They ask for life imprisonment for the first Russian soldier tried in Ukraine for war crimes
The Ukrainian Prosecutor’s Office today requested a life sentence for Vadim Shishimarin, the first Russian soldier tried for war crimes, who asked “forgiveness” before a kyiv court, detailing how he killed a civilian at the beginning of the invasion that began on 24 last February, while President Volodimir Zelensky celebrated the process.
On the second day of the trial, the prosecutor asked the court to pronounce “a sentence of imprisonment for life” for Shishimarin, 21.
“The first trial in Ukraine against a Russian war criminal has already started. And it will conclude with the full restoration of justice in the international court. I am sure of it,” Zelensky wrote in a video message on his online channel. Telegram.
He also declared himself sure that his country would find and deliver “to justice all those who gave and carried out criminal orders.”
Meanwhile, the Russian sergeant on trial admitted to having killed a 62-year-old man on February 28. Turning to his wife, he said, “I know you won’t be able to forgive me, but I apologize anyway.”
Zelensky describes the Russian military invasion in Donbass as “hell”
Although bolstered by a new $40 billion aid package for Ukraine approved hours earlier by the United States, Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelensky said last night that the renewed Russian offensive in the eastern Donbass region had turned into “hell.”
“In Donbass, the occupiers are trying to increase pressure,” Zelensky said during a speech to the population shortly before the 86th day of the Russian invasion began. “It’s hell, and that’s not an exaggeration,” he stoked.
The Ukrainian Defense Ministry said yesterday that Russian forces were preventing civilians from leaving the eastern part of the country known as Donbass, which contains vast territories of Russian-speaking people, some of them separatists, who have been at odds with the kyiv government for eight years. years.
Russia claims that it has almost completely conquered the Ukrainian region of Lugansk
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said on Friday that Moscow was close to fully controlling the breakaway Luhansk region in eastern Ukraine and that more than 1,900 soldiers who were holed up in Mariupol’s Azovstal steelworks had surrendered.
“The liberation of the Lugansk People’s Republic is close to completion,” Shoigu said during a meeting with officials from his ministry and the army, broadcast on television.
The EU disburses another 600 million in emergency aid to Ukraine
The European Union disbursed this Friday another 600 million euros of emergency macro-financial aid to Ukraine, the second tranche of the 1.2 billion package approved weeks before Russia’s military invasion.
This was announced by the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, in a message on the social network Twitter, in which she took the opportunity to recall that “more is to come” because Brussels has just proposed another 9,000 million euros for kyiv.
“In addition to this assistance, we will work on a reconstruction platform to help Ukraine as a free and democratic country,” added the German, referring to the long-term aid that the EU intends to promote together with other international partners.
Russia estimates the number of Ukrainian soldiers who surrendered in Azovstal at 1,908
The Russian Defense Ministry on Friday numbered 1,908 Ukrainian soldiers who surrendered at the Azovstal steelworks in Mariupol, southern Ukraine, in recent days.
“The nationalists blocked at the plant have begun to surrender. So far 1,908 people have laid down their arms,” Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said.
During a meeting of the army’s top leadership, broadcast on Russian television, Shoigu added that the blockade of the steel mill by Russian forces continues.
The Russian minister assured that “177 civilians, including 85 women and 47 children,” have also left the Azovstal metallurgical plant.
Russian bombings in Donetsk and Luhansk leave 20 dead in one day
The bombardment by Russian troops against 54 population centers in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in the last 24 hours caused the death of twenty civilians, the Ukrainian government Group of United Forces reported today.
“According to operational information, some twenty civilians died under enemy fire and at least fifty people were injured,” the organization said in a Facebook message collected by the Ukrinform agency.
It adds that “the preliminary number of victims in Severodonetsk, Avdiivka, Lysychansk, Maryanka and other cities and towns could be much higher” and that the information is being verified.
Russia will create 12 military units on the western border due to NATO threat
Russia will create 12 military units on the western border before the end of the year to respond to threats from NATO and the future incorporation of Finland and Sweden into the Atlantic Alliance, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said today.
“Our closest neighbors, Finland and Sweden, have applied to join NATO. Therefore, tension continues to grow in the Western Military District’s area of responsibility,” Shoigu told a meeting of the Russian Defense Ministry’s board of directors. , according to his speech broadcast on public television.
“We are taking proper countermeasures. Under these conditions, we are actively improving the combat composition of the troops. By the end of the year, 12 military units and subunits will be formed in the Western Military District,” he said.