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Russia-Ukraine war: Zelenskiy plans million-strong army to retake south; death toll rises after Russian strike on apartment block – live
Volodymyr Zelenskiy asks military chiefs to plan new fighting force; rescuers search rubble for survivors after strike in Chasiv Yar
Summary of the day so far
- At least 18 people have died and dozens more were injured after a Russian missile attack hit a five-storey apartment building in the town of Chasiv Yar in eastern Ukraine. Emergency crews worked to pull people trapped in the rubble. Rescuers say they were in voice contact with two people trapped in the ruins. The strike destroyed three buildings in a residential quarter of town, inhabited mostly by people who work in nearby factories.
- Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, accused Moscow of purposely targeting civilians in the Chasiv Yar attack and promised “punishment is inevitable for every Russian murderer”.
- Serhai Haidai, Ukraine’s governor of Luhansk, has said “a small part of the Luhansk region is still holding on, fierce battles are going on”. He accused Russian forces of using new recruits from the occupied areas of Ukraine as “cannon fodder”, who “are guaranteed not to survive even the first battle”.
- Russia has claimed in the last 24 hours to have killed more than 500 Ukrainian troops and to have destroyed large amounts of foreign-supplied weaponry and ammunition, including “ammunition depots for HIMARS multiple launch rocket systems, M777 howitzers, and 2S7 Pion self-propelled guns supplied by the United States to Ukraine”.
- The UK’s Ministry of Defence suggests that neither side has made any territorial gains in Ukraine over the weekend. Its latest briefing states “Russian artillery bombardments continued in the northern Donbas sector, but probably without any major territorial advances. Ukrainian forces continued to apply localised pressure to the Russian defensive line in north-east Kherson oblast, also probably without achieving territorial gain.”
- Ukraine has warned residents in southern Kherson and Zaporizhzhia to evacuate as it prepares to launch a counter-offensive to retake the area. The Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions were occupied by Russian troops in late February after they crossed the bridge from Russia-annexed Crimea. Ukraine’s deputy prime minister, Iryna Vereshchuk, said: “It’s clear there will be fighting, there will be artillery shelling … and we therefore urge [people] to evacuate urgently.”
- Lithuania has expanded restrictions on trade through its territory to Russia’s Kaliningrad exclave, as phase-ins on earlier announced European Union sanctions begin. Goods sanctioned from Monday morning include concrete, wood, alcohol and alcohol-based industrial chemicals. The governor of Kaliningrad, Anton Alikhanov, has proposed a total ban on the movement of goods between the three Baltic states and Russia, in response to what authorities in the exclave have called a “blockade”.
- Russian gas giant Gazprom will begin 10 days of routine maintenance on its Nord Stream 1 pipeline today as Europe waits to see if the gas comes back on. The annual work on the two pipelines was scheduled long in advance, however many fear Gazprom might take the opportunity to simply shut off the valves.
- Two Ukrainian civilians were killed and at least two others injured in Russian missile attacks on the town of Siversk, near Sievierodonetsk, officials said. Donetsk governor, Pavlo Kyrylenko, said three people were hurt by shelling in Soledar, and seven houses and other property burned down in Bakhmut with no details of casualties. Ukraine officials warned last week the city in the Luhansk region was facing a “humanitarian disaster”.
