(Kyiv) Ukraine has accused Moscow of forcibly deporting hundreds of thousands of civilians from devastated Ukrainian towns to Russia to pressure Kyiv to give up, while President Volodymyr Zelensky has urged his country to to maintain its military defense and not to stop “even for a minute. »
Posted at 12:54 a.m.
Lyudmyla Denisova, Ukraine’s ombudsman, said 402,000 people, including 84,000 children, had been taken against their will to Russia, where some could be used as “hostages” to pressure Kyiv to surrender.
The Kremlin gave nearly identical numbers for those who were relocated, but said they wanted to go to Russia. The rebel-held eastern regions of Ukraine are predominantly Russian-speaking, and many people there have maintained close ties to Moscow.
As the war headed into a second month, the two sides traded blows in what became a devastating war of attrition. The Ukrainian navy said it sank a large Russian landing ship near the port city of Berdyansk which had been used to bring in armored vehicles. Russia claimed to have taken the eastern city of Izyum after heavy fighting.
President Zelensky used his nightly video address to rally Ukrainians to “move towards peace, move forward”.
“With our defense every day, we are getting closer to the peace we so badly need. We cannot stop even for a minute, because every minute determines our destiny, our future, if we will live. »
He said thousands of people, including 128 children, died in the first month of the war. Across the country, 230 schools and 155 kindergartens were destroyed. Towns and villages “are in ashes”, he said.
At an emergency NATO summit in Brussels on Thursday, Zelensky pleaded by video conference with Western allies for planes, tanks, rockets, air defense systems and other weapons, saying that his country “defended our common values”.
US President Joe Biden, in Europe for the summit and other important meetings, has assured that more aid is on the way, although the West seems unlikely to give Mr Zelensky all he needs wishes, for fear of starting a much wider war.
Around the capital, Kyiv, and other areas, Ukrainian defenders fought Moscow’s ground troops to a near stalemate, raising fears that a frustrated Russian President, Vladimir Putin, may have resorted to arms chemical, biological or nuclear.