US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken on Thursday echoed President Joe Biden’s assessment that Vladimir Putin’s armed forces are committing war crimes in Ukraine.
He confirmed that another US citizen had been killed in the country and warned China not to come to Russia’s aid.
Meanwhile, senior US defense officials have said that more Russian airstrikes are now hitting civilian infrastructure and targets.
Blinken said the destruction was part of an attempt to break the will of the Ukrainian people.
“President Biden said yesterday that he believes war crimes have been committed in Ukraine,” he said.
– Personally, I agree. Deliberately targeting civilians is a war crime.
“After all the devastation of the past three weeks, it’s hard for me to conclude that the Russians are doing otherwise.”
US officials avoided the designation “war crimes” until Wednesday. They said a complex legal process is currently underway to establish whether the attacks on civilians were deliberate.
The situation changed when journalists at the White House asked Biden’s opinion.
“I think he is a war criminal,” he said.
Secretary of State Anthony Blinken on Thursday said he agreed with President Joe Biden’s assessment that Russia is committing war crimes in Ukraine.
President Vladimir Putin shows no signs of looking for a way to retreat from the conflict
Evacuees fleeing the Ukrainian-Russian conflict emerge from the besieged southern port city of Mariupol, Ukraine, March 17, 2022.
Pictured, evacuees fleeing the Ukrainian-Russian conflict sit in a car as they wait in line to leave the besieged southern port city of Mariupol, Ukraine, March 17, 2022. The windshield of the car shows what looks like a bullet hole.
This week, US diplomacy has focused its attention on China, trying to distract it from responding to Russia’s calls for help, including military equipment.
Blinken said Washington would not hesitate to impose consequences.
“We believe that China, in particular, has a responsibility to use its influence with President Putin and protect the international rules and principles that it claims to uphold,” he said.
“Instead, it looks like China is moving in the opposite direction, refusing to condemn this aggression, trying to portray itself as a neutral arbiter.”
There will be more diplomacy on Friday.
“President Biden will talk to President Xi tomorrow and make it clear that China will be held accountable for any action it takes to support Russian aggression,” he said.
“And we won’t hesitate to take on the costs.”
But the Secretary of State did not explain what those costs might be, and Washington has yet to provide evidence of China’s apparent willingness to help Moscow.
Blinken warned that an even deadlier phase of the conflict could be ahead.
“We believe that Moscow can set the stage for the use of chemical weapons and then falsely accuse Ukraine in order to justify escalating its attacks on the Ukrainian people,” he said.
“Faking events and creating false narratives about the genocide to justify more military force is a tactic Russia has used before, including in Georgia.
“We believe that Russia will bring its mercenaries from private military groups and foreign states to Ukraine.”
Moscow has said it is recruiting 16,000 fighters from Syria to fight in the war.
But U.S. intelligence officials said they believe only a “trickle” of people make the journey.
Earlier, Biden again condemned Russian brutality in Ukraine during a virtual meeting with Irish Taoiseach Michael Martin.
“We are meeting at a time when the demands for unity in the world are really intensifying,” he said.
“We must be united, and we are definitely united.
“But Putin’s brutality and what he is doing and what his troops are doing in Ukraine is simply inhuman.”
Russian forces bombed a theater hiding hundreds of civilians, including children, in the besieged port city of Mariupol on Wednesday, the city council said.
Satellite imagery taken by Maxar on Monday showed huge white letters on the pavement in front of and behind the theater reading “Children” in Russian – “Children” – to warn military aircraft of those inside. He still fell under the blow of Putin’s forces
US officials have repeatedly condemned Russia’s tactics to bomb Ukrainian cities.
A senior US defense official said he could not estimate the proportion of strikes that hit civilian targets.
But the official said: “We are seeing an increase in the number of strikes against civilian infrastructure and civilian objects.”
Particular attention was riveted to the theater of the shelter of families, which suffered on Wednesday in the besieged Mariupol.
Hundreds of people lived in a large colonnaded building in the city center after their homes were destroyed in three weeks of fighting in the strategic port city after Vladimir Putin’s troops invaded.
Rescue efforts continued among the wreckage Thursday, with rescuers saying no one has been found dead so far.
Ukraine’s human rights ombudsman Lyudmila Denisova expressed hope, saying the shelter had withstood the airstrike.
“The building withstood the impact of a powerful aerial bomb and protected the lives of people who took refuge in a bomb shelter,” she said in the Telegram messenger.
“Work is underway to open up the basement,” and the surviving adults and children are coming out,” she wrote. According to her, there is no information about the victims yet.