Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy addresses the Global Peace Summit at the Burgenstock Resort in Lake Lucerne, Switzerland, June 16, 2024 (Sedat Suna/Getty)
Map: Institute for the Study of War
UPDATE 1658 GMT:
Vladimir Putin has fired four Russian deputy defense ministers and appointed his cousin Anna Tsivileva to one of the posts.
Those sacked were Nikolai Pankov, Ruslan Tsalikov, Tatiana Shevtsova, and Pavel Popov.
Leonid Gornin, a Deputy Finance Minister, has been named 1st Deputy Defense Minister, reinforcing last month’s appointment of economist Andrei Belousov as Defense Minister.
Pavel Fradkov, the son of former Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov, fills another vacancy.
UPDATE 1650 GMT:
At least nine civilians have been injured in Russian missile strikes on apartment blocks in the Poltava region in east-central Ukraine.
More than 55,000 private and industrial consumers lost electricity when power lines were damaged.
Two women were injured in Nikopol in south-central Ukraine by Russian shelling.
UPDATE 1025 GMT:
Ukraine military commander-in-chief Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi says Russia is stepping up attacks and trying to seize more territory before a surge in international aid for Kyiv reaches the frontline.
Syrskyi said Russian forces were concentrating their firepower on the Donetsk region, especially on the Pokrovsk front. Moscow’s forces are closing in on a key transit artery and supply route linking civilian hubs in the north of the region to towns further south.
Ukraine’s Deputy Defense Minister said at the weekend that the arrival of some aid had reduced Russia’s artillery advantage from 7:1 to 5:1. However, significant amounts will not arrive and change the frontline situation for several weeks.
UPDATE 1004 GMT:
At least 12,000 Ukrainian civilians, including 551 children, have been killed during Russia’s 28-month invasion, says Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Andrii Kostin.
Speaking at the Global Peace Summit in Switzerland, Kostin emphasized that the numbers are only confirmed deaths, and that the actual figure is likely to be far higher.
UN officials said in April that it had recorded almost 11,000 civilians killed and over 20,500 injured.
But in the port city of Mariupol in southeast Ukraine alone, more than 25,000 civilians may have been slain in Russia’s 12 weeks of attacks and siege in spring 2022, Ukrainian officials have said.
An investigation by the Associated Press found the toll could be up to three times higher.
Kostin said law enforcement officials have documented almost 130,000 cases of war crimes committed by Russian soldiers, including more than 300 episodes of sexual violence.
UPDATE 0702 GMT:
American journalist Evan Gershkovich, seized by Russian security forces in March 2023, will go on “trial” on June 26.
The court in Yekaterinburg near the Ural Mountains, where Gershkovich was detained as he worked on a story about local reactions to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, announced the closed-door proceedings over a charge of espionage.
Gershkovich, the Moscow correspondent for the Wall Street Journal, faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
UPDATE 0646 GMT:
Ukraine’s State energy operator Ukrenergo says lengthy, daily interruptions in electricity are likely until the end of July amid scheduled repairs at nuclear power plants, adding to recovery from Russia’s missile and drone strikes.
Ukrenergo head Volodymyr Kudritsky said, “The next week and even the next few weeks the situation will be much more difficult than today,” with the most extensive blackouts between 11 a.m. and 11 p.m.
ORIGINAL ENTRY: Addressing the first Global Peace Summit in Switzerland, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has rejected Vladimir Putin’s latest attempt to force surrender of territory and Russia’s long-term occupation.
Trying to pre-empt the Summit, Putin demanded that Ukraine give up all of four regions — Donetsk and Luhansk in the east and Kherson and Zaporizhzhia in the south — in addition to Russia’s seizure of Crimea in 2014. Kyiv would have to renounce any intention of joining NATO. It would de-militarize and the Zelenskiy Government would be removed.
Some international media outlets fell for the tactic, calling the ultimatum an offer of “peace negotiations”, but Zelenskiy made clear on Sunday:
Russia is currently not ready for a just peace. Their most recent statements were meant to scare the world. But they demonstrated that Russia in fact had no intention to end the war, but instead wanted to continue seizing Ukrainian territories. This is their big mistake….
No ultimatums are negotiations. Any ultimatums for Putin are pauses; he needs these pauses to prepare his military.
I thank all participants of the first Peace Summit for taking the first steps towards peace together. pic.twitter.com/9WFIhjKKF4
— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) June 16, 2024
European Commission head Ursula von der Leyen echoed: “[The summit] was not a peace negotiation because Putin is not serious about ending the war. He’s insisting on capitulation, he’s insisting on ceding Ukrainian territory – even territory that today is not occupied.”
A Statement for Territorial Integrity and Security
About 80 countries said in the Summit’s final communiqué:
We believe that reaching peace requires the involvement of and dialogue between all parties….We reaffirm our commitment to …the principles of sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity of all states, including Ukraine, within their internationally recognized borders.
Signatories called for a “complete exchange” of POWs and for Russia to return all Ukrainian children who had been “deported and unlawfully displaced”.
They noted the discussions of working groups on global energy and food security and nuclear safety, and said Ukraine should regain “full sovereign control” over the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant.
India, Indonesia, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Thailand and the United Arab Emirates reserved their positions. Brazil attended only as an observer.
Zelenskiy noted, “Unfortunately there are people who are still balancing,” as Putin was trying to divide the world. But he emphasized, “It’s important that all Summit participants supported Ukraine’s territorial integrity because there will be no lasting peace without it.”
He added:
We would welcome China and Brazil to join the principles that have united us all here today and to hear their views, even if they do not align with the majority of the world.
We want China to respect the territorial integrity and sovereignty of our state just as we respect theirs. We value their life and people’s choices and hope China will do the same.
Noting the Summit’s work on the “key challenges” of security and the release of prisoners and deportees, he said, “We already have countries interested in hosting the Second Peace Summit and have started talks with them.”
