WARSAW, Poland – A senior adviser to Polish President Andrzej Duda said Duda and the presidents of the three Baltic states have arrived in Ukraine ahead of talks on material aid to the Russian-occupied country.
Pawel Szrot, Duda’s chief of staff, said on Wednesday that Duda “is currently on the territory of Ukraine together with the presidents of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. They are traveling to Kyiv to meet with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.”
For security reasons, he did not give any details.
Duda brings “symbolic support, with political support and for talks about material support,” Szrot said, adding that all four countries “provide Ukraine with support that is humanitarian in nature and not necessarily humanitarian in nature. “
These countries, all of which border Russia or its Kaliningrad exclave, have supplied Ukraine with what they describe as “defensive” weapons.
Images of the four presidents boarding a train and then gathering around a table on their journey were posted on their social media.
In a Twitter post, Estonian President Alar Karis said: “We are visiting Ukraine to show strong support to the Ukrainian people and will meet our dear friend President Zelenskyy.”
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KEY DEVELOPMENTS IN THE RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR:
— Investigations in Ukraine claim that a toxic substance was dropped in Mariupol
— A look at Russia’s military goals and challenges
– “It’s not the end”: The children who survived Bucha’s terror
– The Russian war is exacerbating fertilizer shortages and jeopardizing food supplies
— Czechs offer free shooting training for local Ukrainians
— For more coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
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OTHER DEVELOPMENTS:
Russia says more than 1,000 Ukrainian troops surrendered in the besieged southeastern port of Mariupol.
Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj.-Gen. Igor Konashenkov said 1,026 soldiers from Ukraine’s 36th Naval Brigade surrendered at a metal plant in the city.
Russian forces advanced on Mariupol in late February and units in the city are running out of supplies.
Konashenkov said the 1,026 Ukrainian marines included 162 officers and 47 female personnel and that 151 wounded received medical treatment.
Ukrainian Presidential Advisor Oleksiy Arestovych did not comment on the alleged mass surrender, but said in a post on Twitter that there were elements of the 36th
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ROME — Pope Francis says his claim, shortly after becoming pope in 2013, that a third world war was sweeping the globe “in pieces” is more timely. In an essay published in the Italian daily Corriere della Sera on Wednesday, Pope Francis writes that a year ago, when he was on a pilgrimage to Iraq, he would never have thought that war would rage in Europe.
Francis wrote that the many wars being fought around the world seem far away, until “almost unexpectedly, war explodes near us. Ukraine was attacked and invaded.”
The Pope also lamented that people’s memories are short. “Yes, because if we had a memory, we would remember what our grandparents and our parents told us, and we would feel the need for peace like our lungs need oxygen.”
Francis called war “a cancer that feeds itself by devouring everything”. He lamented that women, children and older adults “are forced to live in the belly of the earth to avoid bombs”.
Francis said the way to rip “hate from the heart” is “through dialogue, negotiation, listening, diplomatic skill and creativity, long-term strategies capable of building a new system of coexistence on which there is no longer… based weapons, for deterrence.”
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WASHINGTON — The United States and its allies are pushing ahead with sanctions aimed at forcing Vladimir Putin to spend Russia’s money to prop up his economy instead of maintaining his “war machine” to fight in Ukraine, a senior Treasury Department official said Tuesday .
Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo, one of the key US coordinators for Russia’s sanctions strategy, said in an interview with The Associated Press that the goal is to make Russia “less able to project power in the future.”
On the same day that inflation posted its steepest rise in decades, Adeyemo said clearing backlogs in the supply chain and managing the pandemic were key to bringing down soaring prices, which he linked to Ukraine’s ongoing land war brought, which contributed to rising energy costs.
Adeyemo discussed the next steps the US and its allies will take to inflict financial pain on Russia – and the complications the rising cost war has for Americans at home.
Adeyemo said the US and its allies will next target the supply chains that help build Russia’s war machine, which includes “everything from looking for opportunities, to looking for the military hardware that’s not just for use in of Ukraine, but were built for use in projecting power elsewhere.”
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Kyiv, Ukraine — More than 720 people have been killed in Bucha and other Kyiv suburbs occupied by Russian forces, and more than 200 are missing, the Interior Ministry said early Wednesday.
In Bucha alone, Mayor Anatoliy Fedoruk said 403 bodies had been found and the toll could rise as minesweepers comb the area.
Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office said on Tuesday it was also investigating events in the Brovary district, located in the north-east.
Authorities said the bodies of six civilians were found with gunshot wounds in a basement in the village of Shevchenkove and Russian forces are believed to be responsible.
Vladimir Putin on Tuesday vowed that Russia’s bloody offensive in Ukraine would continue until its goals were achieved, insisting the campaign would go ahead as planned despite a major pullback in the face of strong Ukrainian opposition and significant casualties.
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WASHINGTON — The Biden administration is preparing another, more diverse package of military assistance, potentially totaling $750 million, to be announced in the coming days, a senior U.S. defense official said Tuesday.
The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss plans that have not yet been publicly announced.
The additional aid is a sign that the government intends to further increase its support for Ukraine’s war effort.
The delivery of $800 million in military aid, which President Joe Biden approved just a month ago, is scheduled to complete this week.
— reported by Associated Press writer Robert Burns.
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KIEV, Ukraine – Ukrainian officials say fugitive Ukrainian oligarch Viktor Medvedchuk, who is both the former leader of a pro-Russian opposition party and a close ally of Russian leader Vladimir Putin, was arrested in a special operation by the country’s SBU secret service .
In his nightly video address to the nation on Tuesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy suggested that Russia could win Medvedchuk’s freedom by trading in Ukrainians now being held in Russian jails.
Ivan Bakanov, the head of the National Security Agency of Ukraine, said on the agency’s Telegram channel that Medvedchuk had been arrested.
The statement came shortly after Zelenskyy posted a photo on social media of Medvedchuk sitting in handcuffs and wearing a camouflage uniform with a patch of the Ukrainian flag.
Medvedchuk was the former chairman of the pro-Russian party opposition platform – For Life. He was under house arrest before the start of the war and disappeared shortly after hostilities broke out.
Putin is the godfather of Medvedchuk’s youngest daughter.
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KIEV, Ukraine – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Tuesday called on the world to respond to Russia’s use of a toxic substance in Mariupol.
“In the face of repeated threats by Russian propagandists to use chemical weapons against Mariupol defenders, and in the face of the Russian army’s repeated use of phosphorus munitions, for example, in Ukraine, the world must respond now,” Zelenskyy said in his late night video address to the nation Tuesday.
Phosphorus ammunition causes horrific burns, but is not classified as a chemical weapon.
Zelenskyi said experts are still trying to figure out what was used in Mariupol.
Zelenskyy said in addition to the Bucha killings, further evidence of the “inhuman cruelty” of Russian soldiers towards women and children was emerging in other suburbs of Kyiv and other cities to the north and east.