WAR IN UKRAINE: April 6, 2022
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LATEST DEVELOPMENTS: Day 42
In one of the boldest public challenges ever to the United Nations, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky tells the world body it must act against Russian aggression by further isolating Moscow - even expelling it from the Security Council - or risk becoming illegitimate
More Russian cruise missile strikes targeted western Ukraine overnight but were destroyed before causing any damage. Later, CNN quoted the Russian military as saying that a series of strikes around Ukraine in the Lviv, Vinnytsia, Dnipropetrovsk and Dnipropetrovsk regions, targeted what they described as fuel storage and supply bases around the country.
Thousands of people are fleeing Ukraine's Donbas as Russia shifts the focus of its attacks to the east of the country. Ukrainian authorities are calling on people to evacuate the eastern Luhansk region, with five humanitarian corridors out of the area planned today - BBC
At least 1,563 civilians have been killed since the Russian invasion of Ukraine began, according to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). It has recorded 3,776 civilian casualties in Ukraine so far: 1,563 killed and 2,213 injured.
The EU and G7 will announce new Russian sanctions today. Preliminary reports from Reuters are that the sanctions will consist of: a complete import ban of Russian coal, wood, chemical and other raw materials – estimated at 9 billion Euro annually; total export ban on parts and goods for the energy extraction and transportation sectors, computers and chips, and parts for transportation equipment estimated at 10 billion Euro annually; closing of ports for Russian vessels except for deliveries of energy, food, and medicines; increased severity of financial sanctions particularly on Russian state banks, and on inbound investments; additional sanctions on individuals.
Early reaction in Ukraine to the new EU and US sanctions range from incredulity to routine disappointment. My contacts and sources said that earlier rounds of sanctions had failed to deter Mr. Putin and Ukrainian officials said that they’d hoped for a wider package that included bans on Russian oil and gas, not just coal.
According to the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine, as of April 4, Russian forces committed 74 crimes against 56 media people, 19 of them citizens of other countries. Of those, 12 have been killed and 17 wounded.
The Russian Embassy in Ireland is running out of fuel for heating and hot water and is complaining that numerous Irish oil companies have refused to deliver supplies, reported the Irish Daily Mirror. It has forced the embassy to write a letter to Foreign Affairs Minister asking the Government to intervene before they run out.
An International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) team has led a convoy of buses and private cars carrying more than 500 people to Zaporizhzhia. The civilians transported in the humanitarian convoy had fled Mariupol on their own. “This convoy’s arrival to Zaporizhzhia is a huge relief for hundreds of people who have suffered immensely and are now in a safer location. It’s clear, though, that thousands more civilians trapped inside Mariupol need safe passage out and aid to come in. As a neutral intermediary, we’re ready to respond to this humanitarian imperative once concrete agreements and security conditions allow it,” said an ICRC official. The ICRC team had tried over the course of five days and four nights to reach Mariupol, and came within 20 kilometres of the city, but security conditions on the ground made it impossible to enter.
An ICRC team at work in Ukraine. Credit: ICRC
“Where is the security that the Security Council needs to guarantee? It is not there, though there is a Security Council. It is obvious that the key institution of the world designed to combat aggression and ensure peace cannot work effectively”
