Photo: Reuters

Friday’s Coverage: US Steps Up Military Aid in Face of Russia’s Eastern Offensive

UPDATE 1550 GMT:

The Ukraine Defense Ministry says two Russian generals have been killed near Russian-occupied Kherson in the south of the country. Another general was critically injured when Ukrainian forces struck the command post of Russia’s 49th Army.

UPDATE 1445 GMT:

A Russian missile strike on the port city of Odesa in southern Ukraine has killed five people and injured 18, according to Presidential Chief of Staff Andriy Yermak.

Ukraine’s air command said two missiles struck a military facility and two residential buildings. Air defense destroyed two other missiles.

UPDATE 1407 GMT:

The civilian evacuation planned from besieged Mariupol in southern Ukraine has not taken place, a mayor’s aide has said.

The evacuation was scheduled for noon.

Petro Andryushchenko also said 308 people, including 90 children, were forcibly deported to Russia. He claimed they were taken on April 21 to Vladivostok in eastern Russia, more than 9,000 km (5,580 miles) east of Mariupol.

The Ukraine military has posted a video of the women and children in the underground shelter of the Azovstal steel works, the main site of fighting between Russian invaders and Ukrainian defenders of the port city

The footage was taken on Thursday among the up to 1,000 civilians in the shelter

A woman says food and water have almost run out, leaving everyone “on the edge of hunger”:

All the provisions we brought with us are running out. Soon we won’t even have enough food for the children.

We are here and need help. We are at the epicentre of events and we can’t get out. My child needs to be evacuated to a peaceful area and others too. We beg for guarantees of safety for our kids.

A boy says, “I want to go home alive. I want to see the sun.”

UPDATE 1145 GMT:

Kharkiv regional governor Oleg Sinegubov says Ukrainian forces have recaptured three villages near the Russian border: “Our units kicked Russian troops out of the settlements of Bezruki, Slatine, Prudyanka.”

Sinegubov said that there were “fierce battles” on Friday morning and that Russian forces attacked residential buildings, killing two people.

Luhansk regional govern Serhiy Gaidai spoke of “round the clock shelling” as Russian forces continue to attack the cities of Rubizhne and Severodonetsk.

0940 GMT:

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has spoken of recovery in areas of Ukraine that have been liberated from Russian occupiers.

In his nightly video address to the nation, Zelenskiy said:

If at the beginning of this week demining took place in 70 settlements, today 184 settlements have been demined. Of course, much remains to be done. But the pace, I think, is pretty good.

Humanitarian headquarters are already operating in more than 500 de-occupied settlements. Almost 100 settlements are added daily, to which we return medical and educational services, the work of social protection bodies, financial institutions.

We are restoring transport connections at a fairly fast pace. Plus 96 settlements today, where the transport connection was returned. Plus 183 settlements where gas stations have resumed work. Plus 90 settlements where electricity was restored. We return water supply, gas supply, mobile connection.

Zelenskiy pledged a similar recovery in southern and eastern Ukraine when Russia’s offensive is repelled, resurrecting “all areas where degradation, destruction and death have been brought under the Russian flag”.

0700 GMT:

Another mass grave has been found near besieged Mariupol, where up to 21,000 people may have been killed during the Russian invasion, bombardment, and siege.

A satellite photo, from Planet Labs, shows a 45-meter by 25-meter grave outside the village of Vynohradne. Up to 1,000 victims may be buried there.

On Thursday, satellite images from Maxar Technologies showed an expanding site that has more than 200 new graves. The area could hold as many as 9,000 dead, said the Mariupol City Council.

ORIGINAL ENTRY: Even as its military offensive struggles, Russia has threatened to expand its invasion and occupation across southern Ukraine and into neighboring Moldova.

Maj. Gen. Rustam Minnekaev, the acting commander of Russia’s Central Military District, declared on Friday, that Moscow will seek the occupation of all of southern Ukraine — as well as the Donbas in the east — to establish land bridges to Russian occupations of Ukraine’s Crimea and Moldova’s Transnistria.

Speaking to a defense industry conference, the general proclaimed:

Since the beginning of the second phase of the special operation, which began literally two days ago, one of the tasks of the Russian army is to establish full control over Donbas and southern Ukraine. This will provide a land corridor to Crimea, as well as affecting vital objects of the Ukrainian economy, Black Sea ports through which agricultural and metallurgical products are supplied to [other] countries….

Control over southern Ukraine will give yet another point of access to Transnistria, where facts of oppression of the Russian-speaking population have also been observed

Minnekayev continued, “Apparently, we are now at war with the whole world.”

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy turned Minnekaev’s threat into a call for more international assistance: “All the nations that, like us, believe in the victory of life over death must fight with us. They must help us, because we are the first in line. And who will come next?”

Moldova’s Foreign Ministry summoned the Russian ambassador to express “deep concern” over the comments on Transnistria, occupied by 1,500 Russian troops since the 1990s.

Up to now, Vladimir Putin had maintained the fiction that Russia was not seeking permanent occupation of Ukraine’s cities. The Kremlin refused further comment beyond Minnekaev’s statement on Friday, saying the Russian Defence Ministry is responsible for the “special operation” in Ukraine.

Ukrainian officials have warned of Russia’s intent from early in the invasion. On Thursday night, Zelenskiy said the Russians plan to “falsify” an “independence” referendum in areas it occupies, such as the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions.

Russia’s only significant success so far has been occupation of a coastal corridor, including Kherson and Melitopol, in the south. Even then, the offensive has been unable to vanquish Mariupol at the eastern end of the 250-km (155-mile) strip along the Black Sea and Sea of Azov, or to approach Odesa at the western end.

Source: Institute for the Study of War

Did Russia Admit 20,000 Troops Killed or Missing

Even as Minnekaev was issuing his statement, the pro-Kremlin outlet Readovka was highlighting the problems with the Russian invasion, which failed in its initial phase to capture most of Ukraine and has now withdrawn from the north.

Quoting the Defense Ministry, the outlet posted on the Russian social media platform VK that 13,414 Russian troops have been killed, with 7,000 missing.

The total is close to Ukraine’s claim of almost 20,000 slain Russians.

Readovka, which later deleted the post, said 116 of 508 crew were killed when Russia’s Black Sea flagship Moskva sank on April 14, probably after it was struck by a Ukrainian missile. More than 100 crew are missing.

On Friday night the Russian Defense Ministry acknowledged one death and said 27 crew are missing, with 396 personnel rescued.

Another signal of persistent Russian difficulties came from Vladimir Putin on Thursday, when he postponed any attempt to overrun remaining areas of resistance in Mariupol, including the Azovstal steel works. The Russian leader indicated that forces will now pursue a siege to force surrender.