Horrifying scenes as Putin’s evil troops massacre at least 50 civilians at busy train station

Authorities close down Amnesty in Russia

Today, the Russian authorities have closed down representative offices of Amnesty International and other international NGOs.

Reacting to the news, Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International, said: “Amnesty’s closing down in Russia is only the latest in a long list of organizations that have been punished for defending human rights and speaking the truth to the Russian authorities. In a country where scores of activists and dissidents have been imprisoned, killed or exiled, where independent media has been smeared, blocked or forced to self-censor, and where civil society organizations have been outlawed or liquidated, you must be doing something right if the Kremlin tries to shut you up.

“The authorities are deeply mistaken if they believe that by closing down our office in Moscow they will stop our work documenting and exposing human rights violations. We continue undeterred to work to ensure that people in Russia are able to enjoy their human rights without discrimination. We will redouble our efforts to expose Russia’s egregious human rights violations both at home and abroad.

“We will never stop fighting for the release of prisoners of conscience unjustly detained for standing up for human rights. We will continue to defend independent journalism’s ability to report actual facts, free of the Russian government’s intervention. We will continue to work relentlessly to ensure that all those who are responsible for committing grave human rights violations, whether in Russia, Ukraine or Syria, face justice. Put simply, we will never give up.”

Russia ‘must be probed and punished for war crimes’

Josep Borrell – the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy has said that Russia must be investigated and prosecuted for war crimes in Ukraine.

He and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen travelled to the city of Bucha where they saw a number of victims lying on the ground in body bags.

Mitsubishi halts production at Russian plant

Japanese automaker Mitsubishi Motors announced today it had stopped production at a Russian van plant in Kaluga that it owns with Stellantis until further notice, joining other major carmakers that have halted operations in Russia.

“Due to the logistical difficulties, vehicle exports and parts supply to Russia have been suspended since March,” Mitsubishi said in a statement.

Japan has joined the United States and other allies in slapping additional sanctions on Russia, including freezing assets of the country’s leaders and three financial institutions, to punish Russia for what Moscow calls “a special military operation” in Ukraine that started on Feb. 24.

Putin pictured with ‘Russia’s secret nuclear briefcase’

PARANOID Vladimir Putin was seen attending a Moscow funeral today surrounded by military guards carrying Russia’s ‘secret nuclear briefcase’.

The Russian president arrived at Christ the Saviour Cathedral in Moscow, to pay his respects to firebrand ultra-nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky.

Putin, dressed in black, made the sign of the cross in front of Zhirinovsky’s open casket as the political leader and his close ally was laid to rest.

The secret case is thought to contain the launch apparatus for the Kremlin’s strategic missiles and its presence at the funeral is seen as a chilling threat to the world.

The bag, which has a personalised key code, is normally under 24/7 supervision and completely controls Moscow’s nuclear arsenal.

It is reportedly supervised by an armed security officer who accompanies no-nonsense Putin wherever he travels.

The images come seven weeks after the leader put his nuke weapons on alert after lashing out at the NATO alliance over what he claimed were ‘aggressive’ sanctions.

EU chief promises sped-up process for Ukraine to seek membership

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen pledged on Friday to offer Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy a speedier start to Ukraine’s bid to become a member of the European Union.

Handing Zelenskiy a questionnaire which will form a starting point for the EU to decide on membership for Kyiv, she said: “It will not as usual be a matter of years to form this opinion but I think a matter of weeks.” Zelenskiy said he would come back with answers in a week.

She underlined the sanctions put on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine, saying: “Russia will descend into economic, financial and technological decay, while Ukraine is marching towards the European future, this is what I see.”

Russian forces abandon tanks in hasty withdrawal

A western official has provided interesting intelligence, saying that Russian forces had abandoned “a lot” of tanks, vehicles, and artillery in a “hasty” withdrawal.

Vladimir Putin’s operations had been “disastrous”, the official said.

“We can confirm that there are no longer units in northern Ukraine,” they told a news conference.

“It has been a pretty hasty withdrawal by Russian forces and there’s a lot of Russian equipment which has been abandoned in that hasty withdrawal and that’s only going to exacerbate the challenge they have in terms of the refurbishment and reconstitution of their forces as they remove them both into Belarus and into Russia.

“Some of it’s kind of unclear as to why it’s been abandoned because you might have thought there is some of these vehicles are still usable and you think they would have been able to take and I think there’s something around the collapse of morale and the collapse of the will to fight.”

Putin’s troops ‘deport 121,000 children to Russia’

According to Ukraine, around 121,000 children are among more than 600,000 Ukrainians that have been forcibly deported to Russia.

Lyudmila Denysova, Ukraine’s Human Rights Commissioner, took to Facebook to announce this.

She said: “It is currently known that some of the children were taken by the occupiers from Mariupol to Donetsk and in the direction of Taganrog.

“Russian invaders say they are orphans, but all orphans and orphanages were evacuated from Mariupol centrally on February 24-25, days of war.

“Ukraine has no information that the children to be adopted have the status of orphans or deprived of parental care.

“Russia is repeating the scenario of 2014, when it deported Ukrainian children from the occupied Crimea by the so-called train of hope for their adoption.”

Ukraine: Russia has lost 19,000 troops during invasion

Ukraine has today provided its latest update on the number of losses Russia has suffered.

Since the start of the war, Ukraine claims 19,000 Russian troops have been killed, and 1,891 armoured personnel vehicles have been destroyed.

Other military equipment that has been wiped out includes 135 helicopters, 700 tanks and 150 aircraft.

Odessa imposes weekend curfew over ‘missile strike threat’

Ukraine’s southern city of Odessa on Friday imposed a weekend curfew over a “missile strike threat” from Russia, after the shelling of a train station that killed dozens in the eastern city of Kramatorsk.

“A curfew will be introduced in Odessa and Odessa region from 9 pm on April 9 to 6 am April 11,” Odessa’s regional military administration said on Facebook. The decision was taken “given events in Kramatorsk” and “threat of a missile strike on Odessa”, it said.

Ukraine has warned Russia is regrouping to launch a fresh offensive on the country’s east and south, after retreating from the Kyiv area.

An AFP reporter in Odessa heard explosions on Thursday, without knowing where they were coming from.

Last Sunday, Odessa was targeted by Russian strikes for the first time in two weeks.

The Black Sea port and cultural hub has so far been spared the destruction seen by other Ukrainian cities.

Ukrainian MP shares images of mass graves in Chernihiv

Images have emerged and have been shared across social media of what appear to be mass graves in the northern city of Chernihiv.

A round of images were shared by Ukrainian MP Lesia Vasylenko, and they come as forensic investigators began exhuming a mass grave in the Ukrainian town of Bucha today.

UNICEF: ‘We fear the worst’

The United Nations’ children’s agency has issued a statement to “strongly condemn” the missile strike on Kramatorsk train station.

“We do not know yet how many children were killed and injured in the attack, but we fear the worst,” a statement from UNICEF’s Ukraine representative Murat Sahin said.

“Civilians, particularly children, must be protected from harm. The killing of children must stop now,” she added.

Boris Johnson suggests train station attack ‘war crime’

The UK’s Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, said the attack on fleeing civilians at the Kramatorsk train station in Ukraine was “unconscionable”.

He went on to suggest that Vladimir Putin’s forces were guilty of a war crime.

He told a Downing Street press conference: “The attack at the train station in eastern Ukraine shows the depth to which Putin’s once vaunted army has sunk. At least 39 people killed and dozens wounded on a train platform crowded with women and children.

“It is a war crime indiscriminately to attack civilians and Russian crimes in Ukraine will not go unnoticed or unpunished.”

50 confirmed dead after attack in Kramatorsk

The death toll from the railway station attack in Kramatorsk has increased to 50 Ukrainian civilians.

This includes five children, the governor of the Donetsk region has said.

EU’s von der Leyen visits Bucha mass grave

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen today visited a mass grave in Bucha, a town outside Kyiv where Russian forces are accused by Ukraine’s allies of carrying out atrocities against civilians.

An AFP journalist reported that von der Leyen was in the town north of the capital as part of a trip to shore up support for Ukraine alongside the bloc’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell.

Ukrainian forensic investigators start exhuming bodies from Bucha mass grave

Forensic investigators began exhuming today from a mass grave in the Ukrainian town of Bucha.

They were seen wrapping the bodies out in black plastic and laying them out.

Ruslan Kravchenko from the prosecutor’s office in Bucha said they had exhumed 20 bodies, 18 of whom had firearms and shrapnel wounds.

“There are witnesses who can confirm that these people were killed by the Russian forces. Without any reason, they were just walking down the street or being evacuated,” he told Reuters.

“Some of them were just speaking Ukrainian.”

Help those fleeing conflict with The Sun’s Ukraine Fund

Give as little as £3 or as much as you can afford and every penny will be donated to the Red Cross on the ground helping women, children, the old, the infirm and the wounded.

Donate here to help The Sun’s fund

For more information visit https://donate.redcross.org.uk/appeal/disaster-fund

Food prices soar to record levels in Ukraine

Prices for food commodities like grains and vegetable oils reached their highest levels ever last month largely because of Russia’s war in Ukraine and the massive supply disruptions it is causing, threatening millions of people in Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere with hunger and malnourishment, the United Nations said today.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization said its Food Price Index, which tracks monthly changes in international prices for a basket of commodities, averaged 159.3 points last month, up 12.6% from February. As it is, the February index was the highest level since its inception in 1990.

FAO said the war in Ukraine was largely responsible for the 17.1% rise in the price of grains, including wheat and others like oats, barley and corn. Together, Russia and Ukraine account for around 30% and 20% of global wheat and corn exports, respectively.

More on the Ukraine train station strike

Volodymyr Zelensky slammed the attack in a social media post, saying: “This is an evil that has no limits.”

“The occupiers hit the Kramatorsk railway station with a Point-U [missile], where thousands of peaceful Ukrainians were waiting to be evacuated,” the Ukrainian President wrote on Instagram.

“About 30 people died, about 100 people were injured to varying degrees. Police and rescuers are already on the scene. Russian non-humans do not abandon their methods.

“Lacking the strength and courage to stand up to us on the battlefield, they are cynically destroying the civilian population.

“This is an evil that has no limits. And if it is not punished, it will never stop.”

Thirty-five dead & 100 at Ukraine train station

AT LEAST 35 people have been killed and more than 100 injured after a Russian missile with “for our children” scrawled on the side blitzed a Ukrainian train station.

Horror pictures show bodies strewn across the ground beside abandoned luggage at Kramatorsk railway station in eastern Ukraine amid reports the site has been blasted by Russian troops.

At least 35 people were killed and over 100 were wounded, it’s reported, as shocking footage shows smoke billowing from the scene.

About 4,000 people, most of them elderly, women and children, were at the railway station when it was struck, Mayor Oleksander Honcharenko said.

White House condemn airstrike on packed station

The White House has condemned the “horrific and devastating images” of a deadly attack on a train station in Ukraine. 

The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, also criticised the attack, saying: “The missile attack this morning on a train station used for evacuations of civilians in Ukraine is despicable.

“I am appalled by the loss of life and I will offer personally my condolences to President Zelenskyy.

“My thoughts are with the families of the victims.”

Wallace: Ukraine support will change if Russia switches tactics

The UK’s defence secretary, Ben Wallace, has warned today that the support given to Ukraine against a Russian invasion will change if tactics used by Moscow in the war were to change.

“If the tactics of the Russians change, what we give them (Ukraine) will change as well,” Mr Wallace told reporters during a visit to Romania.

He added: “We will do everything to see him defeated in Ukraine. There is more to do, Britain will do more, it will contribute more.”

Latest developments in the war in Ukraine:

• At least 39 people are killed, including four children, in a rocket attack on a train station in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk that is being used for civilian evacuations, according to Ukraine’s SBU security service.
  • AFP journalists on the scene see the bodies of at least 30 people grouped and lying under plastic sheets next to the station.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky describes Russia as an “evil with no limits” after the attack, in which he says 300 were injured. The European Union says the attack is “horrifying”.
• Russia has redeployed its troops towards the east and south, aiming to create a land link between occupied Crimea and the Moscow-backed separatist statelets of Donetsk and Lugansk in Donbas.
• European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen says that she is en route to the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, along with the bloc’s diplomatic chief Josep Borrell.
  • They are to meet with President Zelensky.
• The European Union approves an embargo on Russian coal.It also says it has frozen nearly 29.5 billion euros in Russian and Belarusian assets so far.
• Britain announces sanctions on the daughters of Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
• The UN General Assembly votes to suspend Russia from the UN Human Rights Council as punishment for the invasion of Ukraine.
  • It is only the second ever suspension of a country from the council, after Libya in 2011.
• Zelensky urges the West to impose “Molotov cocktail” sanctions on Moscow, including a ban on Russian gas, and appeals for more weapons as he addresses Finnish MPs.
  • He scolds “those who are making us wait, wait for the things that we need badly, wait for the means of protecting our lives.”

Afternoon, Milica Cosic taking over the Russia-Ukraine war blog. I’ll be bringing you the latest news until 10pm tonight.

Lib Dems call on Priti Patel to resign over refugee shceme

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey has called for the Home Secretary to resign over her “failure” to help those fleeing Ukraine with an effective refugee scheme.

“Priti Patel’s failure to help refugees fleeing from Putin’s bombs is squandering the compassion & generosity of the British people. We want to offer Ukrainians a home, but Priti Patel has slammed the door in their face,” Sir Ed tweeted.

“An apology isn’t enough. She must resign.”