Ukrainians back home…
More than 870,000 Ukrainians have returned home since the start of the war, the country’s border guard service said on Tuesday.
“Currently, 25,000 to 30,000 Ukrainians a day return to their homeland. Unlike in the early days, when it was mostly men, now there are also women, children and the elderly,” spokesman Andriy Demchenko said.
“They say they see that the situation is safer, especially in the western regions, and that they can no longer stay abroad: they are ready to return to the country and stay here,” he said. Explain.
More than 4.6 million refugees have fled Ukraine since the start of the conflict, according to UN figures as of Tuesday.
… but the evacuations continue
Hundreds of civilians continue to leave eastern Ukraine every day, however, as a major Russian offensive there is believed to be imminent. By bus or train, residents of the twin cities of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk continue to be evacuated, as well as the populations of the regions of Lugansk and Donetsk, from where six evacuation trains were to leave on Tuesday, according to the regional administration. .
Evacuations are also continuing discreetly in the other direction, towards pro-Russian territories. Convoys of cars, often old Ladas with the suitcase on the roof, pass each day towards the north under the control of the Russian army, with the tacit agreement of the Ukrainian soldiers on the last checkpoints.
The Kremlin, in an assumed way, intends to seize the border districts of Lugansk and Donetsk before May 9, the anniversary of the Nazi defeat against the Soviet army in 1945.
Zelensky denounces “hundreds of rapes”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Tuesday denounced “hundreds of cases of rape” observed in areas previously occupied by the Russian army, “including underage girls and very small children”.
“In the areas liberated from the occupiers, the recording and investigation of war crimes committed by Russia continues. Almost daily, new mass graves are found,” he said in a video address to the Lithuanian Parliament.
“Thousands and thousands of victims. Hundreds of cases of torture. Bodies continue to be found in drains and cellars, he continued. Hundreds of rape cases have been recorded. »
Twenty yachts seized in the Netherlands
Dutch customs authorities announced on Tuesday that they had immobilized several yachts, apparently intended for Russian oligarchs, in shipyards in the country.
“Following the sanctions decided against Russia and Belarus, customs placed 20 yachts in nine shipyards and traders under increased surveillance,” they said in a statement. “Because these 20 yachts are under heightened surveillance, they are not allowed to be delivered, transferred or exported. »
As of Tuesday, France has also immobilized four freighters and four yachts, worth more than $170 million, as well as six helicopters, in addition to seizing nearly $10 million worth of works of art.
With Agence France-Presse