New York, Dusseldorf After more than a week of war, Ukraine is under massive pressure and blames the West. A first attempt to evacuate civilians via a humanitarian corridor from the port city failed on Saturday morning. The most important events of the morning at a glance.
For a short time, the trapped civilians hoped to be able to leave the port city of Mariupol and the neighboring city of Wolnowacha largely unscathed and thus escape the brutal fighting. But she dissolved into nothing. Who is to blame? Russians and Ukrainians accuse each other. But: Neither the information from the Ukrainian side nor the Russian reports could be independently checked.
The Russian side had announced in the morning that they would put in a seven-hour ceasefire from 8 a.m. CET and open an evacuation corridor. But then this was postponed to the period 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. German time.
The first reports from the Ukrainian side that the evacuation of civilians was not taking place as planned appeared around 11:45 a.m. CET. She was initially suspended. The city of Mariupol announced on the Telegram news channel on Saturday afternoon that the “Russian side” is not adhering to the ceasefire. “For security reasons, the evacuation is therefore being postponed.” Russia is not complying with the necessary and agreed ceasefire for both cities, said the adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Olexii Arestowitsch.
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According to a report by the RIA news agency, the Russian Defense Ministry said that Ukrainian “nationalists” had prevented the withdrawal of civilians from Mariupol and the city of Volnowakha, also in the eastern Ukrainian region of Donetsk. Russian soldiers were fired on after they had set up corridors out of the encircled towns.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called on Ukraine to respect the ceasefire. “We are counting on the clear implementation of this agreement, our military has done its job,” Lavrov said in Moscow on Saturday, according to the Interfax agency. “The most important thing is that people get out of the towns and villages through humanitarian corridors.”
According to the Ukrainian side, negotiations on how to ensure a “safe humanitarian corridor” are ongoing. The city of Mariupol appealed: “We ask all residents of Mariupol to return to their places of refuge.” More information on new evacuations should follow. Earlier, the Ukrainian authorities said that more than 200,000 people from Mariupol and 15,000 people from the neighboring city of Volnovakha wanted to leave the cities during the planned ceasefire.
The civilian population should be allowed to leave the city on Saturday morning.
(Photo: via REUTERS)
Aid organizations had warned of a humanitarian catastrophe because food and medicine were becoming scarce and water supplies were running out. According to Mayor Vadym Boychenko, days after the shelling, there was no water in Mariupol, and the heating and power supply were not working. “We’ll just be destroyed,” he said.
Former NATO general Egon Ramms explained on Saturday in ARD’s “Morgenmagazin” that experience with ceasefires shows “that both sides are often not equally informed” and therefore combat operations are continued by one side. “Then the other side shoots back. And then such a humanitarian corridor has failed, both for the aid services and for the people who want to flee.”
When asked whether a ceasefire also entailed the risk that one side would reorganize its troops, Ramms answered in the affirmative if such a temporary ceasefire lasted longer. Then there is the possibility of “regrouping forces or tracking forces” and organizing supplies without a relative threat to the other side. Then this would be a pause to catch your breath, which also allows you to prepare for certain military operations.
According to Ukrainian sources, Russian troops continued to concentrate on encircling the capital Kyiv and the second largest city Kharkiv on Saturday. Explosions were heard in central Kiev.
Third round of negotiations between the warring parties
The announced third round of negotiations on a ceasefire is expected to take place again this weekend in Belarus. An exact date was not initially given.
The Russian government spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, according to the TASS agency, that Moscow is concerned with security guarantees. He hopes that Ukraine will accept the Russian demands during the negotiations. Among other things, Putin has set the goal of deposing the Ukrainian leadership.
President Zelensky warns: ‘If Ukraine falls, we all fall’
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky bitterly reproaches NATO for not wanting to get involved militarily in the conflict. In a live broadcast of solidarity demos in Europe, Zelensky warned of the war’s impact on the entire continent: “If Ukraine falls, everyone will fall.”
About 2,000 people had gathered in Frankfurt.
(Photo: AP)
He was disappointed that NATO refused to enforce a no-fly zone over the war zone, as Ukraine had recently demanded. The alliance gave the green light for further bombing of Ukrainian cities and villages, he said in his video address.
The Western alliance rejects the suggestion because it could entail direct participation in hostilities. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg made this clear again on Friday.
Zelensky called on those gathered in Frankfurt, Paris, Bratislava, Vilnius, Prague and Tbilisi, among others, to observe a minute’s silence for the men, women and children, soldiers, police officers and civilians who have died since Russia attacked the eastern European country . According to the police, a good 2,000 people had gathered in Frankfurt, many of them with Ukrainian flags or clothing in the Ukrainian national colors of yellow and blue.
Signs of solidarity with Ukraine and protest against the war.
(Photo: Reuters)
The President of Ukraine called on the people of Europe: “Don’t be silent, take to the streets, support Ukraine.” over the darkness.” The President said goodbye with a fist raised in combat and the words “Glory to Ukraine”.
The refugee situation is getting worse
The United Nations World Food Program (WFP) has expressed concern about the food situation for the civilian population in Ukraine. “The situation for the people in Ukraine has worsened dramatically as a result of the bitter fighting,” said Martin Frick, director of the WFP in Germany, according to the Funke media group. Food and drinking water could become scarce in some places in Ukraine.
The priority of the UN organization is now to establish supply routes to Kyiv and the epicenters of the conflict before the fighting escalates further. It’s a race against time.
A man bids farewell to his daughter and wife, whom he put on a westbound train from Kyiv to Lviv.
(Photo: AP)
In Germany and other EU countries, however, more and more refugees are arriving to escape the war. According to estimates by the UN refugee agency UNHCR, more than 1.25 million people had fled by Friday. The migration researcher Gerald Knaus told the editorial network Germany that Europe had to be prepared for up to ten million refugees.
Important international media stop working in Russia – including ARD and ZDF
Reliable information from Russia is now likely to become even more sparse. ARD and ZDF are temporarily stopping their work in Russia, as announced by WDR, which is responsible for the Moscow ARD studio. Zeit Online had previously reported about it.
The German public broadcasters thus join several international broadcasters and agencies that have completely or partially suspended their work on the territory of the Russian Federation – including the US television channel CNN, the British BBC, the Canadian channel CBC and the US Bloomberg news agency. The reason for the temporary withdrawal is a new media law in Russia.
“Given this situation, and concerned about the risk to our journalists and staff in Russia, we have temporarily suspended our on the ground reporting in Russia while we seek clarification on this legislation,” the BBC said via Twitter on Friday evening. Together with other media, they are working “for a free press and unhindered access to correct, independent journalism in Ukraine and Russia”.
Bloomberg Editor-in-Chief John Micklethwait said the amendment to the law appeared to aim to turn any independent journalist into a criminal. This makes it impossible “to continue any semblance of normal journalism in the country”.
Russian President Vladimir Putin signed several laws on Friday evening further restricting freedom of expression in Russia and curtailing independent media reporting. Up to 15 years in prison are threatened for spreading alleged “false information” about the Russian armed forces. Penalties also threaten those who publicly “denigrate” the army.
This is how the Handelsblatt is currently reporting on the Ukraine war:
Since last week, media in Russia have been banned from using terms such as “attack”, “invasion” and “declaration of war” in reporting on the war against Ukraine. Moscow describes the war as a military “special operation”.
In the Ukrainian war zone, on the other hand, journalists are in danger. A television crew from the British broadcaster Sky News said it came under heavy automatic fire on Friday while driving near a Ukrainian checkpoint in north-west Kyiv.
Both the reporter and the cameraman were hit, but thanks to their protective vests they escaped without major injuries. They were later told by Ukrainian soldiers that they had been fired upon by a Russian squad.
More: Snakes like in the Soviet era – the war has arrived in the everyday life of the Russians
With agency material