The days are already very long, in Ukraine, for more than two months. And it’s not about to end. Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov said on Wednesday he expected “extremely difficult weeks” against the Russian army, which “has already accumulated forces for a major offensive in the East”, the priority of Moscow.
He thus called on Ukrainians for “resilience and unity”. According to him, the enemy army, “already aware of its strategic defeat, will try to inflict as much suffering as possible” on the Ukrainian soldiers whom he urged to “hold on”.
- Moscow targets arms depots
Russian forces, which have been stepping up their offensive in Donbass for two weeks, announced on Wednesday that they had carried out airstrikes on 59 Ukrainian targets. At the same time, the local army recognized Russian advances in the East, in the Kharkiv region and in the Donbass.
The Russian Ministry of Defense claimed that “hangars with a large amount of foreign weapons and ammunition, delivered to Ukrainian forces by the United States and European countries, were destroyed with Kalibr missiles fired from the sea on the Zaporozhye aluminum plant in southern Ukraine.
The governor of this region, however, brought a firm denial: “No ammunition and arms depot was hit in Zaporozhye”, he retorted, hammering that the affected factory “has not been operational since six years”.
- The Canadian Parliament in turn evokes a “genocide”
“The House of Commons has passed a motion regarding acts of genocide against the Ukrainian people,” the lower house of Canadian parliament announced on Twitter. The motion, adopted unanimously, states that “there is clear and abundant evidence of systematic and massive war crimes and crimes against humanity committed against the Ukrainian people by the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, under leadership of President Vladimir Putin.
These “crimes” include in particular torture, “mass atrocities in Ukrainian territories”, the “forcible transfer of Ukrainian children to Russian territory”, or even “large-scale cases of physical, mental violence and rape “. By validating this text, the House of Commons “recognizes that the Russian Federation is committing acts of genocide against the Ukrainian people”, according to the document.
The adoption of this text comes about ten days after the Ukrainian Parliament passed a similar resolution. In mid-April, Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau spoke for the first time of a “genocide” in Ukraine, after US President Joe Biden. This term was deemed “unacceptable” by the Kremlin.
- London calls for heavy weapons
British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss has called for increased deliveries of heavy weapons and aircraft to Ukraine, stressing that it is time for “courage” in the face of Russia.
“Heavy weapons, tanks, planes – dig into our stocks, ramp up production, we have to do all of that,” she insisted, in a speech at the official residence of the Lord Mayor of the City of London. She, in passing, called Vladimir Putin “a desperate rogue operator, who has no interest in international mores”. The latter again warned against any outside intervention in the conflict in Ukraine, promising a “rapid and lightning” response.
- Meeting of European energy ministers on Monday
The European ministers in charge of energy will meet on Monday May 2 in an “extraordinary session”, announced Wednesday evening the French minister in charge of Ecological Transition, Barbara Pompili.
This meeting follows the shutdown of natural gas supplies to Bulgaria and Poland by Russia. In the process, the European Union denounced a “gas blackmail” on the part of Russia. “This is not blackmail”, but a response to “unfriendly acts”, retorted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, an allusion to the freezing of Russian foreign currency reserves held abroad.
Authorities in the breakaway pro-Russian republic of Transdniestria in Moldova have announced that a village bordering Ukraine hosting a large Russian ammunition depot came under fire after being overflown by drones. The region, unrecognized by the international community, has reported a series of explosions in recent days which it described as “terrorist attacks”, leading kyiv to accuse Moscow of seeking to spread the war further into Europe. .
Moldovan Foreign Minister Nicu Popescu described these events as a “dangerous deterioration of the situation”.
- The head of the UN in Ukraine
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres arrived in Ukraine on Wednesday, his first visit to the country since the Russian invasion began on February 24. He was in Russia the day before, where he met Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and President Vladimir Putin.
Antonio Guterres is due to travel this Thursday morning to Borodianka, Irpin and Boutcha, theaters of abuses during the Russian occupation in March, before meeting Foreign Minister Dmytro Kouleba and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
- Tourism: Russia suspended from WTO
Russia was suspended from the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) on Wednesday because of its invasion of Ukraine, deemed contrary to the “values” of the organization. Anticipating a possible suspension, Russia itself announced in the morning at the opening of the debates, before the general assembly in Madrid, that it wanted to withdraw from the agency, which brings together 159 member states.
- 200 computer attacks against Ukraine
Groups linked to the Russian state have carried out more than 200 computer attacks against Ukraine and its infrastructure since the beginning of the invasion by the Russian army, according to a Microsoft report published on Wednesday. These attacks “have not only damaged the systems of institutions in Ukraine but have also targeted the disruption of the population’s access to reliable information and vital services on which civilians depend, and have attempted to undermine trust in the country’s leaders,” said Tom Burt, vice president of Microsoft.