | AP
On Tuesday, the Russian military announced a new ceasefire in five Ukrainian cities, according to state media. But the evacuation routes will lead to Russia.
The Interfax news agency reported that evacuation routes would lead civilians “from Kyiv, Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkov, Mariupol to Russia,” citing Russia’s National Defense Control Center.
On Monday, Russian plans for a ceasefire to allow civilian evacuation were dismissed by Ukrainian officials as “completely immoral” after it emerged that evacuation routes Russia planned to open would lead into Russian or Belarusian territory.
This comes after evacuation efforts were halted over the weekend over claims that Russian troops were violating ceasefire agreements by continuing to attack cities and routes out of them.
At a briefing on Tuesday, Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine Irina Vereshchuk said that Kyiv had agreed on an evacuation route from Sumy to the Ukrainian city of Poltava. The route was coordinated with both Russia and the International Committee of the Red Cross, she told reporters.
“No other routes have been agreed upon,” she said, according to an NBC News translation. But she added: “We already have information that the Russian side is preparing a violation of this corridor, they are preparing manipulations with routes so that people enter. [another] direction.”
On Monday, a UN official said civilians should be allowed to evacuate conflict zones “in the direction they choose.”
— Chloe Taylor
Airstrike in Sumy kills 18 in Ukraine, including two children
A Russian airstrike on the city of Sumy on Monday night killed 18 civilians, including two children, a Ukrainian official said.
Ukrainian Deputy Interior Minister Anton Gerashchenko said in a Telegram message on Tuesday that Russian pilots “committed another crime against humanity in Sumy” by dropping bombs on residential buildings in Sumy.
“Removal of rubble continues,” he said. “But the fact of the death of 18 civilians has already been established. Including two children.”
Gerashchenko said that these deaths were also “on the conscience of European politicians … who have not yet made a decision to give us powerful anti-aircraft missiles or close the sky.”
Western countries and the NATO military alliance ruled out the introduction of a no-fly zone over Ukraine, arguing that the downing of Russian aircraft would lead to an escalation of the conflict and even greater human suffering.
— Chloe Taylor
UK says Russia is using claims of Ukrainian nuclear weapons to justify invasion
In an intelligence brief on Tuesday, the UK Department of Defense said there had been “a marked increase in Russia’s accusations that Ukraine is developing nuclear or biological weapons” since late February.
“These narratives have been around for a long time, but they are now likely to be amplified as part of the retrospective justification for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.”
Russia launched an invasion of Ukraine on 24 February.
Last week, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba named Russian claims the fact that Ukraine is developing nuclear weapons is a “hallucination”.
“I once again refute this sick fake,” he wrote on Twitter.
— Chloe Taylor
UN calls for safe passage for civilians fleeing conflict
In a statement Monday, Martin Griffiths, UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, said there are three urgent priorities that need to be addressed in Ukraine in order to “reduce the pain and suffering that we are all seeing in real time.”
First, he said, military operations must constantly take care to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure from attack—this included creating safe passageways to allow civilians to leave areas of active hostilities “in the direction they choose.”
On Monday, Ukrainian officials accused Russia of only allowing civilian evacuations to Russian or Belarusian territory, which the Ukrainian government called “completely immoral.”
Griffiths said in a statement that the safe passage of humanitarian supplies to conflict zones is also vital. According to him, the UN also wanted to have a system of “permanent communication” with both Russia and Ukraine, as well as guarantees for the delivery of humanitarian aid.
— Chloe Taylor
Ukraine says Russia’s advance has “significantly slowed down”
As the Russian invasion of Ukraine enters its thirteenth day, officials in Kyiv say the pace of Russia’s advance has slowed.
The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said in a Facebook post on Tuesday that “the enemy continues the offensive operation, but the pace of advancement of its troops has slowed down significantly,” the translation says.
As of 6 a.m. local time, defensive battles continued throughout the country, including in Chernihiv, the capital of Kyiv and on the southern coast of Ukraine, the report said.
According to Ukrainian officials, Russian troops are “increasingly violating international humanitarian law regarding military conflict.”
In Kherson and Nikolaev, which Ukraine says are now occupied by Moscow’s troops, Ukrainian officials say Russia has set up tactical teams designed to “do propaganda work with the local population.”
— Chloe Taylor
Russia Says Oil Could Rise To $300 A Barrel If Western Allies Target Energy
Oil pumpers, also known as “nodding donkeys”, are reflected in a puddle as they work at an oil field near Almetyevsk, Russia, on Sunday, August 16, 2020.
Andrey Rudakov | Bloomberg via Getty Images
Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said oil prices could rise above $300 a barrel if the West decides to impose full sanctions on its energy exports.
“It is absolutely clear that the withdrawal of Russian oil will lead to catastrophic consequences for the global market,” Novak said in a speech on state television.
“The surge in prices will be unpredictable. It will be $300 per barrel, if not more.”
Brent futures rose 3.5% to $127.61 a barrel on Tuesday morning in London, while US West Texas Intermediate futures jumped 3% to $123.04.
— Sam Meredith
Putin still enjoys strong support in some circles in Russia, says former NATO deputy chief
Rose Gottemoeller, former Deputy Secretary General of NATO, said there are signs that Russian President Vladimir Putin retains strong support in parts of the country.
“There are a number of very strong nationalists in Russia. Apparently, yesterday they were present … in motorcades at the Kremlin, waving flags, supporting the president, ”she said on CNBC’s Squawk Box Asia on Tuesday.
Some polls also show that his popularity in Russia continues to rise, she added.
On the other hand, people who are informed or interested in this, “for example, oligarchs who have investments around the world and want to keep their wealth,” may be concerned about increased international sanctions.
“I’m not surprised they’re getting more and more worried,” Gottemoeller said.
“I don’t think he will lose control of power, but perhaps some messages will start to reach him,” she said.
— Abigail Ng
Ukraine claims to have killed another top General Putin and other top Russian military officers
A man stands on the rubble of a house destroyed by recent shelling during the Ukrainian-Russian conflict in Kharkiv, Ukraine, March 7, 2022.
Alexander Lapshin | Reuters
The military intelligence service of Ukraine said that Major General of the Russian army Vitaly Gerasimov was killed and other high-ranking officers of the Russian army “were also killed or wounded” in the battle near Kharkov.
Gerasimov was identified by the security services as the chief of staff and first deputy commander of the 41st Combined Arms Army.
The agency that said Gerasimov had been “liquidated” said the findings related to his death near a city in northeastern Ukraine “indicate significant communication problems” in the Russian army “and with the evacuation of their broken units.”
The post contains embedded audio files purporting to be intercepted messages from Russians discussing Gerasimov’s death.
The report of the assassination comes days after a Ukrainian sniper shot and killed another deputy commander of the 41st Combined Arms Division, General Andrey Sukhovetsky.
— Dan Mangan