A resident of Irpin, northwest of Kyiv, amid fire from Russian shelling — eight civilians, including a family of 4, were killed, March 6, 2022 north-west outskirts (Carlos Barría/Reuters)

See also EA on India’s WION and NDTV and UK’s talkRADIO: Russia’s Lies as Ukraine Holds Out

Sunday’s Coverage: Russia’s Ceasefire Lie

UPDATE 1937 GMT:

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has asked the international community to boycott supplies to Russia and Russian exports: “If they do not want to comply with civilised rules, they should not receive goods and services from civilization either. Let the war feed them.”

In the video statement, he called on other countries to send warplanes to Ukraine.

UPDATE 1935 GMT:

At least 13 civilians were killed in Russian shelling of a bread factory in Makariv, near Kyiv.

Five people were rescued from rubble.

UPDATE 1925 GMT:

Ukraine and Russia have had a third set of discussions on the Belarus border, with no significant advance on issues such as a ceasefire and evacuation of civilians.

Ukraine Presidential advisor Mikhailo Podolyak tweeted:

Russia, apparently playing for time for its military offensive, said, “Expectations from negotiations were not fulfilled.”

Moscow’s representative Vladimir Medinsky declared, “We hope that next time we will be able to take a more significant step forward.”

Russian official Leonid Slutsky said another round of talks will be held soon, without giving a date.

UPDATE 1855 GMT:

Ukraine Infrastructure Minister Oleksander Kubrakov says the country has suffered about $10 billion in damage to infrastructure from the Russian invasion.

Kubrakov said the majority of structures will be repaired in a year, and the most difficult ones in two years.

UPDATE 1535 GMT:

The Financial Times reports on the risk to many countries of disruption of wheat supplies by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Ukraine and Russia are the leading exporters of wheat to many areas of Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Turkey, and Nicaragua.

Ukraine accounts for 90% of wheat imports by Lebanon, which is facing an economic meltdown, and is a leading supplier for Somalia, Syria, Tunisia, and Libya. Russia provides Turkey, which has an official inflation rate of 54.4%, with more than 70% of its wheat. The World Food Programme takes in 70% of its wheat from Ukraine and Russia.

Global wheat prices are now at their highest level since 2007-2008.

UPDATE 1520 GMT:

The rouble has recorded new historic low against the US dollar (131.25:1) and the euro (143.3).

Finnish food group giant Valio is leaving the Russian market. Accounting firms PwC and KPMG are halting operations.

JPMorgan has projected a 35% contraction in Russian GDP in the second quarter of 2022. The Institute for International Finance is predicting a 15% contraction during the year.

IIF’s chief economist Robin Brooks wrote, “We see risks as tilted to the downside. Russia will never be the same again.”

UPDATE 1510 GMT:

Violinist Vera Lytovchenko plays for fellow Kharkiv residents in a bomb shelter.

It was very difficult to play and think about something that wasn’t war. But I decided I must do something. We have become a family in this cellar and when I played they cried. They forget about the war for some moments and think about something else.

UPDATE 1455 GMT:

The military analysts at Oryx set out Russian military losses as of Sunday:

UPDATE 1335 GMT:

An audio is circulating on social media which depicts the beating of a women detained in Russia for protesting against the invasion of Ukraine.

Alexandra Kaluzhskikh uploaded the audio after she was seized and interrogated by Russian police. The Russia newspaper Novaya Gazeta published the recording and transcript on Sunday, and it has been translated and republished by the online magazine n+1.

When Kaluzhskikh invokes the 51st clause of the Russian Constitution, protecting an individual against self-incrimination, she is struck by an officer, who gloats, “You’ll have a little bruise now. Come on, get up, time to talk, right?”, and strikes her again.

Still defiant, she responds about the punches, “Not as hard as my father, to be honest.”

The officer tries insults, “Look at your goddamn tits, like goddamn udders hanging out! Take a look at yourself, goddamn it. Fucking monkey!”, and then “I’m threatening you! I’m threatening you with physical violence!”

The punches soon resume, as the officer shouts:

You think we’re gonna get in trouble for this? Putin told us to kill all of these dumbfucks. That’s it! Putin’s on our side! You’re the enemies of the Russian people, OK, fucking enemies of the state. I’m gonna fucking kill you, OK, and that’s it. Finished. And then they’ll give us a prize for it, too.

A female officer joins, “You’re all fucked in the head! All of you are fucked up.”

Kaluzhskikh replies, “A man is beating me in front of you and I’m the one who’s fucked up?

UPDATE 1138 GMT:

The jeans manufacturer Levi Strauss and the French yogurt company Danone are the latest firms to pull out of Russia.

UPDATE 1130 GMT:

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said he will host a meeting with his Ukrainian and Russian counterparts, Dmytro Kuleba and Sergey Lavrov, in Antalya on Thursday.

Çavuşoğlu told reporters last Friday, on the sidelines of a NATO meeting, that he wanted to bring Kuleba and Lavrov together at the Antalya Diplomatic Forum.

UPDATE 0938 GMT:

Russia has boycotted the opening of proceedings in the International Court of Justice over possible war crimes in Ukraine.

A row of seats reserved for Russian lawyers was empty as the hearing began in The Hague. The Court’s President, Judge Joan Donoghue, conveyed a message from Russia’s Ambassador to the Netherlands that “his government did not intend to participate in the oral proceedings”.

UPDATE 0930 GMT:

At least eight people were killed in Ukraine’s second city Kharkiv by Russian shelling of residential areas on Sunday.

A Russian bombing about 7:15 p.m. “completely or partially demolished” multi-story residential buildings, administrative buildings, medical institutions, educational institutions, and dormitories.

About 200 people were rescued and evacuated by rescuers from 21 buildings set ablaze.

UPDATE 0900 GMT:

Al Jazeera English’s Jonah Hull notes scepticism about Russia’s latest PR declaration of a “humanitarian corridor” after shelling proclaimed corridors on Saturday and Sunday:

This looks much more like a unilateral Russian act and indeed a Ukrainian presidential spokesperson has called these actions immoral.

Because, and this is the second point of caution, the routes of evacuation being laid out by the Russian ministry of defence point in the direction of Belarus and Russia.

Which raises the very obvious question just how many Ukrainians under Russian bombardment, knowing that, would actually make use of them.

UPDATE 0830 GMT:

The Washington Post reports on planning by Ukraine’s allies, including the US, for a move of the Ukrainian Government to Lviv in the west of the country if the capital Kyiv falls to Russian occupiers.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, seen as vital to maintaining Ukrainian resistance and guerrilla warfare against the Russians, has had discussions with American officials. There are plans for his security detail to swiftly relocate him and his Cabinet.

For now, however, Zelenskiy is assuring Ukrainians that he is not leaving Kyiv.

UPDATE 0815 GMT

Amid fears of Russian shelling and bombing of the Black Sea port of Odessa, population 1 million, a sign of defiance:

UPDATE 0743 GMT:

The number of Ukrainian refugees in Poland since the Russian invasion has passed 1 million.

The total reached 1.067 million after 142,300 arrived on Sunday. Another 42,000 crossed the border by 7 a.m. local time Monday.

The Prime Minister of Moldova, Europe’s poorest country, has asked for international assistance as her country takes in Ukrainians.

Natalia Gavrilita said on Sunday, “We are seeing an extraordinary humanitarian crisis. Already 230,000 people have crossed the Moldovan border from Ukraine, and about 120,000 have chosen to stay. 96,000 are Ukrainian citizens.”

Moldova has a population of 2.6 million. Gavrilita noted, “Every eighth child in Moldova is now a refugee.”

UPDATE 0740 GMT:

The protest monitor OVD-Info has updated the number of demonstrators arrested on Sunday to 4,957 in 53 Russian towns and cities.

Human Rights Watch condemned Russia’s crackdown on dissent and the media:

These new laws are part of Russia’s ruthless effort to suppress all dissent and make sure the population does not have access to any information that contradicts the Kremlin’s narrative about the invasion of Ukraine.

The Kremlin is wiping out all options for dissent to ensure that brave anti-war protesters do not return to the streets.

UPDATE 0715 GMT:

Global oil prices near an all-time high on Monday morning amid the limits on supply by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The cost of Brent crude rose more than $20 per barrel to pass the $139 mark, less than $10 off the all-time high of $147.50 in July 2008.

The price fell back to $129, but some analysts are warning that it could reach $200.

ORIGINAL ENTRY: In an emotional address, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy promises defiance and justice over mass killing of civilians by Russia’s 12-day invasion.

Zelenskiy said late Sunday night, as Moscow continued its assault while lying about “humanitarian corridors” for evacuations:

We will not forgive the destroyed houses. We will not forgive the missile that our air defence shot down over Okhmatdyt today. And more than five hundred other such missiles that hit our land. All over Ukraine…hitting our people and children.

We will not forgive the shooting of unarmed people. Destruction of our infrastructure.

We will not forgive.

Hundreds and hundreds of victims. Thousands and thousands of sufferings.

And God will not forgive. Not today. Not tomorrow. Never.

And instead of Forgiveness, there will be a Day of Judgment. I’m sure of it.

The President, who is seeking a no-fly zone, again called on the international community to do more in supporting Ukraine against the invasion and the killings:

Think about the sense of impunity of the invaders: they announce their planned atrocities.

Why? Because there is no reaction. Because there is silence. Not a word, as if Western leaders have dissolved tonight. For this day.

I hope that at least tomorrow you will notice it.

Zelenskiy noted the Russian deception over “humanitarian corridors”, after the collapse of evacuations on both Saturday and Sunday in southern Ukraine amid shelling by Russia’s forces — “Instead of humanitarian corridors, they can only make bloody ones” — and the killing of a family of four who were trying to leave Irpin, northwest of Kyiv.

He concluded:

We will not forgive. We will not forget.

We will punish everyone who committed atrocities in this war. On our land. We will find every bastard. Who shot at our cities, our people. Who bombed our land. Who launched rockets. Who gave the order and pressed “start”.

There will be no quiet place on this earth for you. Except for the grave.

Talk of Evacuations, Reality of Bombing

After the failed evacuations from Mariupol and Volnovakha over the weekend, Russia proclaimed on Monday morning that corridors will be established for the capital Kyiv, Ukraine’s second city Kharkiv, and Sumy as well as Mariupol.

The statement comes after French President Emmanuel Macron sought safe evacuations in a 105-minute video call with Russian leader Vladimir Putin on Sunday evening.

But Macron’s office cautioned that “President Putin has again expressed his determination to obtain all his objectives by negotiation or by war”, with the Russian repeated his buzzwords of “denazification” and “demilitarization” of Ukraine.

And on Monday morning, Russian forces launched a heavy artillery barrage against Mykolaiv, northwest of the Russian-occupied corridor in southern Ukraine along the Black Sea and Sea of Azov.

On Sunday, Ukrainian troops repelled an invasion of the city and recaptured the local airport.

At the eastern end of the 250-km (155-mile) corridor, Russian forces are besieging Mariupol, whose 400,000 population is enduring a cutoff of heat and electricity and shortages of food. In the center, the Russians have occupied Kherson. On the western end is Odessa, whose million people are at risk.

Mayor Gennady Trukhanov, considered to be pro-Russian, lashed out at Putin: “I don’t know what kind of bastard you have to be to press the button to drop bombs on Odessa.”

Warplanes for Kyiv?

While rejecting the no-fly zone over Ukraine, to avoid a confrontation with Russian forces, the US and Europe moved over the weekend towards supply of warplanes to Kyiv.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and then Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield spoke of an arrangement in which Poland will provide jet fighters to Ukraine, and Washington will deliver jets to Warsaw.

But Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda told the visiting Blinken that “deterrence is no longer enough” and called for more immediate military assistance, as Putin “will not stop”.

American officials also indicated that sanctions may be expanded to restrict Russia’s export of oil. Blinken said on CNN that the US is discussing the initiative with allies, as both Republican and Democratic legislators including Sens. Marco Rubio, Joe Manchin, and Lisa Murkowski, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Rep. Adam Schiff called for a ban.

On Thursday, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said, “Our objective and the president’s objective has been to maximize impact on President Putin and Russia while minimizing impact to us and our allies and partners. We don’t have a strategic interest in reducing the global supply of energy.”

But on Friday, she shifted, “[We are] looking at options we could take right now to cut U.S. consumption of Russian energy.”

South Korea banned transactions with Russia’s Central Bank, following a March 1 halt to business with seven major Russian banks and their affiliates. New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said expanded measures will be adopted this week, preventing sanctioned Russians from moving assets to New Zealand and stopping Russian super-yachts from entering the country’s waters.

More companies left Russia on Sunday, including Prada, after Visa and Mastercard halted any international transactions.

Amid threatened prison sentences of up to 15 years for any reporting or commentary on the Russian invasion or sanctions, TikTok and Netflix are the latest media platforms to halt services.

More than 4,500 protesters were arrested in 49 Russian towns and cities on Sunday, taking the total to more than 10,000 since the invasion on February 24.