Kyiv, Ukraine (AP) – Russia launched an offensive in Ukraine’s eastern Donbass region on Sunday as the Polish president traveled to Kyiv to support the country’s Western aspirations and became the first foreign leader to address Ukraine’s parliament since the war began.
Ukrainian lawmakers stood up to applaud Polish President Andrzej Duda, who thanked them for the honor of speaking in a place where “the heart of a free, independent and democratic Ukraine is beating.”
Duda’s visit, his second in the Ukrainian capital since April, came as Russian and Ukrainian forces took part in battles spread over a 551-kilometer (342-mile) wedge from the country’s eastern industrial center.
After announcing full control of a sprawling naval steel plant that was the last defender in the port city of Mariupol, the Russian military launched artillery and missile attacks in Ukraine’s industrial center in an effort to expand the territory Moscow-backed separatists have held since 2014. г.
In a video address to the nation on Saturday night, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described the situation in Donbass as “really difficult”, but said his country’s ability to endure nearly three months of full-scale war against Russia “is good news”.
“Every day that our defenders take away from these offensive plans of Russia, violating them, is a concrete contribution to the approach of the main day. The desired day that we are all looking forward to and fighting for: Victory Day, “Zelenski said.
Zelensky stressed on Saturday that the 27-nation European Union must consider Ukraine’s desire to join the bloc as soon as possible in the context of the Russian invasion.
“I want to emphasize that our path to European integration is not just politics,” Zelenski said. “It’s about quality of life. And about the fact that Ukrainians perceive the values of life in the same way as the vast majority of Europeans.
Ukraine’s potential bid for EU membership will be discussed at a summit in Brussels in late June. The Warsaw government is stepping up efforts to persuade other EU members who are reluctant to accept the war-torn country as a member.
Poland has welcomed millions of Ukrainian refugees and become a portal to Western humanitarian aid and weapons entering Ukraine. It is also a transit point to Ukraine for some foreign fighters, including from Belarus, who have volunteered to fight against Russian forces.
“Despite the great destruction, despite the terrible crime and the great suffering that the Ukrainian people suffer every day, the Russian invaders did not break you. They failed. And I deeply believe that they will never succeed, “he told the Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine’s legislature. “I want to say it with all my might: the free world has the face of Ukraine today.
Russia seems to have made slow strides in the Donbass in recent days. It has stepped up efforts to seize Severodonetsk, the Ukrainian-controlled capital of Luhansk province, which, along with Donetsk province, makes up Donbass.
Luhansk Governor Sergei Haidai said the city’s only working hospital has only three doctors and enough supplies for 10 days.
On Sunday, the British Ministry of Defense said that Russia’s only operational company of BMP-T Terminator tank maintenance tanks designed to protect major battle tanks “was probably located on the Severodonetsk axis of the Donbass offensive.”
However, it says that with a maximum of 10 of the deployed vehicles, “they are unlikely to have a significant impact on the campaign.”
In a morning report from the General Staff, Russia also said it was preparing to resume its offensive against Slavyansk, a city in Donetsk province that is crucial to Russia’s goal of capturing all of eastern Ukraine, and saw fierce fighting last month after Moscow troops withdrew from Kyiv.
Seven civilians were killed in a Russian shelling on Saturday, and 10 others were injured elsewhere in the Donetsk region, the district governor said.
A monastery in the village of Bogorodichno has been evacuated after a Russian air strike, regional police said on Saturday. About 100 monks, nuns and children sought safe shelter in the church’s basement and no one was injured, police said on Facebook.
As Russia claims to have captured nearly 2,500 Ukrainian fighters from the besieged Mariupol steel mine, fears of their fate and future are growing for the city’s rest, now in ruins with more than 20,000 residents feared dead.
Family members of the fighters, who came from various military and law enforcement units, argued that they would be given rights as prisoners of war and eventually return to Ukraine. Deputy Prime Minister Irina Vereshchuk said on Saturday that Ukraine “will fight for the return” of each of them.
Russia’s Defense Ministry released on Saturday a video of the arrest of its troops, Sergei Volinsky, commander of the 36th Special Marine Brigade of the Ukrainian Navy, which was one of the main forces defending the steel plant. The Associated Press was unable to verify the date, location and conditions of the video.
The Azovstal steel plant has been the last defender in Mariupol for weeks and has become a symbol of Ukraine’s tenacity. His seizure gave Russian President Vladimir Putin a highly coveted victory in the war that began nearly three months ago.
Denis Pushilin, the pro-Kremlin leader of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, has vowed that Ukrainian fighters from the plant will face a tribunal. He said there were foreign nationals among the fighters, although he did not provide details.
The Ukrainian government has not commented on Russia’s claim to take over Azovstal. The Ukrainian military told the fighters that their mission was over and they could leave. She describes their retrieval as an evacuation, not a mass transfer.
Mariupol, part of Donbass, was blocked at the start of the war and has become a frightening example to people elsewhere in the country of hunger, terror and death they could face if the Russians surround their communities.
The mayor warned on Saturday that the city was facing a health and sanitation “catastrophe” from mass burials in shallow pits in the destroyed city, as well as damage to sewage systems. Approximately 100,000 of the 450,000 people who lived in Mariupol before the war remain.
“In addition to the humanitarian catastrophe created by (Russian) occupiers and collaborators, the city is on the verge of an outbreak of infectious diseases,” Mayor Vadim Boychenko told Telegram.
As Russia controls the city, Ukrainian authorities are likely to face delays in documenting evidence of alleged Russian atrocities in Mariupol, including bombings at a maternity hospital and a theater where hundreds of civilians have taken refuge.
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Bekatoros reported from Donetsk. Associated Press journalists Juras Karmanau from Lviv, Andrea Rosa in Kharkiv and other PA officials around the world contributed.
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