“I’m available to do anything,” Francis said during an airborne press conference en route home from Hungary. “There’s a mission that’s not public that’s underway; when it’s public I’ll talk about it.”

Francis gave no details when asked whether he spoke about peace initiatives during his talks in Budapest this weekend with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban or the representative of the Russian Orthodox Church in Hungary.

Deportations of Ukrainian children have been a concern since Russia invaded Ukraine last year. Francis said the Holy See had already helped mediate some prisoner exchanges and would do “all that is humanly possible” to reunite families.

“All human gestures help. Gestures of cruelty don’t help,” Francis said.

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The International Criminal Court in March issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Russia’s children’s commissioner, accusing them of war crimes for abducting children from Ukraine. Russia has denied any wrongdoing, contending the children were moved for their safety.

Last week Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal met with Francis at the Vatican and asked him to help return Ukrainian children taken following the Russian invasion.

“I asked His Holiness to help us return home Ukrainians, Ukrainian children who are detained, arrested, and criminally deported to Russia,″ Shmyhal told the Foreign Press Association after the audience.

Francis recalled that the Holy See had facilitated some prisoner exchanges, working through embassies, and was open to Ukraine’s request to reunite Ukrainian children with their families.

The prisoner exchanges “went well. I think it could go well also for this. It’s important,” he said of the family reunifications. “The Holy See is available to do it because it’s the right thing,” he added. “We have to do all that is humanly possible.” ___

Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

The attacks included the first one against Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, in nearly two months, although there were no reports of any targets hit. The city government said Ukraine’s air force intercepted 11 cruise missiles and two unmanned aerial vehicles over Kyiv.

The strikes on the nine-story residential building in central Ukraine occurred in Uman, a city located around 215 kilometers (134 miles) south of Kyiv. Twenty-three people, including four children, died in that attack, according to NBC’s Anna Tsybko. The Ukrainian national police said 17 people were wounded and three children were rescued from the rubble.

The bombardment was nowhere near the war’s sprawling front lines or active combat zones in eastern Ukraine, where a grinding war of attrition has taken hold. Moscow has frequently launched long-range missile attacks during the 14-month war, often indiscriminately hitting civilian areas.

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Ukrainian officials and analysts have alleged the strikes are part of a deliberate intimidation strategy by the Kremlin. Russia has denied its military aims at civilian targets.

Survivors of the Uman strikes recounted terrifying moments as the missiles hit when it still was dark outside.

“All the glass flew out, everything flew out, even the chandelier fell. Everything was covered in glass,” resident Olha Turina told The Associated Press at the scene.

“Then there was an explosion. … We barely found our things and ran out,” she said.

Turina, whose husband is fighting on the front lines, said one of her child’s classmates was missing.

“I don’t know where they are, I don’t know if they are alive,” she said. “I don’t know why we have to go through all this. We never bothered anyone.”

One of the 10 people killed in the Uman attack was a 75-year-old who was in her apartment in a neighboring building and suffered internal bleeding from the shockwave of the blast, according to emergency personnel on the scene.

Three body bags lay next to the building as smoke continued to billow hours after the attack. Soldiers, civilians and emergency crews searched through the rubble outside for more victims, while residents dragged belongings out of the damaged building.

One woman, crying in shock, was taken away by rescue crews for help.

A 31-year-old woman and her 2-year-old daughter were also killed in the eastern city of Dnipro in another attack, regional Governor Serhii Lysak said. Four people were also wounded, and a private home and business were damaged.

In Kyiv, fragments from intercepted missiles or drones damaged power lines and a road in one neighborhood. No casualties were reported.

The city’s anti-aircraft system was activated, according to the Kyiv City Administration. Air raid sirens started at about 4 a.m., and the alert ended about two hours later.

The attack was the first on the capital since March 9.

The missiles were fired from aircraft operating in the Caspian Sea region, according to Ukrainian Armed Forces Commander in Chief Valerii Zaluzhnyi.

Overall, he said, Ukraine intercepted 21 of 23 Kh-101 and Kh-555 type cruise missiles launched, as well as the two drones.

The attacks came as NATO announced that its allies and partner countries have delivered more than 98% of the combat vehicles promised to Ukraine during Russia’s invasion and war, strengthening Kyiv’s capabilities as it contemplates launching a counteroffensive.

Along with more than 1,550 armored vehicles, 230 tanks and other equipment, Ukraine’s allies have sent “vast amounts of ammunition” and trained and equipped more than nine new Ukrainian brigades, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said.

Some NATO partner countries, such as Sweden and Australia, have also provided armored vehicles.

The overnight attacks and comments came as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he and Chinese leader Xi Jinping held a “long and meaningful” phone call on Wednesday in their first known contact since Russia’s full-scale invasion more than a year ago.

Though Zelenskyy said he was encouraged by Wednesday’s call and Western officials welcomed Xi’s move, it didn’t appear to improve peace prospects.

Russia and Ukraine are far apart in their terms for peace, and Beijing — while looking to position itself as a global diplomatic power — has refused to criticize Moscow’s invasion. The Chinese government sees Russia as a diplomatic ally in opposing U.S. influence in global affairs, and Xi visited Moscow last month.

_____

Arhirova and Rising reported from Kyiv. Patrick Quinn in Bangkok contributed to this story.

___

Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine: https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Along with more than 1,550 armored vehicles, 230 tanks and other equipment, Ukraine’s allies have sent “vast amounts of ammunition” and also trained and equipped more than nine new Ukrainian brigades, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said.

More than 30,000 troops are estimated to make up the new brigades. Some NATO partner countries, such as Sweden and Australia, have also provided armored vehicles.

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“This will put Ukraine in a strong position to continue to retake occupied territory,” Stoltenberg told reporters in Brussels.

His comments came a day after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he and Chinese leader Xi Jinping held a “long and meaningful” phone call in their first known contact since Russia’s full-scale invasion more than a year ago.

Though Zelenskyy said he was encouraged by Wednesday’s call and Western officials welcomed Xi’s move, it didn’t appear to improve peace prospects.

Russia and Ukraine are far apart in their terms for peace, and Beijing — while looking to position itself as a global diplomatic power — has refused to criticize Moscow’s invasion. The Chinese government sees Russia as a diplomatic ally in opposing U.S. influence in global affairs, and Xi visited Moscow last month.

Stoltenberg said the 31 NATO allies were committed to shoring up Ukraine’s military, adding that taking back land the Kremlin’s forces occupied would give Kyiv a stronger negotiating position if peace talks occur.

Ukrainian officials said China’s overture was encouraging. Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal on Thursday described the call between Xi and Zelenskyy as “very productive.”

“I’m convinced it is a good beginning for our relations in the future,″ Shmyhal said after visiting Pope Francis at the Vatican.

But the Kremlin’s response was lukewarm.

Asked if the call could help end the fighting, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters: “We are ready to welcome anything that could lead to the termination of the conflict in Ukraine and the achievement of all the goals set by Russia.”

Peskov said the conversation between the Chinese and Ukrainian leaders was “the sovereign business of those countries and the issue of their bilateral dialogue.”

With battlefield positions in Ukraine largely static in what’s become a war of attrition, Russian forces have kept up their bombardment of Ukrainian areas, often hitting apartment buildings and other civilian infrastructure.

At least seven civilians were killed and 33 were injured between Wednesday and Thursday, Ukraine’s presidential office said Thursday.

They included one person killed and 23 wounded, including a child, when four Kalibr cruise missiles hit the southern city of Mykolaiv, a regional official said. The governor of Mykolaiv province, Vitalii Kim, said 22 multi-story buildings, 12 private houses and other residential buildings were damaged.

Kalibr missiles are launched from ships or submarines, The ones that hit Mykolaiv were fired from the Black Sea, according to Ukraine’s Operational Command South.

While celebrations were subdued due to security risks, with a curfew barring the faithful from customary all-night services, Ukrainian authorities and ordinary people shared messages of hope, linking the story of Jesus’ resurrection to their longing for peace and a Ukrainian victory.

Dozens of families had special reasons to rejoice, as presidential adviser Andriy Yermak announced that 130 soldiers, sailors, border guards and others captured by Moscow were on their way back home following a “big Easter prisoner exchange.”

Yermak said in a Telegram post Sunday that those released included troops who fought near Bakhmut, the eastern mining city which has for months been the focus of Russia’s grinding offensive.

“The lives of our people are the highest value for us,” Yermak said, adding that Kyiv’s goal was to bring back all remaining POWs.

There was no immediate information on how many Russian prisoners were released, but the press service of the founder of the Wagner Group, the Kremlin-affiliated paramilitary force whose fighters are prominent in eastern Ukraine, also released a video Sunday showing Ukrainian prisoners of war being readied for an exchange.

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The video, published on the Telegram messaging service, features Wagner founder Yevgeny Prigozhin instructing a soldier to prepare the Ukrainian captives to leave Russian-controlled territory “by lunchtime” on Sunday. The POWs are then shown boarding trucks and walking along a road.

In his Easter address released on Sunday morning, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy described the holiday as marking “the victory of good, the victory of truth, the victory of life,” and he stressed what he said was Ukrainian unity in the face of Russian aggression.

“Belief in victory unites all of us always, and especially today. At Easter, which from time immemorial has been a family holiday for Ukrainians, a day of warmth, hope and great unity. We are one big family — Ukrainians. We have one big home — Ukraine. We have one big goal — victory for all,” Zelenskyy said.

Ukraine’s top soldier, Gen. Valery Zaluzhnyy, likewise drew parallels between the Christian message of resurrection and renewal and Ukraine’s hopes for victory.

“Easter is a holiday of great hope. Hope that will bring us peace. I believe that together, united, we will overcome the enemy,” he wrote in a Facebook post. He also thanked all front-line soldiers who he said will “hold the defense in the trenches, stay in the dugouts, (…) carry out combat duty” as the rest of the country celebrates.

In central Kyiv, people gathered in the courtyard of the landmark St. Michael’s Golden-Domed Monastery on Sunday morning to have their Easter eggs and baskets of food blessed by a priest. A curfew had prevented most from attending the traditional all-night service there hours earlier, with many tuning into a live stream instead.

Ukrainian churches are usually crowded on Orthodox Easter Sunday. But this year, the wide courtyard was barely half full, and the line of people waiting for the priest to sprinkle holy water on their adorned baskets was moving briskly.

For a second year in a row, Moscow’s brutal war has interrupted holiday routines. Ukraine’s main security service this week issued a statement urging residents not to linger in churches on Sunday, in order to avoid crowding and minimize security risks.

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Alla Voronina, one of the people who came to St. Michael’s with baskets containing Easter cakes and multi-colored eggs, said that the restrictions were “very hard” on residents’ morale.

“You constantly recall how it used to be before the war,” she told The Associated Press. She said that she and her family would nevertheless follow the security recommendations and go straight home after receiving the blessing.

Others in the line echoed Zaluzhnyy’s words about a wartime Easter being a symbol of hope.

“As never before, Easter at a time of war inspires us with hope and faith in the future, in the victory of Ukraine, in God’s protection of our Motherland,” said Inna Holivets.

Another worshipper, Tetiana Voloshyna, said she was praying for Ukrainian troops “who defend us and make it possible for us to have this holiday.” She added she had come to the monastery with her “personal pain and personal requests to God for victory, peace and life.”

Despite the shared Orthodox holiday, Russian shelling and missile attacks continued to sow destruction in Ukraine, according to social media statements from Ukrainian regional officials. Officials in the country’s south and east said that churches had not been spared. The governor of the eastern Dnipropetrovsk region, Serhii Lysak, claimed in a Telegram update that Russian forces stationed at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant shelled a church in a nearby town, wounding two civilians.

“The Russians have once again confirmed that they hold nothing sacred,” Lysak said in his post. He did not immediately provide evidence of the strike or its consequences.

Earlier on Sunday, the head of the local military administration in Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia province reported that Russian shelling overnight hit an Orthodox church in the town of Komyshuvakha. Photos showed local residents rescuing icons from the church, its gutted frame visible in the background.

At least four civilians were killed and eight others were wounded on Saturday and overnight, Ukrainian officials reported on Sunday morning.

Across the front line, in Russian-occupied territory in Ukraine’s industrial east, the Kremlin-appointed head of the Donetsk region claimed that a Ukrainian strike killed one civilian and wounded six others in the province’s namesake capital. Denis Pushilin wrote in a Telegram post that shelling hit the center of the city, near its Holy Transfiguration cathedral.

Neither Pushilin’s claim nor those from Ukrainian authorities regarding the civilian death toll could be independently verified.

___

In a social media world that produces traceable digital fingerprints, it didn’t take long for federal authorities and open-source investigators adept at sifting through data to land on the name of Jack Teixeira.

Teixeira, 21, who served in the Massachusetts Air National Guard, was arrested Thursday in connection with the far-reaching leak of classified documents that have shaken capitals from Washington to Kyiv to Seoul with revelations of U.S. spying on allies and foes alike and the disclosure of sensitive military intelligence about the war in Ukraine.

Attorney General Merrick Garland said Teixeira would be charged with the unauthorized removal of classified national defense information.

There were clues in messages posted in a chatroom on Discord, a social media platform where Teixeira is believed to have posted for years about guns, games and his favorite memes — and, according to some others chatting with him, closely guarded U.S. secrets.

The investigative website Bellingcat and The New York Times first publicly identified Teixeira, minutes before federal officials confirmed he was a subject of interest in the investigation. They reported tracking profiles on other more obscure sites linked to Teixeira.

The suspect, as part of his duties, reportedly had access to highly classified information.

The case underscores the challenges the U.S. and other governments have in keeping secrets in an era of omnipresent data and an ever growing army of savvy users who know how to exploit it.

When asked how such a young service member could have had access to highly sensitive documents, the Pentagon spokesman, Brig. Gen. Patrick Ryder, said it was the nature of the military to trust its very young service members with high and sometimes grave levels of responsibility, including high levels of security clearance.

Soldiers fresh out of high school went to fight in Iraq, Afghanistan and other combat zones for a generation, often using top-secret intelligence and programs to target adversaries.

“We entrust our members with a lot of responsibility at a very early age. Think about a young combat platoon sergeant, and the responsibility and trust that we put into those individuals to lead troops into combat,” Ryder said.

In previous Associated Press stories, the leaker was identified as “the O.G.” by a member of an online chat group where Teixeira and others posted for years. The member of the chat group declined to give his name to the AP, citing concerns for his personal safety.

The chat group, called “Thug Shaker Central,” drew roughly two dozen enthusiasts who talked about their favorite types of guns and also shared memes and jokes, some of them racist. The group also included a running discussion on wars that included talk of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In that discussion, “the O.G.” would for months post material that he said was classified — originally typing it out with his own notations, then a few months ago switching to posting images of folded-up papers because he felt his writings weren’t being taken seriously, the person said.

A different participant in the group shared some of the files several weeks ago in a different chat group — and from there they appear to have spread across the Internet.

The person who spoke to the AP said he had not communicated with Teixeira on Thursday but had stayed in touch earlier in the week. Teixeira had said he knew the FBI was looking for him, the person said.

Teixeira was an airman first class detailed to an Air Force intelligence, according to Facebook posts from the 102nd Intelligence Wing based at Otis Air National Guard Base in Massachusetts.

Teixeira’s specialty in the Air National Guard was as a “cyber transport systems specialist,” essentially an IT specialist responsible for military communications networks, including their cabling and hubs. In that role Teixeira would have had a higher level of security clearance because he would have also been tasked with responsibility to access and ensure protection for the network, a defense official told the AP.

The National Guard issued a statement saying it was aware of the investigation and “takes this issue very seriously.”

“National security is our foremost priority and any attempt to undermine it compromises our values and degrades trust among our members, the public, allies and partners,” the statement said.

Local police on Thursday had blocked off the street in front of a home listed as belonging to his family.

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The person who spoke to the AP says “the O.G.” — who he acknowledged Thursday was Teixeira — was an observant Christian who often spoke of God and prayed with members of the chat group.

While he was enlisted, Teixeira opposed many of the priorities of the U.S. government and denounced the military “since it was run by the elite politicians,” the person said, adding that he didn’t know why Teixeira had signed up in the first place.

“He expressed regret (about) joining a lot,” the person said. “He even said he’d kick my ass if I thought about joining.”

But the person has stressed that he didn’t believe Teixeira leaked documents to undermine the U.S. government or for an ideological reason.

When The New York Times first published a story last week about the documents, the person said, members of the group were on a video call when “the O.G.” talked to them.

“Basically what he said was, ‘I’m sorry, guys, I prayed every single day that this wouldn’t happen,’” the person said. “’I prayed, and I prayed, and now it’s only up to God what happens next.’”

Associated Press writer Tara Copp contributed to this report.

After eight months of intense and brutal fighting between Russian and Ukrainian forces in and around Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, both sides are fatigued as they continue to fight over a town that is now little more than ruins, according to Western officials.

Speaking at a defense intelligence briefing Wednesday, Western officials — who asked to remain anonymous due to the sensitive nature of the situation on the ground in Ukraine — said Russian forces had made extremely slow progress in their efforts to capture Bakhmut in the Donetsk region, saying any advances over the last couple of weeks could be measured in meters.

A lull in recent activity had been due to poor weather, officials said, as well as “exhaustion on both sides.”

Russia was taking an increasing number of casualties, the officials said, and they believed its fighters were not in full control of Bakhmut, despite the head of Russia’s mercenary forces there claiming that his fighters had taken over the town’s main administration building last Sunday.

In any case, they noted that Bakhmut is no longer recognizable as it once was. “There isn’t a town left,” they said.

Russian forces, the majority of whom are mercenary units belonging to the Wagner Group, have been trying to advance in the wider Donetsk for months as fully occupying the region is a key aim for the Kremlin. While not strategically critical by itself, capturing the town is seen by Russia as a stepping stone to advance onto other regional cities such as Sloviansk and Kramatorsk.

Despite defense analysts assessing that Bakhmut has been gradually encircled by Russian forces to the north, east and south, Ukraine has refused to tactically withdraw from Bakhmut, instead vowing to reinforce and defend it. And so the fighting continues.

Western officials said Wednesday that Ukraine had surprised everybody with its tenacity and ability to hold off the Russians in Bakhmut and had been effective as a way to inflict as many casualties on Russia as possible.

Whether Ukraine could or should put forces into Bakhmut to retake the town just as they’re preparing for a large-scale counteroffensive — with little known about when and where this could start — was another question, officials said.

Bakhmut stands

For its part, Ukraine has brushed off any question that it’s facing a potential over-run by Russian forces there with Yuriy Sak, an official in Ukraine’s defense ministry, describing Russia’s claims to have technically taken control of Bakhmut last weekend as “bull—-.”

“We’ve been hearing this for months now,” Sak told CNBC Monday, referring to claims that Bakhmut is under Russian control.

“The reality is, and as our General Staff and military report, is that it’s not easy there, it’s pretty bad, and it’s been bad for the last three months and it’s not got any better. There has been a bit of a lull over the last few days which was quite unusual but it has intensified again. But Bakhmut stands, that’s the most important thing,” he said.

As for an indication as to when Kyiv might launch a counter-offensive, Ukraine’s defense ministry is understandably tight-lipped but Sak noted that preparations have to be made as he noted “being on the offensive is always much tougher than being on the defensive.”

“We’re not prepared to use our soldiers as cannon fodder. So unless our military command is confident that we have sufficient armor, sufficient number of tanks, sufficient artillery rounds, they will not make a move. That’s why we’re preparing for it. We’re preparing for it and we’ll go for it as soon as we’re ready.”

Russian forces were not far from their battered front-line town of Avdiivka in eastern Ukraine, where shells fall daily, ripping through buildings, smashing cars and leaving craters.

Dark, curly hair peeping out from beneath his hoodie, 15-year-old Oleksii Mazurin was one of the last youths still living there. After his evacuation Friday, another 13 remained, said police chief Roman Protsyk.

Before the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, about 25,000 people lived in Avdiivka. Despite the shelling, about 2,000 civilians remain, Protsyk said.

For months, authorities have been urging civilians in areas near the fighting to evacuate to safer parts of the country. But while many have heeded the call, others — including families with children — have steadfastly refused.

So it has fallen to police to try to persuade people to leave. A special unit known as the White Angels risk their lives to head into front-line villages and towns, knocking on doors and pleading with the few remaining residents to evacuate.

In early March, the government issued an order for the compulsory evacuation of families with children from combat areas. Under the order, children must be accompanied by a parent or guardian. But it currently applies only to Bakhmut, the hard-hit eastern city where fighting has raged for months.

“The compulsory evacuation order is unfortunately only in force in Bakhmut. In Avdiivka, this law is not adopted,” said White Angels policeman Gennadiy Yudin. “We’re driving around to all the families. We are warning them, we are informing them about the evacuation.”

In Bakhmut itself, the situation is so dangerous that civilian evacuations are exceptionally risky.

“I already think that for Bakhmut, it’s too late,” Protsyk said. “Here in our region, … if such a decision would be made now, it would be safe.”

But without a compulsory evacuation order, the hands of the police are tied. All they can do is use their powers of persuasion.

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For Oleksii’s mother, 37-year-old, Svitlana Mazurina, the decision to finally leave was tough.

“It’s hard when you’ve lived in this town from birth,” she said. “Now I’m leaving I don’t know to where, where no one needs me. I don’t know where or what to start with.”

Mazurina had been living in the building’s basement with her partner and Oleksii for nearly a year, fearing the bombs less than leaving for an unknown destination and an uncertain future. Her partner still won’t leave, saying he fears being drafted into the army.

“I agreed only because I feel sorry for the child,” Mazurina said. “I want him to live well.”

And living well is no longer possible in Avdiivka. Living at all is a game of chance.

Moments before the evacuation of the mother and son and just a few streets away, another apartment building was hit by an airstrike. The entire corner of the apartment block was gone, reduced to smoldering rubble as flames and black smoke billowed from the gaping hole the bomb left in the 15-story structure.

As Yudin and a fellow White Angels policeman surveilled the damage, the wail of incoming artillery pierced the air. They dived to the ground as the detonation reverberated through the shattered landscape of bombed-out buildings and splintered trees. As the sound died down, they picked themselves up and headed to Mazurina’s apartment building.

But not all attempts to evacuate civilians are successful. Protsyk, the police chief, described families hiding their children from authorities, or accusing police of trying to kidnap them.

In the nearby village of Netailove, so close to the front line that the sound of shooting sounded across the fields on the village outskirts, the police tried — and failed — to persuade a teenager’s family that it was time to go.

“Drop everything, I cannot imagine it,” said Natalya, wiping tears from her eyes. “I just want to die. I can’t live without a home.”

Her son, 14-year-old Maksim, said he wanted to stay, as did his father, Andreii. Natalya was in favor of evacuation but wouldn’t leave them. The family did not give their surname.

Again and again, the police tried to convince them: “What if a shell destroys your house? What if you are injured?”

Natalya replied: “It is better to die fast.”

A policeman countered, “But the child will live and live. A child’s life is important.”

The argument was to no avail. Maksim stood outside his home, his hoodie pulled over his head to ward off the morning cold.

He didn’t flinch at the sound of exploding artillery. No one did — the shelling has become the regular backdrop of their lives.

___

Vasilisa Stepanenko in Avdiivka contributed.

___

The Ukrainians’ skills are being evaluated on simulators at a U.S. military base in Tucson, Arizona, the officials said, and they may be joined by more of their fellow pilots soon. 

U.S. authorities have approved bringing up to 10 more Ukrainian pilots to the U.S. for further assessment as early as this month, the officials said.

The arrival of the first two pilots marks the first time Ukrainian pilots have traveled to the U.S. to have their skills evaluated by American military trainers. Officials said the effort has twin goals: to improve the pilots’ skills and evaluate how long a proper training program could take.

Read the full story on NBCNews.com here.

Friday marked the somber first anniversary of the Russian invasion. Steve Fults, director of operations for Fort Worth Presbyterian Church, said the church joined several others shortly after the war began on Feb. 24, 2022.

Fort Worth Presbyterian is currently collecting medical supplies and household items with Trinity Presbyterian Church for the “Crates For Ukraine” effort.

“In many people’s lives, people have moved on. They have forgotten there is a war in Ukraine. They have forgotten there are people whose lives have been shattered, whose children have lost their father and are in a protracted struggle. Millions of people whose lives have been devastated,” Fults said.

Church leaders are asking people to drop off donations such as Tylenol, bandages, and other supplies by Sunday, Feb. 26. Fort Worth Presbyterian is located at 6251 Oakmont Trail in Fort Worth.

Once collected, they will begin packing in the coming weeks and then ship the supplies in March with other organizations.

As Ukrainians planned memorials, candle vigils, and other remembrances this week, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy pledged to push for victory in 2023.

It was Ukraine’s “longest day,” Zelenskyy said, but the country’s dogged resistance a year on has proven that “every tomorrow is worth fighting for.”

“We have been standing for exactly one year,” Zelenskyy said.

Feb. 24, 2022, he said, was “the longest day of our lives. The hardest day of our modern history. We woke up early and haven’t fallen asleep since.”

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On Friday, the one-year anniversary of the war’s start, Paisley is releasing a new song called “Same Here,” featuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy speaking proudly about his country and people.

The song is Paisley’s first from his new record, “Son of the Mountains,” to be released later this year on Universal Music Group Nashville.

The West Virginia native wrote the song with Lee Thomas Miller (co-writer on Paisley hits “The World” and “Perfect Storm”) and Dawes frontman Taylor Goldsmith. It’s a three-part narrative that reflects on universal similarities, despite distance and language.

While it doesn’t mention Ukraine specifically, the song ends with Paisley and Zelenskyy in conversation, recorded during a video call. Zelenskyy talks about Ukrainians’ desire for freedom, adding “There is no distance between our two countries in such values.”

“There’s just no differences,” Paisley told The Associated Press. “You can put us in different places with different flags and different languages, but we have so many similarities.”

Paisley is one of several celebrity ambassadors for Ukraine’s United24 crowdfunding effort, and has donated his time for other fundraising efforts to assist Ukrainians. But even he thought it would be a long shot to have the direct involvement of Zelenskyy, who has traveled the world advocating for Ukraine’s military and recovery efforts.

“I think he understands that art is how you reach the most people, especially in the heart,” Paisley said of Zelenskyy, who was an actor and comedian before becoming president.

“He can give as many speeches as he can give, but it’s a lot easier to hear something with a melody maybe.”

Zelenskyy didn’t just sign off on the song; he also suggested some changes to it, Paisley said.

Paisley’s royalties for the song will be donated to United24 to help build housing for thousands of displaced Ukrainians whose homes were destroyed in the war, he said. Using his platform to advocate for causes important to him has always been part of his career, whether it was opening a free grocery store in Nashville with his wife, Kimberly Williams-Paisley, or fighting hunger by donating 1 million meals during the pandemic.

“I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night if I didn’t sort of swing for the fence with things like this,” Paisley said. “For me, I’m happiest dealing with stuff as a songwriter that’s very true and very, very passionate. And sometimes I don’t know if you’d call it risky, but it’s more like it’s bigger than me.”

Paisley brings his passion on stage during live shows. He’s been changing the lyrics to his hit song “American Saturday Night,” for instance, to replace a reference to the U.S.S.R. to “There’s a Ukrainian flag hanging up behind the bar.”

The new record will be his debut on UMG since moving from Sony’s Arista label, and he said “Same Here” reflects the kinds of big universal themes on it.

“We do deal with stuff going on in the world,” Paisley said. “How do you sing about things that are truly big — a big deal right now — that also don’t feel like maybe they’re the type of thing that you would be singing about typically? And yeah, on this album I have kind of really dug deep and tried to say something.”

Paisley, who has visited U.S. troops in Afghanistan, said he’s been invited to visit Ukraine, which he’d like to do. In the meantime, he hopes the song’s message will bolster the country now facing down year two of the war.

“That’s where it gets really rewarding… feeling like maybe the heart of this helps paint the picture they want to paint,” Paisley said.

The announcement comes just days after President Joe Biden made an unannounced visit to Kyiv and pledged America’s continuing commitment to Ukraine. Biden told President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his people that “Americans stand with you, and the world stands with you.”

In a statement Friday, the Pentagon said the aid includes weapons to counter Russia’s unmanned systems and several types of drones, including the upgraded Switchblade 600 Kamikaze drone, as well as electronic warfare detection equipment.

It also includes money for additional ammunition for the High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, artillery rounds and munitions for laser-guided rocket systems. But, in an unusual move, the Pentagon provided no details on how many rounds of any kind will be bought. Including this latest package, the U.S. has now committed more than $32 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement that the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion is a chance for all who believe in freedom “to recommit ourselves to supporting Ukraine’s brave defenders for the long haul — and to recall that the stakes of Russia’s war stretch far beyond Ukraine.”

Biden was scheduled to meet virtually Friday with other Group of Seven leaders and Zelenskyy “to continue coordinating our efforts to support Ukraine and hold Russia accountable for its war,” the White House said.

Those efforts include what the White House called “sweeping” sanctions on over 200 people and entities “to further degrade Russia’s economy and diminish its ability to wage war against Ukraine.” The Biden administration will also further restrict exports to Russia and raise tariffs on some Russian products imported to the U.S.

The White House statement released Friday also said, “G7 countries will continue to keep Russia’s sovereign assets immobilized until there is a resolution to the conflict that addresses Russia’s violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty and integrity.”

Russia-Ukraine War Feb 24

Casualties, Cost and Weapons: Russia's Invasion of Ukraine by the Numbers

Russia-Ukraine War Feb 23

Photos: The Year Since Russia Invaded Ukraine

Just days after Austin traveled to Kyiv in April 2022 to meet with Zelenskyy, he launched a now-monthly meeting of ministers of defense and defense chiefs to make sure momentum on assisting Ukraine does not fade. The most recent meeting was last week in Brussels, and over the past year the sessions have resulted in regular announcements by international partners of increasingly lethal weapons systems to help Ukraine defend itself.

That effort also spawned a spin-off group of the chief weapons buyers for each partner nation. They now meet regularly to address the pressure that support for Ukraine has put on international weapons stockpiles, to make sure equipment continues to flow and manufacturing meets the demands.

Allies and partners, said Austin, have committed more than $20 billion in security assistance to Ukraine, including tanks, armored vehicles, air-defense systems, artillery systems and weapons.

“Difficult times may lie ahead, but let us remain clear-eyed about what is at stake in Ukraine,” Austin said, “to ensure that a world of rules and rights is not replaced by one of tyranny and turmoil.”

The latest aid package uses the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative to provide funding for longer-term contracts to buy weapons and equipment. Unlike the presidential drawdown authority that the Pentagon has used repeatedly over the past year to pull weapons from its own stocks and quickly ship them to Ukraine, the USAI-funded equipment could take a year or two to get to the battlefront. As a result, it will do little to help Ukraine prepare for an expected new offensive in the spring.

According to the Pentagon, the money will also buy mine clearing and communications equipment and fund training, maintenance and sustainment for Ukraine’s forces.

On CNN Thursday night, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan confirmed that Biden and Zelenskyy discussed Ukraine’s request for F-16 fighter jets during the U.S. president’s visit week to Kyiv.

“They’re about to mount a significant counter offense,” Sullivan noted, referring to expectations that Ukraine will mount a spring offensive. “From our perspective, F-16s are not the key capability for that offensive.” He suggested, however, that the F-16 request could be revisited for long-term defense.

While China has provided some help to Russia, including parroting Russian disinformation campaigns about the war, this is more tangible assistance for use by Russian troops in Ukraine.

The officials declined to provide specifics about the non-lethal military assistance, but said it could include gear for the spring offensive like uniforms or even body armor. 

A spokesperson for National Security Council declined to comment.

Read the full story on NBCNews.com here.

Current planning underway is for Biden to visit Poland near the end of February, the sources told NBC News. The sources noted that the trip is not final until the White House announces it and that the plans could change.

A spokesperson for the National Security Council declined to comment.

It was not immediately clear whether additional stops would be added to the trip.

Read the full story at NBCNews.com.

Top Ukrainian presidential aide Andriy Yermak said in a Telegram post that 116 Ukrainians were freed.

He said the released POWs include troops who held out in Mariupol during Moscow’s monthslong siege that reduced the southern port city to ruins, as well as guerrilla fighters from the Kherson region and snipers captured during the ongoing fierce battles for the eastern city of Bakhmut.

Russian defense officials, meanwhile, announced that 63 Russian troops had returned from Ukraine following the swap, including some “special category” prisoners whose release was secured following mediation by the United Arab Emirates.

A statement issued Saturday by the Russian Defense Ministry did not provide details about these “special category” captives.

Reed, 33, was aiding in the evacuation of Ukrainian citizens when his evacuation vehicle was hit with a reported missile, according to a statement from Global Outreach Doctors (GoDocs).

Reed worked with GoDocs as its Ukraine Country Director since January 2023.

According to a message Reed’s wife shared on Facebook he gave his life saving his team member by covering their body with his.

“Pete’s death underscores the devastation war has on innocent civilians, and highlights the importance of humanitarian and medical aid for affected communities. GoDocs is committed to carrying out this work around the world in honor of Pete,” GoDocs said in a statement on Reed’s death.

Reed was a former US Marine Corps rifleman who served two tours in Helmand, Afghanistan. He was also the founder of Global Response Management.

His family is currently working to get him home and says as more details become clear they will share them.

New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy released a statement on Reed’s death on Friday extending his and his wife’s condolences to the Reed’s family and friends.

“A Bordentown native, Pete dedicated his life to service, both founding and working for organizations that help people in need throughout the world. Pete will be remembered for the depth of his courage and his compassion, his selflessness, and his sacrifice. His death serves as a devastating reminder of the catastrophic suffering that this unjustified war has caused,” Gov. Murphy said.

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Critical infrastructure in Kyiv was targeted, the deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, said on Telegram.

An unidentified infrastructure object was hit in the city and emergency services were operating at the site of the strike, Kyiv’s city military administration said.

Explosions were heard in the Dniprovskyi district of the city, Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko said. Klitschko also said that fragments of a missile fell on a non-residential area in the Holosiivskyi district, and a fire broke out in a building there. No casualties have been reported so far.

It wasn’t immediately clear whether several facilities in Kyiv were targeted or just the one that was reported hit. The Ukrainian capital hasn’t been attacked with missiles since New Year’s night, Jan. 1.

In the outlying Kyiv region, a residential building in the village of Kopyliv was hit, and windows of the houses nearby were blown out, Tymoshenko said.

A total of 18 private houses were damaged in the region, according to regional Gov. Oleksii Kuleba. “There are damaged roofs and windows,” but no casualties, Kuleba said in a Telegram post. He added that a fire has been contained at a “critical infrastructure facility” in the region.

Earlier on Saturday, two Russian missiles hit Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, the governor of the Kharkiv region reported.

Oleh Syniehubov said Russian forces fired two S-300 missiles at the industrial district of Kharkiv. The strikes targeted “energy and industrial objects of Kharkiv and the (outlying) region,” Syniehubov said. No casualties have been reported, but emergency power cuts in the city and other settlements of the region were possible, the official said.

The attacks come amid conflicting reports on the fate of the fiercely contested salt mining town of Soledar, in Ukraine’s embattled east. Russia claims that its forces have captured the town, a development that would mark a rare victory for the Kremlin after a series of humiliating setbacks on the battlefield.

Ukrainian authorities and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy insist the fight for Soledar continues.

Moscow has painted the battle for the town and the nearby city of Bakhmut as key to capturing the eastern region of the Donbas, which comprises of partially occupied Donetsk and Luhansk regions, and as a way to grind down the best Ukrainian forces and prevent them from launching counterattacks elsewhere.

But that cuts both ways, as Ukraine says its fierce defense of the eastern strongholds has helped tie up Russian forces. Western officials and analysts say the two towns’ importance is more symbolic than strategic.

Some Orthodox Ukrainians have decided to observe Christmas on Dec. 25, like many Christians around the world. Yes, this has to do with the war, and yes, they have the blessing of their local church.

The idea of commemorating the birth of Jesus in December was considered radical in Ukraine until recently, but Russia’s invasion changed many hearts and minds.

In October, the leadership of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, which is not aligned with the Russian church and one of two branches of Orthodox Christianity in the country, agreed to allow faithful to celebrate on Dec. 25.

The choice of dates has clear political and religious overtones in a nation with rival Orthodox churches and where slight revisions to rituals can carry potent meaning in a culture war that runs parallel to the shooting war.

For some people, changing dates represents a separation from Russia, its culture, and religion. People in a village on the outskirts of Kyiv voted recently to move up their Christmas observance.

“What began on Feb. 24, the full-scale invasion, is an awakening and an understanding that we can no longer be part of the Russian world,” Olena Paliy, a 33-year-old Bobrytsia resident, said.

The Russian Orthodox Church, which claims sovereignty over Orthodoxy in Ukraine, and some other Eastern Orthodox churches continue to use the ancient Julian calendar. Christmas falls 13 days later on that calendar,, or Jan. 7, than it does on the Gregorian calendar used by most church and secular groups.

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The Catholic Church first adopted the modern, more astronomically precise Gregorian calendar in the 16th century, and Protestants and some Orthodox churches have since aligned their own calendars for purposes of calculating Christmas.

The Synod of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine decreed in October that local church rectors could choose the date along with their communities, saying the decision followed years of discussion but also resulted from the circumstances of the war.

In Bobrytsia, some members of the faith promoted the change within the local church, which recently transitioned to being part of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, with no ties to Russia. When a vote was taken last week, 200 out of 204 people said yes to adopting Dec. 25 as the new day to celebrate Christmas.

“This is a big step because never in our history have we had the same dates of celebration of Christmas in Ukraine with the whole Christian world. All the time we were separated,” said Roman Ivanenko, a local official in Bobrytsia, and one of the promoters of the change. With the switch, he said, they are “breaking this connection” with the Russians.

“The church is Ukrainian, and the holidays are Ukrainian,” said Oleg Shkula, a member of the volunteer territorial defense force in the district that includes the village. For him, his church doesn’t have to be linked to “darkness and gloom and with the anti-christ, which Russia is today.”

In 2019, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the spiritual leader of the Eastern Orthodox Church, granted complete independence, or autocephaly, to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine. Ukrainians who favored recognition for a national church in tandem with Ukraine’s political independence from the former Soviet Union had long sought such approval.

The Russian Orthodox Church and its leader, Patriarch Kirill, fiercely protested the move, saying Ukraine was not under the jurisdiction of Bartholomew.

The other major branch of Orthodoxy in the country, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, remained loyal to Moscow until the outbreak of war. It declared independence in May, though it remains under government scrutiny. That church has traditionally celebrated Christmas on Jan. 7.

____

Arhirova reported from Kyiv, Ukraine. The Associated Press religion correspondent, Peter Smith, contributed from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Zelenskyy could address a joint session of Congress on Wednesday evening, three sources said. The five sources stressed that the plans were contingent on security and could still change. 

U.S. Capitol Police have been undergoing preparations for the possible visit, with leadership joining State Department agents along with emergency management personnel on a walk-through Tuesday, according to one source familiar with the planning who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive plans.

Dec 15, 2022

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Russia-Ukraine War Dec 15, 2022

Russia Warns of ‘Consequences' If US Patriot Missiles Are Sent to Ukraine

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., suggested members attend Wednesday’s session in person in a letter to colleagues Tuesday.

Pelosi would not confirm the trip when asked for comment by NBC News, but said she invited Zelenskyy, describing him as a “total hero.”

Read the full story on NBCNews.com here.

The image of a woman in a bathrobe and gas mask holding a fire extinguisher, was cut away from the war damaged wall on the side of a scorched building in the Hostomel suburb of the Ukrainiain capital, Kyiv Regional Gov. Oleksii Kuleba said in a post on his Telegram channel.

He said the thieves “were detained at the scene,” and the image was “undamaged” and under the protection of law enforcement officers.

“These images are a symbol of our struggle against the enemy,” he added. “These are stories about the support and solidarity of the entire civilized world with Ukraine. Let’s do everything to preserve the works of street art as a symbol of our future victory.”

The mural is one of several Banksy has completed in Ukraine since the Russian invasion on Feb. 24.

Read the full story on NBCNews.com.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Oleh Nikolenko wrote on Facebook that the “bloody parcels” were received by the Ukrainian embassies in Hungary, the Netherlands, Poland, Croatia and Italy, as well as by consulates in Naples, Italy; Krakow, Poland and the Czech city of Brno. He said that “we are studying the meaning of this message.”

“It’s a very strong signal,” the Ukrainian consul in Naples, Maksym Kovalenko, said, confirming his office received two letters containing fish eyes at around 10:30 a.m. Thursday.

Nikolenko said the parcels arrived after a package containing an explosive device sent to the Ukrainian Embassy in Madrid ignited upon opening on Wednesday and injured an employee. That was one of multiple explosive parcels found in Spain this week.

Spain´s Interior Ministry said police evacuated the Madrid embassy on Friday after another suspect package was detected. The ministry said the parcel was posted from outside Spain and might be part of the chain of mail sent to other embassies in Europe. Police were investigating the contents and did not find any explosives, the ministry said.

Elsewhere, the entrance to the residence of the Ukrainian ambassador to the Vatican was vandalized and the Ukrainian Embassy in Kazakhstan was warned of an attack with explosives, though that wasn’t confirmed, Nikolenko said.

In Poland, a spokesman for the police in Warsaw confirmed by email that a package arrived at the Ukrainian Consulate in the Polish capital on Thursday that “raised concern” from one of the employees. The police department for protecting diplomatic missions was notified and “we quickly eliminated the danger” spokesman Sylwester Marczak said. He provided no further details. Marczak said he was not aware of any such parcel arriving at the Ukrainian Embassy in Warsaw.

Police in Krakow, in southern Poland, did not confirm an incident at the consulate there but said a suspicious package was identified at a post office Thursday. Police said the contents were being examined but would not say to whom the package was addressed.

In the Czech Republic, police said an X-ray scan found no explosives in a checked package, but they added later that animal tissue was found inside that has been submitted to laboratory tests.

Ukraine’s ambassador to the Vatican, Andrii Yurash, said the entrance to his Rome residence was vandalized Thursday afternoon with what he believed to be animal feces. The door to the apartment and the stairs and walls in the entryway were “smeared with a dirty substance with an unpleasant smell,” he told The Associated Press. He said his wife and son were not home at the time, and police were called.

“And also the diplomatic mission in Italy received some letters also with some very unpleasant stuff inside, I mean some animal eyes. I don’t know exactly but it looks like eyes from fish or some other animals,” Yurash said. “So it is hard to explain completely why, and what is the reason of this terrible message, but it is no doubt a systematic trend, a systematic attack on Ukrainian missions around Europe.”

In Croatia, police said the Ukrainian Embassy in Zagreb called to report that a suspicious package meant for the embassy arrived at the post office, but diplomatic personnel didn’t collect it following the warning from the Foreign Ministry.

Croatian police took custody of the package and are investigating where it was sent from and what it contained. No other details were revealed.

All Ukrainian embassies and consulates have stepped up security measures. Nikolenko quoted Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba as saying that “we have reason to believe that a well-planned campaign of terror and intimidation of Ukrainian embassies and consulates is taking place.”

___

Jovana Gec in Belgrade, Serbia, Monika Scislowska in Warsaw, Poland, Karel Janicek in Prague, and Ciaran Giles in Madrid contributed reporting.

Russian forces kept up rocket attacks on infrastructure and airstrikes against Ukrainian troop positions along the contact line, the Ukrainian general staff said Friday, adding that Moscow’s military push has focused on a dozen towns including Bakhmut and Avdiivka — key targets for Russia in the embattled east.

Late Thursday, Mykhailo Podolyak, a top adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, relayed new figures about Ukrainian soldiers killed in battle, while noting that the number of injured troops was higher and civilian casualty counts were “significant.”

Russia-Ukraine Crisis Nov 29, 2022

‘It Was Like Hell': Kherson Residents Describe Torture Under Russian Occupation

Nov 30, 2022

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“We have official figures from the general staff, we have official figures from the top command, and they amount to between 10,000 and 12,500-13,000 killed,” Podolyak told Channel 24.

The Ukrainian military has not confirmed such figures and it was a rare instance of a Ukrainian official providing such a count. The last dates back to late August, when the head of the armed forces said that nearly 9,000 military personnel had been killed. In June, Podolyak said that up to 200 soldiers were dying each day, in some of the most intense fighting and bloodshed this year.

On Wednesday, Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Union’s executive Commission, said 100,000 Ukrainian troops had been killed before her office corrected her comments — calling them inaccurate and saying that the figure referred to both killed and injured.

Last month, Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that as many as 40,000 Ukrainian civilians and “well over” 100,000 Russian soldiers have been killed or wounded in the war so far. He added that it was the “same thing probably on the Ukrainian side.”

The U.N. human rights office, in its latest weekly update published Monday, said it had recorded 6,655 civilians killed and 10,368 injured, but has acknowledged that its tally includes only casualties that it has confirmed and likely far understates the actual toll.

Ukrainians have been bracing for freezing winter temperatures as Russia’s campaign has recently hit infrastructure including power plants and electrical transformers, leaving many without heat, water and electricity.

Ukraine has faced a blistering onslaught of Russian artillery fire and drone attacks since early October. The shelling has been especially intense in southern Kherson since Russian forces withdrew and Ukraine’s army reclaimed the southern city almost three weeks ago.

Local authorities said about two-thirds of the city of Kherson had electricity as of Thursday night, after new Russian strikes had cut power that had recently been restored.

In Kyiv, Mayor Vitali Klitschko warned the capital’s millions of residents that they should stock up on water and preserved food to see them through a winter that could prove miserable if more energy infrastructure is damaged.

He also urged people to consider leaving the city to stay with friends or family elsewhere, if possible.

“Trying months lie ahead. The enemy still possesses substantial resources,” Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov said. He added, however, that “signs are accumulating that (Russia) needs a pause at all costs.”

Ukraine has faced a blistering onslaught of Russian artillery fire and drone attacks since early October. The shelling has been especially intense in Kherson since Russian forces withdrew and Ukraine’s army reclaimed the southern city almost three weeks ago.

Nov 30, 2022

Trenches, Mud and Death: One Ukrainian Battlefield Looks Like Something Out of World War I

Russia-Ukraine Crisis Nov 29, 2022

‘It Was Like Hell': Kherson Residents Describe Torture Under Russian Occupation

Ukraine’s presidential office said Thursday that at least two civilians were killed and six others wounded nationwide by the latest Russian shelling. In Kherson, a 70-year-old woman was killed in her apartment and a 64-year-old man was wounded on the street. A 15-year-old boy died when a hospital in the northeastern Sumy region town of Bilopillia was hit, the presidential office said.

Local authorities said about two-thirds of Kherson had electricity as of Thursday night. Some residents congregated at the train station or at government-supported tents that provided heating, food, drinks and electricity to charge cellphones.

Walking gingerly toward an evacuation train, 79-year-old Liudmyla Biloshysta said she decided to leave and join her children in Kyiv because she feared conditions in Kherson would worsen.

“The strike was so massive our house even began to shake,” Biloshysta said of the latest barrage. “These bombardments make me so scared.”

Alluding to her birth during World War II, she said “I was a child of war and now I’m a granny in wartime.”

In the eastern Dnipropetrovsk region, Russian forces fired “from evening till morning” at Ukrainian-held towns facing the Russian occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant across the Dnieper River, the regional governor said Thursday.

“Eight shelling attacks per night. The Russians from evening till morning struck the Nikopol area with (multiple rocket launchers) and heavy artillery. Two districts — Marhanets and Chervonohryhorivka — came under enemy fire,” governor Valentyn Reznichenko wrote on Telegram.

Elsewhere in eastern Ukraine, Russian forces continued their attempts to encircle the Donetsk region city of Bakhmut, focusing on several villages around it and trying to cut a key highway.

Andriy Yermak, the head of Ukraine’s presidential office, said Russia released 50 Ukrainian prisoners of war and Ukraine turned over the same number Thursday as the fighting continued.

In Berlin, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg praised the “heroic resistance of the Ukrainian people” against Russia’s attacks, saying that with the help of allies “Ukraine has made significant gains” on the battlefield.

“But we should not underestimate Russia,” Stoltenberg warned in a speech at the Berlin Security Conference. “Russian missiles and drones continue to rain down on Ukrainian cities, civilians and critical infrastructure, causing enormous human suffering as winter sets in.”

The NATO chief said Russian President Vladimir Putin had made “two big strategic mistakes” when he invaded Ukraine in February: underestimating Ukraine and underestimating the support NATO and its allies were willing to provide so the country could defense itself.

In a related development, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Thursday strongly condemned a European Union proposal, issued the previous day, to set up a U.N.-backed court to investigate possible Russian war crimes in Ukraine.

“As for attempts to establish some kind of tribunals, they will not have any legitimacy and will not be accepted by us. They will be condemned by us,” Peskov said during a media briefing.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in a video message Wednesday that the EU would work with international partners to get “the broadest international support possible” for the proposed war crimes court while continuing to support the International Criminal Court.

Neither Russia nor Ukraine are among the ICC’s 123 member states.

The exodus from Kherson came as Ukraine solemnly remembered a Stalin-era famine and sought to ensure that Russia’s war in Ukraine doesn’t deprive others worldwide of its vital food exports.

A line of trucks, vans and cars, some towing trailers or ferrying out pets and other belongings, stretched a kilometer or more on the outskirts of the city of Kherson.

Days of intensive shelling by Russian forces prompted a bittersweet exodus: Many civilians were happy that their city had been won back, but lamented that they couldn’t stay.

“It is sad that we are leaving our home,” said Yevhen Yankov, as a van he was in inched forward. “Now we are free, but we have to leave, because there is shelling, and there are dead among the population.”

Poking her head out from the back, Svitlana Romanivna added: “We went through real hell. Our neighborhood was burning, it was a nightmare. Everything was in flames.”

Nov 24, 2022

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Emilie Fourrey, emergency project coordinator for aid group Doctors Without Borders in Ukraine, said an evacuation of 400 patients of Kherson’s psychiatric hospital, which is situated near both an electrical plant and the frontline, had begun on Thursday and was set to continue in the coming days.

Ukraine in recent days has faced a blistering onslaught of Russian artillery fire and drone attacks, with the shelling especially intense in Kherson. Often the barrage has largely targeted infrastructure, though civilian casualties have been reported. Repair crews across the country were scrambling to restore heat, electricity and water services that were blasted into disrepair.

Russia has ratcheted up its attacks on critical infrastructure after suffering battlefield setbacks. A prominent Russian nationalist said Saturday the Russian military doesn’t have enough doctors, in what was a rare public admission of problems within the military.

In the capital Kyiv, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy oversaw a busy day of diplomacy, welcoming several European Union leaders for meetings and hosting an “International Summit on Food Security” to discuss food security and agricultural exports from the country. A deal brokered by the U.N. and Turkey has allowed for safe exports of Ukrainian grain in the Black Sea amid wartime disruptions that have affected traffic.

“The total amount we have raised for ‘Grain from Ukraine’ is already about $150 million. The work continues,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly TV address. “We are preparing up to 60 ships. All of us together do not just send Ukrainian agricultural products to those countries that suffer the most from the food crisis. We reaffirm that hunger should never again be used as a weapon.”

The prime ministers of Belgium, Poland and Lithuania and the president of Hungary were on hand, many others participated by video. Zelenskyy said more than 20 countries supported the summit.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said Ukraine — despite its own financial straits — has allocated 900 million hryvna ($24 million) to purchase corn for countries including Yemen, Sudan, Kenya and Nigeria.

Our food security summit was supported by more than 20 countries. The total amount we have raised for ‘Grain from Ukraine’ is already about 150 million US dollars. The work continues. We are preparing up to 60 ships. All of us together do not just send Ukrainian agricultural products to those countries that suffer the most from the food crisis. We reaffirm that hunger should never again be used as a weapon.

The reminder about food supplies was timely: Ukrainians were marking the 90th anniversary of the start of the “Holodomor,” or Great Famine, which killed more than 3 million people over two years as the Soviet government under dictator Josef Stalin confiscated food and grain supplies and deported many Ukrainians.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz marked the commemoration by drawing parallels with the impact of the war on Ukraine on world markets. Exports from Ukraine have resumed under a U.N.-brokered deal but have still been far short of pre-war levels, driving up global prices.

“Today, we stand united in stating that hunger must never again be used as a weapon,” Scholz said in a video message. “That is why we cannot tolerate what we are witnessing: The worst global food crisis in years with abhorrent consequences for millions of people – from Afghanistan to Madagascar, from the Sahel to the Horn of Africa.”

He said Germany, with the U.N.’s World Food Program, will provide an additional 15 million euros for further grain shipments from Ukraine.

Scholz spokes as a cross-party group of lawmakers in Germany are seeking to pass a parliamentary resolution next week that would recognize the 1930s famine as “genocide.”

Last year Ukraine and Russia provided around 30% of the world’s exported wheat and barley, 20% of its corn, and over 50% of its sunflower oil, the U.N. has said.

In a post on the Telegram social network on Saturday, Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said more than 3,000 specialists for a local utility continued to work “around the clock” and had succeeded in restoring heat to more than more than 90% of residential buildings. While about one-quarter of Kyiv residents remained without electricity, he said water serviced had been returned to all in the city.

The scramble to restore power came as Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo met Saturday with Zelenskyy in Kyiv.

“This might be a difficult winter,” he said, alluding to Belgium’s contributions of generators, and support for schools and hospitals in Ukraine, as well as military aid such as “fuel, machine guns, propelled artillery and so on.”

“And by standing here, we hope that we provide you hope and resilience in fighting through this difficult period.”

___

Mednick reported from Kherson, Ukraine.

Germany said earlier this week that it has offered Warsaw Eurofighter planes and Patriot defense systems to help defend Poland’s airspace after two men were killed when an apparently stray Ukrainian defense projectile fell in Poland near the border with Ukraine.

Poland’s Defense Minister Mariusz Blaszczak initially said he received Germany’s offer with “satisfaction.”

But following Russia’s heavy barrage of Ukraine on Wednesday, Polish leaders said it would be better if the defense systems were placed in western Ukraine.

The head of Poland’s ruling party, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, called Germany’s offer “interesting,” but said he believe “it would be best for Poland’s security if Germany handed the equipment to the Ukrainians, trained Ukrainian teams, with the caveat that the batteries would be placed in Ukraine’s west.”

Ukrainian Ambassador to Warsaw, Vasyl Zvarych, thanked Blaszczak, saying on Twitter that Ukraine needs as many air defense weapons as it can get.

But Poland’s apparent decision not to accept the German Patriot system met with some criticism from the opposition in Poland.

Russia-Ukraine War Nov 24, 2022

Ukraine Works to Restore Power to Capital After Russian Strikes

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Some critics pointed out that Poland’s populist government was not only refusing military protection but also critical European Union funding, money which has been held up by Poland’s refusal to follow EU guidelines on safeguarding the independence of judges. Poland needs the money as it seeks to absorb large numbers of refugees at a time of inflation of nearly 18%.

Marcin Kierwinski of the opposition Civic Platform party said Kaczynski “has gone mad” for “rejecting” the Patriot missiles and EU funding “during war and crisis.”

Kaczynski’s Law and Justice party has been pursuing policies hostile toward its neighbor Germany, accusing Berlin of blocking Poland’s interests in the EU. Warsaw has also been demanding $1.3 trillion in reparations from Germany for World War II losses.

Two Poles were killed Nov. 15 when a missile hit a grain depot in the village of Przewodow, just 6 kilometers (4 miles) from the border with Ukraine, which came under heavy Russian missile attacks that day.

Western officials say it appeared that a Ukrainian air defense missile went astray and landed in Poland. While acknowledging that Russia did not fire the missile, NATO, the United States and Poland say they believe the ultimate blame lies with Russia, which invaded Ukraine and started the onslaught.

First lady Olena Zelenska wrote on Twitter that a 2-day-old boy died in the strike and expressed her condolences. “Horrible pain. We will never forget and never forgive,” she said.

The region’s governor said the rockets were Russian.

The strike in Vilniansk, close to the city of Zaporizhzhia, adds to the gruesome toll suffered by hospitals and other medical facilities — and their patients and staff — in the Russian invasion entering its tenth month this week.

They have been in the firing line from the outset, including a March 9 airstrike that destroyed a maternity hospital in the now-occupied port city of Mariupol.

“At night, Russian monsters launched huge rockets at the small maternity ward of the hospital in Vilniansk. Grief overwhelms our hearts — a baby was killed who had just seen the light of day. Rescuers are working at the site,” said the regional governor, Oleksandr Starukh, writing on the Telegram messaging app.

Photos he posted show thick smoke rising above mounds of rubble, being combed by emergency workers against the backdrop of a dark night sky. The State Emergency Service said the two-story building was destroyed.

Medical workers’ efforts have been complicated by the succession of Russian attacks in recent weeks on Ukraine’s infrastructure.

The situation is even worse in the southern city of Kherson, from which Russia retreated nearly two weeks ago after months of occupation — cutting power and water lines.

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Many doctors in the city are working in the dark, unable to use elevators to transport patients to surgery and operating with headlamps, cell phones and flashlights. In some hospitals, key equipment no longer works.

“Breathing machines don’t work, X-ray machines don’t work … There is only one portable ultrasound machine and we carry it constantly,” said Volodymyr Malishchuk, the head of surgery at a children’s hospital in the city.

On Tuesday, after strikes on Kherson seriously wounded 13-year-old Artur Voblikov, a team of health staff carefully maneuvered the sedated boy up six flights of a narrow staircase to an operating room to amputate his left arm.

Malischchuk said that three children wounded by Russian strikes have come to the hospital this week, half as many as had previously been admitted in all of the nine months since the invasion began. Picking up a piece of shrapnel that was found in a 14-year-old boy’s stomach, he said children are arriving with severe head injuries and ruptured internal organs.

Artur’s mother, Natalia Voblikova, sat in the dark hospital with her daughter, waiting for his surgery to end.

“You can’t even call (Russians) animals, because animals take care of their own,” said Voblikova wiping tears from her eyes. “But the children … Why kill children?”

“Russian strikes are plunging Ukraine into the Stone Age,” says Anastasia Pyrozhenko. In a recent 24-hour spell, her 26-story high-rise only had power for half an hour. She says the “military living conditions” have driven her and her husband from their apartment.

“Our building is the highest in the area and is a great target for Russian missiles, so we left our apartment for our parents’ place and are preparing for the worst winter of our lives,” said the 25-year-old.

The situation in Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and other major cities has deteriorated drastically following the largest missile attack on the country’s power grid on Tuesday. Ukrainian state-owned grid operator Ukrenergo reported that 40% of Ukrainians were experiencing difficulties, due to damage to at least 15 major energy hubs across the country.

Warning that electricity outages could last anywhere from several hours to several days, the network said that “resilience and courage are what we need this winter.”

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko, too, stressed the need to be ready and resilient in the face of a potential blackout: “Worst case scenario. Actually, I don’t like to talk about that, but I have to be prepared if we (do not) have electricity, blackout, no water, no heating, no services and no communication,” Klitschko told the AP on Friday.

Ukrenergo said in a statement that “thousands of kilometers of key high-voltage lines are not working,” affecting the entire country.

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It published a picture of a transformer station that was destroyed by a Russian missile, leaving around 400,000 people without power. According to the report, “there are dozens of such transformers in the power system now. This equipment cannot be replaced quickly.”

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said after last week’s strikes that more than 10 million Ukrainians were left without electricity; by Sunday, he said some areas had seen improvements.

“The restoration of networks and technical supply capabilities, the de-mining of power transmission lines, repairs — everything goes on round the clock,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly address.

Blackouts were scheduled Sunday night in 15 regions and the city of Kyiv, he said. Ukrenergo said there would be scheduled outages in every region on Monday.

A sharp cold snap and the first snow have significantly complicated the situation in Kyiv, where temperatures are often below freezing in winter months. The cold forces people to turn on their heaters, which drastically increases the load on the grid and makes power outages longer. In light of the dropping temperatures, the Kyiv authorities announced they were setting up communal heating points.

In the city of 3 million people, 528 emergency points have been identified. Here, residents will be able to keep warm, drink tea, recharge their phones and get any necessary help. The heating points will be equipped with autonomous power sources, as well as special boiler rooms.

Mayor Klitschko, too, spoke of measures taken to prepare for energy outages with the onset of colder temperatures: “We prepared and we (asked for) electric generators (from) our partners, which they send to us. For this case, we have a reserve of diesel, (of) oil. We have a lot of warm stuff. We have medication.”

Many residents in Kyiv have begun to leave boxes of food, flashlights and power banks in elevators, in case anyone gets stuck in one for a long time. Due to the lack of electricity, public transport is disrupted, many small shops cannot operate, and some medical institutions can only work to a limited capacity.

Dentist Viktor Turakevich said that he was forced to postpone his patients’ appointments “for an indefinite time” because without electricity his central Kyiv clinic cannot function even during the day, and the generator will only arrive in a few weeks.

“We cannot accept patients even with acute toothache, people have to suffer and wait a long time, but the light comes on only for a few hours a day,” Turakevich said. “Generator prices have skyrocketed, but even with money, they are not easy to come by.”

Most hospitals in Kyiv have already received generators and there are no power outages there yet. The Oleksandrivska hospital, the largest and oldest one in the center of Kyiv, reported that it had not canceled elective surgeries because the hospital had received electric generators from France. Generators have also been supplied to educational institutions and social services.

“Such facilities are a priority for us, and most of them are equipped with autonomous energy sources,” Ukrenergo head Volodymyr Kudrytskyi said on Friday. However, many schools in Kyiv have endured significant disruption to the learning process, with a lack of electricity meaning internet outages that make remote learning near impossible.

Yaroslav, age 8, stopped attending his school in the Vynohradar district of Kyiv after a rocket attack blew out all the windows of the school and damaged a shelter there.

“Most of the children studied remotely, but now it is no longer possible to do this,” said Yaroslav’s mother, Olena, who asked for her last name to be withheld for safety reasons, in a phone interview. “We are trying to protect children from the horrors of war, but the cold and the lack of power greatly hinder this.”

Analysts say that Russian rocket attacks on the energy industry do not affect the successful advance of the Ukrainian army in the south and the situation on the battlefield in general.

“The Russians cannot win on the battlefield, and therefore they use cold and darkness as a weapon against the civilian population, trying to sow panic, depression and demoralize Ukrainians,” Volodymyr Fesenko, an analyst at the Penta Center think tank in Kyiv, told the AP.

Russian President Vladimir Putin “is suffering military defeats and is in dire need of a military pause, which is why he is forcing Zelenskyy into negotiations in such a wild way,” he said.

The analyst believes the Kremlin is also trying to put pressure on Western support for Ukraine, as the EU and the U.S. will be forced to expand aid packages to a freezing Kyiv amid growing domestic troubles.

“Putin is trying to make the price of supporting Ukraine too high — this applies both to money and to a possible new flow of refugees to Europe from a freezing country,” Fesenko said.

Pyrozhenko, having left her high-rise, moved in with her mother in a small apartment in Kyiv, now home to five people. The family has a wooden house in a village near Kyiv and has already prepared firewood in case of a forced evacuation.

“We understand that winter can be long, cold and dark, but we are ready to endure,” Pyrozhenko said. “We are ready to live without light, but not with the Russians.”

___

Karmanau reported from Tallinn, Estonia.

Still, U.S. Defense officials said in a Pentagon press conference that ultimate responsibility lies with Russian President Vladimir Putin as more than a quarter of Ukrainians remain without power following a Russian barrage of missiles.

“The deliberate targeting of the civilian power grid, causing excessive collateral damage, and unnecessary suffering on the civilian population is a war crime,” said Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley.

Wednesday morning at the Bush Center in Dallas, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy bowed out of a scheduled discussion with former President George W. Bush, citing the recent attack on his nation.

The conversation was to be held virtually as part of the Bush Institute’s The Struggle for Freedom Conference.

Instead, Bush spoke at length about the war that’s drawn on now for nearly nine months.

“There’s no bigger problem than to have a young democracy bullied by its neighbor, by an autocrat,” said Bush.

Bush said while Americans have their own economic battles, it remains critical that the U.S. financially support Ukraine.

“Failure in Ukraine will impact future generations of Americans. An unstable Europe, a Europe in which a tyrant is on the march is going to affect our national security. And the question is, shouldn’t we be thinking about a future generation of Americans leaving behind something better,” he said.

Just this week, President Joe Biden asked Congress to provide another $37 billion of aid for Ukraine. 

Zelenskyy’s office on Wednesday released the video of the encounter during Penn’s most recent visit to Ukraine, his third since the Feb. 24 start of the war. The president tweeted that the Oscar was “a symbol of faith in the victory of our country.”

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Penn, who has been involved in numerous international humanitarian and anti-war efforts over the years, told Zelenskyy that every time he leaves Ukraine “I feel like a traitor.”

“But if I know this is here with you then I will feel better and stronger for the fights,” Penn said as he pulled the statuette from a black bag and placed it on a table in front of Zelenskyy. “When you win, bring it back to Malibu. Because I feel much better knowing there is a piece of me here.”

Zelenskyy at first hesitated about accepting the statue, then quipped: “We have to win, quick.”

It wasn’t clear when the encounter occurred or which Oscar Penn left behind: Penn has won two best actor Academy Awards, in 2003 for “Mystic River” and in 2008 for “Milk.”

His publicist didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking details Wednesday.

Penn was one of the first people who visited Ukraine after Russian troops moved into the country and he has been working on a documentary about the invasion.

During their meeting, Zelenskyy presented Penn with an award, the Ukrainian Order of Merit, which is given to citizens for outstanding achievements in economics, science, culture, or military or political activity. Established by former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma in 1996, the award’s past recipients include Ukrainian academics and writers, as well as Soviet-era military commanders.

The video released by the president’s office then showed Penn and Zelenskyy walking around Kyiv and arriving at Constitution Square, across from the Ukrainian parliament building and presidential palace, where there is a “Walk of the Brave” — a walkway lined with plaques honoring world leaders who have shown solidarity with Ukraine. The walkway, which was inaugurated in August, features a square plaque laid in the ground engraved with Penn’s name and the date Feb. 24, 2022, the start of the invasion.

Pointing to the plaque, Penn told Zelenskyy that there were three places in the world that were the source of his pride: “The place where my daughter was born, the place where my son was born and this. Thank you.”

The comments by Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian come after months of confusing messaging from Iran about the weapons shipment, as Russia sends the drones slamming into Ukrainian energy infrastructure and civilian targets.

“We gave a limited number of drones to Russia months before the Ukraine war,” Amirabdollahian told reporters after a meeting in Tehran.

Previously, Iranian officials had denied arming Russia in its war on Ukraine. Just earlier this week, Iran’s Ambassador to the U.N. Amir Saeid Iravani called the allegations “totally unfounded” and reiterated Iran’s position of neutrality in the war. The U.S. and its Western allies on the Security Council have called on Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to investigate if Russia has used Iranian drones to attack civilians in Ukraine.

Even so, Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard has vaguely boasted of providing drones to the world’s top powers. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has extolled the efficacy of the drones and mocked Western hand-wringing over their danger. During state-backed demonstrations to mark the 1979 U.S. Embassy takeover on Friday, crowds waved placards of the triangle-shaped drones as a point of national pride.

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As he acknowledged the shipment, Amirabdollahian claimed on Saturday that Iran was oblivious to the use of its drones in Ukraine. He said Iran remained committed to stopping the conflict.

“If (Ukraine) has any documents in their possession that Russia used Iranian drones in Ukraine, they should provide them to us,” he said. “If it is proven to us that Russia used Iranian drones in the war against Ukraine, we will not be indifferent to this issue.”

Speaking at a conference of international foreign policy experts, Putin said it’s pointless for Russia to strike Ukraine with nuclear weapons.

“We see no need for that,” Putin said. “There is no point in that, neither political, nor military.”

Putin said an earlier warning of his readiness to use “all means available to protect Russia” didn’t amount to nuclear saber-rattling but was merely a response to Western statements about their possible use of nuclear weapons.

He particularly mentioned Liz Truss saying in August that she would be ready to use nuclear weapons if she became Britain’s prime minister, a remark which he said worried the Kremlin.

“What were we supposed to think?” Putin said. “We saw that as a coordinated position, an attempt to blackmail us.”

Without offering evidence, the Russian leader repeated Moscow’s unproven allegation that Ukraine was plotting a false flag attack involving a radioactive dirty bomb it would try to pin on Russia.

Ukraine has strongly rejected the claim, and its Western allies have dismissed it as “transparently false.” Ukraine argued Russia might be making the unfounded allegation to serve as a cover for its own possible plot to detonate a dirty bomb.

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Putin said he personally ordered Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu to call his foreign counterparts to tell them about the purported plot. He maintained that Russia knows the Ukrainian facilities working on the project.

Putin claimed, still without citing any proof, that Kyiv’s plan was to rig a missile with radioactive waste and to characterize its explosion as a Russian nuclear strike in an effort to isolate Russia in the global arena.

He mocked the allegations by Ukraine and the West that Russia was firing on the territory of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in southern Ukraine as “ravings.” Russian troops have occupied the plant, Europe’s largest, since the early days of the conflict and Moscow has accused Ukraine of continuously shelling it.

In a long speech full of diatribes against the United States and its allies, Putin accused the U.S. and its allies of trying to dictate their terms to other nations in a “dangerous, bloody and dirty” domination game.

Putin, who sent his troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24, has cast Western support for Ukraine as part of broad efforts by Washington and its allies to enforce its will upon others through what they call a rules-based world order. He argued that the world has reached a turning point, when “the West is no longer able to dictate its will to the humankind but still tries to do it, and the majority of nations no longer want to tolerate it.”

The Russian leader claimed that the Western policies will foment more chaos, adding that “he who sows the wind will reap the whirlwind.”

Putin claimed that “humankind now faces a choice: accumulate a load of problems that will inevitably crush us all or try to find solutions that may not be ideal but working and could make the world more stable and secure.”

The Russian leader said Russia isn’t the enemy of the West but will continue to oppose the purported diktat of Western neo-liberal elites, accusing them of trying to subdue Russia.

“Their goal is to make Russia more vulnerable and turn it into an instrument for fulfilling their geopolitical tasks, they have failed to achieve it and they will never succeed,” Putin said.

Putin reaffirmed his long-held claim that Russians and Ukrainians are part of a single people and again denigrated Ukraine as an “artificial state,” which received historic Russian lands from Communist rulers during the Soviet times. In a frank statement. he acknowledged that the fighting in Ukraine effectively amounts to a civil war.

Putin said he thinks “all the time” about the casualties Russia has suffered in the Ukraine conflict, but insisted that NATO’s refusal to rule out prospective Ukraine’s membership and Kyiv’s refusal to adhere to a peace deal for its separatist conflict in the country’s east has left Moscow no other choice.

He denied underestimating Ukraine’s ability to fight back and insisted that his “special military operation” has proceeded as planned.

Putin also acknowledged the challenges posed by Western sanctions, but argued that Russia has proven resilient to foreign pressure and has become more united.

Shakhtar Donetsk chief executive Sergei Palkin accused Iran of “direct participation in terrorist attacks on Ukrainians,” suggesting his own country’s team should play in Qatar instead as a replacement.

“This will be a fair decision that should draw the attention of the whole world to a regime that kills its best people and helps kill Ukrainians,” Palkin said in a statement one day before his team plays at Celtic in the Champions League.

The White House said Thursday that the U.S. has evidence that Iranian troops are “directly engaged on the ground” in Crimea supporting Russian drone attacks on Ukraine’s infrastructure and civilian population. And the head of Ukraine’s intelligence service, Kyrylo Budanov, said in a published interview on Monday that Russian forces had used about 330 Iranian-built “Shahed” drones as of Saturday — and that more had been ordered.

Russia and Iran have both denied that the drones used were Iranian-built.

Iran plays in the second game of the World Cup, on Nov. 21 against England, and then faces Wales and the United States in Group B. Wales qualified by beating Ukraine in the playoffs in June in a game that was delayed from March by the war.

FIFA did not immediately respond to a request for comment. However, if an Asian team was suspended there would be no precedent for FIFA to replace it with a European team at the World Cup.

Soccer’s world body does not typically suspend member federations because of military decisions by a national government, though Yugoslavia was barred from trying to qualify for the 1994 World Cup after United Nations sanctions were imposed during the war in the Balkans.

FIFA has suspended Russian teams following its invasion of Ukraine, which barred Russia from playing in the World Cup qualifying playoffs in March. FIFA cited risks to the security and integrity of its competitions, and Russia’s scheduled opponent Poland had refused to play that game.

FIFA is also resisting calls this month from Iranian fan groups to suspend the national team during a national crackdown on street protests in support of women’s rights and because of a long-time policy stopping women from freely attending games in soccer and other sports.

FIFA normally only suspends national teams when the country’s government is judged to have interfered in the independent running of the national soccer federation.

Five Asian confederation teams advanced to the World Cup to join host Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates was the next best in qualifying. The UAE lost a regional playoff in June to Australia ahead of the intercontinental playoffs.

Former Mayor Tom Leppert met Ukrainian journalist Ruslan Kukharshek on a mission trip to Ukraine years before the war.

Kukharchuk led a group of journalists and organized large gatherings in his home country before the Russian attack. He remained in Kyiv since the invasion maintaining his media and ministry work, but some activities are no longer possible there.

“It’s a huge risk to be outside, organize anything outside. And of course, a lot of volunteers, a lot of team members, they are out of Ukraine. They are refugees now,” Kukharshuk said. “It’s a very terrible time in fact in Ukraine. But Ukrainian people are very firm to protect their land and to overcome.”

The journalist told Mayor Johnson about devastation from Russian drones in the latest attacks targeting homes and power plants.

“Almost 10 hours every day in Kyiv there is no light,” he said.

Kukharshuk has sent his family to safety in Poland amid the new attacks on Ukraine’s capital.

Johnson said what he has seen of Russian behavior should be considered terrorism.

“What the Russians are doing to the civilians is heartbreaking,” Johnson said. “We stand with you as a city in terms of solidarity with the people.”

Immediately after the war began, Johnson and the Dallas City Council unanimously passed a resolution supporting Ukraine and condemning the Russian attack. The vote suspended ties with a Russian sister city and urged Dallas businesses to suspend connections with Russia.

The United States has committed more than $20.3 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since 2014, about $17.6 billion of that since the Feb. 24 Russian invasion.

“Of course, it is the decision of the American people and the American government, but yes, we need more. Unfortunately, we need more because we speak about people’s lives,” Kukharshuk said.

Tuesday’s visit comes as some U.S. leaders say America has done enough for Ukraine and the spending should not continue.

“One of the challenges we have is sustaining the interest. The United States’ support has been very strong to this point, but it needs to maintain that strength. We can’t let Putin, we can’t let the Russians win just because it becomes convenient for us to forget,” Leppert said.

The former Dallas mayor has ties to Ukraine dating back to his days as a White House aide in the early 1980s.

He said this Dallas tour with Kukharshuk is part of an effort to build a network to help support Ukraine now and after this war.

“We’re trying to build the network and really brainstorm what can be done in our communities, through health care, through foundations, through other leaders in our community to aid the people in Ukraine, not only today but looking down the road,” Leppert said.

Leppert also arranged meetings for Kukharshuk with Dallas hospitals, charity foundations and other political leaders in his effort to build that network for the future.

Elon Musk said Friday that SpaceX cannot continue fund Starlink terminals in Ukraine “indefinitely,” after a report suggested his space exploration company had asked the Pentagon to cover the costs.

SpaceX’s donated Starlink internet terminals have been crucial in keeping Ukraine’s military online during the war against Russia, even as communication infrastructure gets destroyed.

Last week, Musk tweeted that the operation has cost SpaceX $80 million so far, and will exceed $100 million by the end of the year.

On Friday, the billionaire, who is also CEO of Tesla, said SpaceX cannot fund the existing system “indefinitely” and send several thousand more terminals that have high data usage.

It follows a CNN report that SpaceX told the U.S. government it could no longer fund Starlink services in Ukraine. The report cited documents obtained from the Pentagon and said SpaceX is asking the U.S. government pay for the terminals instead.

The letter from SpaceX to the Pentagon claimed that Ukraine’s use of Starlink could cost close to $400 million over the next 12 months, according to the CNN report.

In a separate tweet Friday, Musk appeared to confirm that SpaceX was exiting Ukraine in some form, replying to a Twitter post that referenced the Ukrainian ambassador telling Musk earlier this month to to “f— off.”

“We’re just following his recommendation,” Musk replied.

The SpaceX founder drew the ire of Ukrainian politicians when he posted a Twitter poll gauging support for what he claimed was a likely outcome of the Russia-Ukraine war.

A spokesperson for SpaceX was not immediately available for comment when contacted by CNBC.

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Putin’s land-grab and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s signing of what he said is an “accelerated” NATO membership application sent the two leaders speeding faster on a collision course that is cranking up fears of a full-blown conflict between Russia and the West.

Putin vowed to protect newly annexed regions of Ukraine by “all available means,” a renewed nuclear-backed threat he made at a Kremlin signing ceremony where he also railed furiously against the West, accusing the United States and its allies of seeking Russia’s destruction.

Zelenskyy then held a signing ceremony of his own in Kyiv, releasing video of him putting pen to papers he said were a formal NATO membership request.

Putin has repeatedly made clear that any prospect of Ukraine joining the military alliance is one of his red lines and cited it as a justification for his invasion, now in its eighth month, in the biggest land war in Europe since World War II.

In his speech, Putin urged Ukraine to sit down for peace talks but immediately insisted he won’t discuss handing back occupied regions. Zelenskyy said there’d be no negotiations with Putin.

“We are ready for a dialogue with Russia, but … with another president of Russia,” the Ukrainian leader said.

The U.S. responded with a new round of sanctions targeting more than 1,000 people and firms connected to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, including its Central Bank governor and families of National Security Council members.

The Treasury Department named hundreds of members of Russia’s legislature, leaders of the country’s financial and military infrastructure and suppliers for sanctions designations. The Commerce Department added 57 companies to its list of export control violators, and the State Department added more than 900 people to its visa restriction list.

“We will not stand by as Putin fraudulently attempts to annex parts of Ukraine,” said Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.

At his signing ceremony in the Kremlin's ornate St. George's Hall, Putin accused the West of fueling the hostilities as part of what he called a plan to turn Russia into a “colony” and “crowds of slaves.” The hardening of his position, in the conflict that has killed and wounded tens of thousands of people, further raised tensions already at levels unseen since the Cold War.

Of Putin's annexation of the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, President Joe Biden said: “Make no mistake: These actions have no legitimacy.”

The European Union said its 27 member states will never recognize the illegal referendums that Russia organized “as a pretext for this further violation of Ukraine’s independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg called it “the largest attempted annexation of European territory by force since the Second World War.”

The war is at “a pivotal moment,” he said, and Putin’s decision to annex more territory – Russia now has claimed to have sovereignty over 15% of the country – marks “the most serious escalation since the start of the war.” Stoltenberg was noncommittal on Zelenskyy’s decision to make a fast-track NATO application, saying alliance leaders “support Ukraine’s right to choose its own path, to decide what kind of security arrangements it wants to be part of.”

Zelenskyy vowed to keep fighting, defying Putin's warnings that Kyiv shouldn't try to take back what it has lost.

“The entire territory of our country will be liberated from this enemy," he said. “Russia already knows this. It feels our power."

The immediate ramifications of the “accelerated” NATO application weren't clear, siince approval requires members' unanimous support. The supply of Western weapons to Ukraine has, however, already put it closer to the alliance's orbit.

“De facto, we have already proven compatibility with alliance standards," Zelenskyy said. “We trust each other, we help each other, and we protect each other.”

Putin's Kremlin ceremony came three days after the completion in occupied regions of Moscow-orchestrated “referendums” on joining Russia that Kyiv and the West dismissed as a bare-faced land grab held at gunpoint and based on lies.

In his fiery Kremlin speech, Putin insisted that Ukraine must treat the Kremlin-managed votes “with respect.”

After the signing ceremony of treaties to join Russia, Moscow-installed leaders of the occupied regions gathered around Putin, linked hands and joined chants of “Russia! Russia!” with the audience.

Putin cut an angry figure as he accused the United States and its allies of seeking to destroy Russia. He said the West acted “as a parasite” and used its financial and technological strength “to rob the entire world.”

He portrayed Russia as pursuing a historical mission to reclaim its post-Soviet great power status and counter Western domination he said is collapsing.

“History has called us to a battlefield to fight for our people, for the grand historic Russia, for future generations,” he said.

Moscow has backed eastern Ukraine's separatist Donetsk and Luhansk regions since declaring independence in 2014, weeks after the annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula. Russia captured the southern Kherson region and part of neighboring Zaporizhzhia soon after Putin sent troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24.

Both houses of the Kremlin-controlled Russian parliament will meet next week to rubber-stamp the treaties for the regions to join Russia, sending them to Putin for final approval.

The orchestrated process went into a celebratory phase Friday night when thousands gathered in Red Square for a concert and rally, with Putin joining. Many waved Russian flags as entertainers from Russia and occupied parts of Ukraine performed patriotic songs. Russian media reports said employees of state-run companies and institutions were told to attend, and students were allowed to skip classes.

Putin's land grab and a partial troop mobilization were attempts to avoid more battlefield defeats that could threaten his 22-year rule. By formalizing Russia’s gains, he seemingly hopes to scare Ukraine and its Western backers with an increasingly escalatory conflict unless they back down — which they show no signs of doing.

Russia controls most of the Luhansk and Kherson regions, about 60% of the Donetsk region and a large chunk of the Zaporizhzhia region, where it seized Europe’s largest nuclear power plant.

But the Kremlin is on the verge of another stinging military loss, with reports of the imminent Ukrainian encirclement of the eastern city of Lyman. Retaking it could open the path for Ukraine to push deep into Luhansk, one of the annexed regions.

“It looks quite pathetic. Ukrainians are doing something, taking steps in the real material world, while the Kremlin is building some kind of a virtual reality, incapable of responding in the real world,” former Kremlin speechwriter-turned-analyst Abbas Gallyamov said, adding that "the Kremlin cannot offer anything сomforting to the Russians.”

Russia pounded Ukrainian cities with missiles, rockets and suicide drones in Moscow’s heaviest barrage in weeks, with one strike in the Zaporizhzhia region’s capital killing 30 people and wounding 88.

In the Zaporizhzhia attack, anti-aircraft missiles that Russia has repurposed as ground-attack weapons rained down on people waiting in cars to cross into Russian-occupied territory so they could bring family members back across front lines, said Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office.

Russian-installed officials in Zaporizhzhia blamed Ukrainian forces, but gave no evidence.

The strike left deep craters and sent shrapnel tearing through the humanitarian convoy, killing passengers. Nearby buildings were demolished. Trash bags, blankets and, for one victim, a blood-soaked towel, covered the bodies.

A Ukrainian counteroffensive has deprived Moscow of battlefield mastery. Its hold of the Luhansk region appears increasingly shaky, as Ukrainian forces make inroads with the pincer assault on Lyman, a key node for Russian military operations in the Donbas and a sought-after prize in Ukraine's counteroffensive. The Russian-backed separatist leader of Donetsk, Denis Pushilin, said Ukrainian forces have “half-encircled” Lyman. Ukraine maintains a large foothold in the neighboring Donetsk region.

Russian strikes were also reported in the city of Dnipro. Regional Gov. Valentyn Reznichenko said at least three people were killed and five were wounded.

Ukraine’s air force said the southern cities of Mykolaiv and Odesa were targeted with Iranian-supplied suicide drones that Russia has increasingly deployed, seemingly to avoid losing more pilots who don’t control Ukraine’s skies.

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Armed troops had gone door-to-door with election officials to collect ballots in five days of voting. The results were widely ridiculed as implausible and characterized as a land grab by an increasingly cornered Russian leadership following embarrassing military losses in Ukraine.

Moscow-installed administrations in the four regions of southern and eastern Ukraine claimed Tuesday night that residents had voted to join Russia.

“Forcing people in these territories to fill out some papers at the barrel of a gun is yet another Russian crime in the course of its aggression against Ukraine,” Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry said, adding that the balloting was “a propaganda show” and “null and worthless.”

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen urged the European Union’s 27 member countries to slap more sanctions on Russian officials and trade over the “sham referendums.” She labeled the ballots “an illegal attempt to grab land and change international borders by force.”

The ballot was “falsified” and the outcome “implausibly claimed” that residents had agreed to rule from Moscow, the Washington-based think tank Institute for the Study of War said.

Pro-Russia officials in Ukraine’s Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia regions said Wednesday they would ask Russian President Vladimir Putin to incorporate their provinces into Russia. Separatist leaders Leonid Pasechnik in Luhansk and Denis Pushilin in Donetsk said they were leaving for Moscow to settle the annexation formalities.

According to Russia-installed election officials, 93% of the ballots cast in the Zaporizhzhia region supported annexation, as did 87% in the Kherson region, 98% in the Luhansk region and 99% in Donetsk.

Western countries, however, dismissed the balloting as a meaningless pretense staged by Moscow in an attempt to legitimize its invasion of Ukraine launched on Feb. 24.

The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, said Washington would propose a Security Council resolution to condemn the “sham” vote. The resolution would also urge member states not to recognize any altered status of Ukraine and demand that Russia withdraws its troops from its neighbor, she tweeted.

European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell called the vote “illegal” and described the results as “falsified.”

“This is another violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty (and) territorial integrity, (amid) systematic abuses of human rights,” he tweeted.

Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry statement asked the EU, NATO and the Group of Seven major industrial nations to “immediately and significantly” step up pressure on Russia with new sanctions and by significantly increasing their military aid to Kyiv.

The Kremlin remained unmoved amid the hail of criticism. Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that at the very least, Russia intended to drive Ukrainian forces out of the Donetsk region, where Moscow’s troops and separatist forces currently control about 60% of the territory.

Russia is calling up 300,000 reservists to fight in the war and warned it could resort to nuclear weapons after this month’s counteroffensive by Ukraine dealt Moscow’s forces heavy battlefield setbacks. The partial mobilization is deeply unpopular in some areas, however, triggering protests, scattered violence and Russians fleeing the country by the tens of thousands.

The mobilization prompted the U.S. Embassy in Moscow to warn Americans in Russia to leave immediately because “Russia may refuse to acknowledge dual nationals’ U.S. citizenship, deny their access to U.S. consular assistance, prevent their departure from Russia, and conscript dual nationals for military service.” Earlier embassy security alerts also advised Americans to leave, saying they could be harassed and have difficulty obtaining consular assistance.

The EU expressed outrage over the suspected sabotage Tuesday of two underwater natural gas pipelines from Russia to Germany and warned of retaliation for any attack on Europe’s energy networks.

Borrell said “all available information indicates those leaks are the result of a deliberate act,” even though the perpetrators haven’t so far been identified.

“Any deliberate disruption of European energy infrastructure is utterly unacceptable and will be met with a robust and united response,” Borrell said in a statement on behalf of the EU’s 27 member countries.

Kremlin spokesman Peskov said allegations that Russia could be behind the incidents were “predictable and stupid,” saying the damage has caused Russia huge economic losses.

The war has brought an energy standoff between the EU, many of whose members have for years relied heavily on Russian natural gas supplies, and Moscow.

The damage makes it unlikely the pipelines will be able to supply any gas to Europe this winter, according to analysts.

Ukraine’s military and Western analysts said Russia is sending troops without any training to the front line.

In a briefing, the Ukraine military’s general staff said the 1st Tank Regiment of the 2nd Motorized Rifle Division of Russia’s 1st Tank Army has received untrained new troops.

The Ukrainian military also said prison convicts are reinforcing the Russian lines. It offered no evidence to support the claim, although Ukrainian security services have released audio of purportedly monitored Russian phone conversations on the issue.

The Institute for the Study of War cited an online video by a man who identified himself as a member of the 1st Tank Regiment, visibly upset, saying that he and his colleagues wouldn’t receive training before shipping out to the Russian-occupied parts of the Kherson region.

“Mobilized men with a day or two of training are unlikely to meaningfully reinforce Russian positions affected by Ukrainian counteroffensives in the south and east,” the institute said.

The U.K. Ministry of Defense said Ukraine’s counteroffensive is advancing slowly, meeting a stouter Russian defense.

In the partially occupied Donetsk region Russian attacks killed five people and wounded 10 others over the last 24 hours, said Pavlo Kyrylenko, the head of the local military authority.

Authorities in the southern Ukrainian city of Nikopol said Russian rockets and artillery pounded the city overnight.

The city, across the Dnieper River from Russian-occupied territory, saw 10 high-rises and private buildings hit, as well as a school, power lines and other areas, said Valentyn Reznichenko, the head of the local military administration.

In the U.S. weapons industry, the normal production level for artillery rounds for the 155 millimeter howitzer — a long-range heavy artillery weapon currently used on the battlefields of Ukraine — is about 30,000 rounds per year in peacetime.

The Ukrainian soldiers fighting invading Russian forces go through that amount in roughly two weeks.

That’s according to Dave Des Roches, an associate professor and senior military fellow at the U.S. National Defense University. And he’s worried. 

“I’m greatly concerned. Unless we have new production, which takes months to ramp up, we’re not going to have the ability to supply the Ukrainians,” Des Roches told CNBC. 

Europe is running low, too. “The military stocks of most [European NATO] member states have been, I wouldn’t say exhausted, but depleted in a high proportion, because we have been providing a lot of capacity to the Ukrainians,” Josep Borrell, the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, said earlier this month. 

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg held a special meeting of the alliance’s arms directors on Tuesday to discuss ways to refill member nations’ weapons stockpiles.

Military analysts point to a root issue: Western nations have been producing arms at much smaller volumes during peacetime, with governments opting to slim down very expensive manufacturing and only producing weapons as needed. Some of the weapons that are running low are no longer being produced, and highly skilled labor and experience are required for their production — things that have been in short supply across the U.S. manufacturing sector for years.   

Indeed, Stoltenberg said during last week’s U.N. General Assembly that NATO members need to reinvest in their industrial bases in the arms sector. 

“We are now working with industry to increase production of weapons and ammunition,” Stoltenberg told The New York Times, adding that countries needed to encourage arms makers to expand their capacity longer term by putting in more weapons orders. 

But ramping up defense production is no quick or easy feat. 

Is the U.S. ability to defend itself at risk?

The short answer: no. 

The U.S. has been by far the largest supplier of military aid to Ukraine in its war with Russia, providing $15.2 billion in weapons packages to date since Moscow invaded its neighbor in late February. Several of the American-made weapons have been game changers for the Ukrainians; particularly the 155 mm howitzers and long-range heavy artillery like the Lockheed Martin-made HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket System). And the Biden administration has said it will support its ally Ukraine for “as long as it takes” to defeat Russia. 

That means a whole lot more weapons. 

The U.S. has essentially run out of the 155 mm howitzers to give to Ukraine; to send any more, it would have to dip into its own stocks reserved for U.S. military units that use them for training and readiness. But that’s a no-go for the Pentagon, military analysts say, meaning the supplies reserved for U.S. operations are highly unlikely to be affected.

“There are a number of systems where I think the Department of Defense has reached the levels where it’s not willing to provide more of that particular system to Ukraine,” said Mark Cancian, a former U.S. Marine Corps colonel and a senior advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.  

That’s because “the United States needs to maintain stockpiles to support war plans,” Cancian said. “For some munitions, the driving war plan would be a conflict with China over Taiwan or in the South China Sea; for others, particularly ground systems, the driving war plan would be North Korea or Europe.” 

Javelins, HIMARs and howitzers

What this means for Ukrainian forces is that some of their most crucial battlefield equipment – like the 155 mm howitzer – is having to be replaced with older and less optimum weaponry like the 105 mm howitzer, which has a smaller payload and a shorter range. 

“And that’s a problem for the Ukrainians,” Des Roches says, because “range is critical in this war. This is an artillery war.”

Other weapons Ukraine relies on that are now classified as “limited” in the U.S. inventory include HIMARS launchers, Javelin missiles, Stinger missiles, the M777 Howitzer and 155 mm ammunition. 

The Javelin, produced by Raytheon and Lockheed Martin, has gained an iconic role in Ukraine — the shoulder-fired, precision-guided anti-tank missile has been indispensable in combating Russian tanks. But production in the U.S. is low at a rate of around 800 per year, and Washington has now sent some 8,500 to Ukraine, according to the CSIS — more than a decades’ worth of production.  

President Joe Biden visited a Javelin plant in Alabama in May, saying he would “make sure the United States and our allies can replenish our own stocks of weapons to replace what we’ve sent to Ukraine.” But, he added, “this fight is not going to be cheap.” 

The Pentagon has ordered hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of new Javelins, but ramping up takes time — the numerous suppliers that provide the chemicals and computer chips for each missile can’t all be sufficiently sped up. And hiring, vetting and training people to build the technology also takes time. It could take between one and four years for the U.S. to boost overall weapons production significantly, Cancian said.

“We need to put our defense industrial base on a wartime footing,” Des Roches said. “And I don’t see any indication that we have.”

The U.S. Department of Defense disputed the suggestion that the U.S. is running low on its weapons stockpiles for Ukraine.

“The Department has provided a mix of capabilities to Ukraine – we, and they, are not over-reliant on any one system,” DOD spokesperson Jessica Maxwell told CNBC in an email. “We have been able to transfer equipment from U.S. stocks to Ukraine while managing risks to military readiness.”

The Pentagon is “working with industry to replenish depleted stocks on an accelerated basis,” Maxwell said. “This includes providing funding to buy more equipment, set up new production lines, and support additional worker shifts. We still have the necessary inventory for our needs.”

The DOD’s latest military assistance package, she added, “underscores the lasting nature of our commitment and represents a sustainable, multi-year investment in critical capabilities for Ukraine.”

A Lockheed Martin spokesman, when contacted for comment, referenced an April interview during which the company’s CEO, Jim Taiclet, told CNBC: “We’ve got to get our supply chain ramped up, we’ve got to have some capacity, which we’re already investing to do. And then the deliveries happen, say, six, 12, 18 months down the road.”

What are Ukraine’s options?

In the meantime, Ukraine can look elsewhere for suppliers — for instance South Korea, which has a formidable weapons sector and in August signed a sale to Poland for $5.7 billion worth of tanks and howitzers. Ukrainian forces will also have to work with replacement weapons that are often less optimal.

Jack Watling, an expert on land warfare at the Royal United Services Institute in London, believes there is still ample scope for Ukraine to supply itself with many of the weapons it needs. 

“There is sufficient time to resolve that problem before it becomes critical in terms of stepping up manufacture,” Watling said, noting that Kyiv can source certain ammunition from countries that don’t immediately need theirs, or whose stocks are about to expire.

“So we can continue to supply Ukraine,” Watling said, “but there is a point where especially with certain critical natures, the Ukrainians will need to be cautious about their rate of expenditure and where they prioritize those munitions, because there isn’t an infinite supply.”

Alex Drueke, 40, and Andy Huynh, 27, had gone missing June 9 in the Kharkiv region of northeastern Ukraine near the Russian border. The Alabama residents were released as part of a prisoner exchange. The pair had traveled to Ukraine on their own and bonded over their shared home state.

“It’s them!” a family member shouted as the pair appeared at the top of an escalator at the Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport in Birmingham, one of Alabama’s largest cities.

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Smiling but looking tired, the two were pulled into long emotional hugs by family members after their connecting flight home. Then they were whisked to a waiting car.

“Surreal. I still have chill bumps. I always imagined this day. I always held not just hope but belief in this day. But I thought it was going to be two or three years from now at best,” said Drueke’s aunt, Dianna Shaw.

“There are prisoners of war who have been held for months and years. There are people who have been detained wrongfully for years and for this to come about in three months is, just, unimaginable to me,” she added. “Even though I’m living it, it feels unimaginable, and I don’t want people to forget all the Ukrainians who are still being held.”

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The families of the two men announced their release on Wednesday. The men were among 10 prisoners released by Russian-backed separatists as part of a prisoner exchange mediated by Saudi Arabia. The Saudi embassy said five British nationals and others from Morocco, Sweden and Croatia also were freed.

Darla Black, whose daughter is engaged to Huynh, said she thought, “there he is. There he is” as Huynh came into view.

“I had to get my hands on him to actually believe it. I’m just overwhelmed with gratitude. We got our miracle,” Black said.

The men had arrived Friday at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport.

“We’re looking forward to spending time with family and we’ll be in touch with the media soon,” Drueke said shortly after arriving in New York with Huynh. “Happy to be home.”

In meetings with senior Ukrainian officials, including President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Blinken said the Biden administration had notified Congress of its intent to provide $2.2 billion in long-term military financing to Ukraine and 18 of its neighbors, including NATO members and regional security partners, that are “potentially at risk of future Russian aggression. “

“We know this is a pivotal moment, more than six months into Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, as your counteroffensive is now under way and proving effective,” Blinken told Zelenskyy.

Zelenskyy replied, “We are grateful for the signal, for this enormous support that you’re providing on a day-to-day basis.”

The White House said Biden was holding holding a call with allies and partners “to underscore our continued support for Ukraine.”

The new U.S. military financing is on top of a $675 million package of heavy weaponry, ammunition and armored vehicles for Ukraine alone that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced earlier Thursday at a conference in Ramstein, Germany.

Pending expected congressional approval, about $1 billion of the $2.2 billion will go to Ukraine and the rest will be divided among Albania, Bosnia, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Georgia, Greece, Kosovo, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia, the State Department said.

It will help those countries “deter and defend against emergent threats to their sovereignty and territorial integrity” by enhancing their military integration with NATO and countering “Russian influence and aggression,” the department said.

“This assistance demonstrates yet again our unwavering commitment to Ukraine’s future as a democratic, sovereign, and independent state, as well as the security of allies and partners across the region,” it said.

Foreign Military Financing allows recipients to purchase U.S.-made defense equipment, often depending on their specific needs.

The package announced by Austin includes howitzers, artillery munitions, Humvees, armored ambulances, anti-tank systems and more that is intended to assist Ukraine with its shorter-term needs as it presses a counteroffensive against Russian forces.

Austin said “the war is at another key moment.”

“Now we’re seeing the demonstrable success of our common efforts on the battlefield,” he said at a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, which was attended by NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg and Ukraine’s defense minister as well as officials from allied countries.

Germany and the Netherlands will provide training in demining to Ukrainian soldiers as well as demining equipment, the countries’ defense ministers said on the sidelines of the meeting with Austin. The training will be carried out in Germany. The two countries previously joined forces to send howitzers to Ukraine.

“The capabilities we are delivering are carefully calibrated to make the most difference on the battlefield,” Blinken said.

Thursday’s contributions bring total U.S. aid to Ukraine to $15.2 billion since Biden took office. U.S. officials said the new commitments were intended to show that American support for the country in the face of Russia’s invasion remains firm.

Zelenskyy said Ukraine is grateful for the “enormous support” the United States has sent Ukraine and singled out Biden and Congress for praise. He said the U.S. was helping Ukraine “return our territory and lands.”

The announcements came as fighting between Ukraine and Russia has intensified in recent days, with Ukrainian forces mounting a counteroffensive to retake Russian-held areas.

Ukrainian forces in the northeastern Kharkiv region have retaken portions of Russian-held territory there as a Ukrainian counteroffensive in the south has drained some of Moscow’s resources in the area, according to a report from the Washington-based think tank Institute for the Study of War.

Meanwhile, shelling continued near Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, Europe’s largest, with the warring sides trading blame again amid dire warnings from the U.N. atomic watchdog, which has urged the creation of a safe zone to prevent a catastrophe.

On Wednesday, the U.S. accused Moscow of interrogating, detaining and forcibly deporting hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians to Russia. Russian officials rejected the claim as “fantasy.”

In Kyiv before meeting with Zelenskyy and Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, Blinken visited the U.S. Embassy and then the National Specialized Children’s Hospital Ohmatdyt, where he saw boys and girls injured during Russian bombardments, including Maryna, a 6-year-old from the city of Kherson who lost a leg after a rocket struck her house.

In the hospital lobby, Blinken also met Patron, a Jack Russell terrier that has helped Ukraine’s military find more than 200 mines laid by Russian forces. Blinken kneeled down, petted the dog and presented him with treats, saying he was “world famous.”

In one ward, Blinken brought a basket of stuffed animals, which the children quickly dangled in front of Patron to get his attention.

Blinken told parents that “the spirit of your children sends a very strong message around the world.”

___

AP Diplomatic Writer Matthew Lee reported from Rzeszow, Poland.

Ukraine’s atomic energy agency painted an ominous picture of the threat Sunday by issuing a map forecasting where radiation could spread from the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, which Russian forces have controlled since soon after the war began.

Attacks were reported over the weekend not only in Russian-controlled territory adjacent to the plant along the left bank of the Dnieper River, but along the Ukraine-controlled right bank, including the cities of Nikopol and Marhanets, each about 10 kilometers (six miles) from the facility.

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said Sunday that Ukrainian forces had attacked the plant twice over the past day, and that shells fell near buildings storing reactor fuel and radioactive waste.

“One projectile fell in the area of the sixth power unit, and the other five in front of the sixth unit pumping station, which provides cooling for this reactor,” Konashenkov said, adding that radiation levels were normal.

The U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency also reported Sunday that radiation levels were normal, that two of the Zaporizhzhia plant’s six reactors were operating and that while no complete assessment had yet been made, recent fighting had damaged a water pipeline, since repaired.

In another apparent attack Sunday, Russian forces shot down an armed Ukrainian drone targeting one of the Zaporizhzhia plant’s spent fuel storage sites, a local official said. Vladimir Rogov, a Russian-installed regional official, said on the Telegram messaging app that the drone crashed onto a building’s roof, not causing any significant damage or injuring anyone.

Nearby, heavy firing during the night left parts of Nikopol without electricity, said Valentyn Reznichenko, the Dnipropetrovsk region’s governor. Rocket strikes damaged a dozen residences in Marhanets, according to Yevhen Yevtushenko, the administration head for the district that includes the city of about 45,000.

The city of Zaporizhzhia, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) up the Dnieper River from the nuclear plant, also came under Russian fire, damaging dozens of apartment buildings and homes and wounding two people, city council member Anatoliy Kurtev said. Russian forces struck a Zaporizhzhia repair shop for Ukrainian air force helicopters, Konashenkov said.

Neither side’s claims could be independently verified.

Downriver from the nuclear plant, Ukrainian rockets hit the Kakhovka hydroelectric plant and adjacent city three times on Sunday, said Vladimir Leontyev, the head of the Russia-installed local administration.

The plant’s dam is a major roadway across the river and a potentially key Russian supply route. The dam forms a reservoir that provides water for the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant.

The radiation map Ukraine’s nuclear agency Energoatom issued showed that based on wind forecasts for Monday, a nuclear cloud could spread across southern Ukraine and southwestern Russia. Release of the map may have been meant to warn that if Russian forces were responsible for a radiation leak, their own country would suffer. In the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear power plant accident, the world’s worst atomic energy catastrophe, radiation spread from Ukraine to several neighboring countries.

Authorities last week began distributing iodine tablets to residents who live near the Zaporizhzhia plant in case of radiation exposure. Much of the concern centers on the cooling systems for the plant’s nuclear reactors. The systems require electricity, and the plant was temporarily knocked offline Thursday because of what officials said was fire damage to a transmission line. A cooling system failure could cause a nuclear meltdown.

Periodic shelling has damaged the power station’s infrastructure, Energoatom, said Saturday.

“There are risks of hydrogen leakage and sputtering of radioactive substances, and the fire hazard is high,” it said.

The IAEA has tried to work out an agreement with Ukrainian and Russian authorities to send a team to inspect and secure the plant, but it remained unclear when the visit might take place.

In eastern Ukraine, where Russian and separatist forces are trying to take control, shelling hit the large and strategically significant cities of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk, with no casualties reported, said Pavlo Kyrylenko, the Donetsk region’s governor. Konashenkov said Russian missile strikes killed 250 Ukrainian soldiers and reservists in and near Sloviansk. Ukrainian officials didn’t comment on the claim, in keeping with their policy of not discussing losses.

Sloviansk resident Kostiantyn Daineko told The Associated Press that he was falling asleep when an explosion blew out his apartment windows.

“I opened my eyes and saw how the window frame was flying over me, the frame and pieces of broken glass,” he said.

Russian and separatist forces hold much of the Donetsk region, one of two Russia has recognized as sovereign states.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy vowed again Sunday to re-take the separatist areas.

“The invaders brought degradation and death and they believe that they are there forever,” Zelenskyy said Sunday in his nightly video address. “But it’s a temporary thing for them. Ukraine will return. For sure. Life will return.”

___

Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

___

Andrew Katell contributed to this report from New York.

___

A previous version of this story was corrected to show that the first name of the Sloviansk resident is Kostiantyn, not Konstiantyn.

Ukraine and Russia also accused each other of shelling Europe’s largest nuclear power plant.

The loaded vessels were cleared to depart from Chornomorsk and Odesa, according to the Joint Coordination Center, which oversees an international deal intended to get some 20 million tons of grain out of Ukraine to feed millions going hungry in Africa, the Middle East and parts of Asia.

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Ukraine, Russia, Turkey and the United Nations signed the agreements last month to create a 111-nautical-mile sea corridor that would allow cargo ships to travel safely out of ports that Russia’s military had blockaded and through waters that Ukraine’s military had mined. Implementation of the deal, which is in effect for four months, has proceeded slowly since the first ship embarked on Aug. 1.

Four of the carriers cleared Sunday to leave Ukraine were transporting more than 219,000 tons of corn. The fifth was carrying more than 6,600 tons of sunflower oil and the sixth 11,000 tons of soya, the Joint Coordination Center said.

Three other cargo ships that left Friday passed their inspections and received clearance Sunday to pass through Turkey’s Bosporus Strait on the way to their final destinations, the Center said.

However, the vessel that left Ukraine last Monday with great fanfare as the first under the grain exports deal had its scheduled arrival in Lebanon delayed Sunday, according to a Lebanese Cabinet minister and the Ukraine Embassy. The cause of the delay was not immediately clear.

Ukrainian officials were initially skeptical of a grain export deal, citing suspicions that Moscow would try to exploit shipping activity to mass troops offshore or send long-range missiles from the Black Sea, as it has done multiple times during the war.

The agreements call for ships to leave Ukraine under military escort and to undergo inspections to make sure they carry only grain, fertilizer or food and not any other commodities. Inbound cargo vessels are checked to ensure they are not carrying weapons.

In a weekend analysis, Britain’s Defense Ministry said the Russian invasion that started Feb. 24 “is about to enter a new phase” in which the fighting would shift to a roughly 350-kilometer (217-mile) front line extending from near the city of Zaporizhzhia to Russian-occupied Kherson.

That area includes the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Station which came under fire late Saturday. Each side accused the other of the attack.

Ukraine’s nuclear power plant operator, Energoatom, said Russian shelling damaged three radiation monitors around the storage facility for spent nuclear fuels and that one worker was injured. Russian news agencies, citing the separatist-run administration of the plant, said Ukrainian forces fired those shells.

Russian forces have occupied the power station for months. Russian soldiers there took shelter in bunkers before Saturday’s attack, according to Energoatom.

Rafael Grossi, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, recently warned that the way the plant was being run and the fighting going on around it posed grave health and environmental threats.

For the last four months of the war, Russia has concentrated on capturing the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine, where pro-Moscow separatists have controlled some territory as self-proclaimed republics for eight years. Russian forces have made gradual headway in the region while launching missile and rocket attacks to curtail the movements of Ukrainian fighters elsewhere.

The Russians “are continuing to accumulate large quantities of military equipment” in a town across the Dnieper River from Russian-held Kherson, according to the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington think tank. Citing local Ukrainian officials, it said the preparations appeared designed to defend logistics routes to the city and establish defensive positions on the river’s left bank.

Kherson came under Russian control early in the war and Ukrainian officials have vowed to retake it. It is just 227 kilometers (141 miles) from Odesa, home to Ukraine’s biggest port, so the conflict escalating there could have repercussions for the international grain deal.

The city of Mykolaiv, a shipbuilding center that Russian forces bombard daily, is even closer to Odesa. The Mykolaiv region’s governor, Vitaliy Kim, said an industrial facility on the regional capital’s outskirts came under fire early Sunday.

Over the past day, five civilians were killed by Russian and separatist firing on cities in the Donetsk region, the part of Donbas still under Ukrainian control, the regional governor, Serhiy Haidai, reported.

He and Ukrainian government officials have repeatedly urged civilians to evacuate.

___

Andrew Wilks contributed reporting from Istanbul.

Russia said that Ukraine used U.S.-supplied HIMARS multiple rocket launchers in the attack on the prison in Olenivka, in the Russian-controlled Donetsk region. Officials from Russia and the separatist authorities in Donetsk said the attack killed 53 Ukrainian POWs and wounded 75.

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Lt. Gen. Igor Konashenkov described the strike as a “bloody provocation” aimed at discouraging Ukrainian soldiers from surrendering. He said that eight prison guards were also wounded by the shelling.

The Ukrainian military denied any rocket or artillery strikes on Olenivka, insisting that it wasn’t shelling civilian areas and only strikes Russian military targets.

It accused the Russian forces of deliberately shelling the prison in Olenivka in order to accuse Ukraine of war crimes and also to cover up torture and executions there.

The statement denounced the Russian claims as part of an “information war to accuse the Ukrainian armed forces of shelling civilian infrastructure and the population to cover up their own treacherous action.”

The Associated Press and NBC News has not independently verified either claims.

Denis Pushilin, the Moscow-backed separatist leader, said the prison has 193 inmates. He didn’t specify how many of them were Ukrainian POWs.

Ukrainian authorities in the Donetsk region said Russia has pressed on with the shelling of civilian targets in Ukrainian-held areas.

“The fighting in the region has been intensifying by the day, and civilians must evacuate while it’s still possible,” said Donetsk Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko. “The Russian army doesn’t worry about civilian casualties. They are pummeling cities and villages in the region.”

The Ukrainian troops in Mariupol were taken prisoner after the fierce fighting for Ukraine’s Azov Sea port, where they had been holed up at the giant Azovstal steel mill. Their resistance has become a symbol of Ukrainian struggle against the Russian invasion that started on Feb. 24.

The Azov Regiment and other Ukrainian units defended the steel mill for nearly three months, clinging to its underground maze of tunnels. More than 2,400 surrendered in May under relentless Russian attacks from the ground, sea and air.

Scores of Ukrainian soldiers were taken to prisons in Russian-controlled areas such as the Donetsk region, a breakaway area in eastern Ukraine which is run by Russian-backed separatist authorities. Some have returned to Ukraine as part of prisoner exchanges with Russia, but families of others have no idea whether their loved ones are alive, or if they will ever come home.

In other developments:

— Ukrainian officials said Russian forces shelled the country’s second-largest city, Kharkiv.

City mayor Ihor Terekhov said a central part of the northeastern city was hit, including a two-story building and a higher education institution. Terekhov said the strike occurred just after 4 a.m. on Friday.

“The State Emergency Service is already working — they are sorting out the rubble, looking for people under them,” Terekhov said in a Telegram update.

— The Ukrainian presidential office said that at least 13 civilians were killed and another 36 were wounded in Russian shelling over the past 24 hours.

In the southern city of Mykolaiv, at least four people were killed and seven others were wounded when Russian shelling hit a bus stop.

“The Russians have changed their tactics because of the Ukrainian forces’ successes in the south. … They fire near a bus stop,” Mykolaiv Gov. Vitaliy Kim said.

The Russian barrage also hit a facility for distribution of humanitarian assistance, where three people were wounded, officials said.

Ukrainian officials also said at least four civilians were killed and another five were wounded in the eastern town of Bakhmut in the Donetsk region, which is the focus of the Russian offensive in the Donbas. More than 30 residential buildings and a kindergarten were damaged.

One of them was 31-year-old Luke Lucyszyn. He was the father of two who flew to Ukraine in early April and was serving as a medic. Lucyszyn’s father is Ukrainian and says his son felt a call to duty once the war started.

Both of Lucyszyn’s parents say they asked their son to come back home.

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“Last time I talked to him I told him ‘why don’t you just come home,'” George Lucyszyn said.

The U.S. State Department confirmed to NBC News that Lucyszyn and another American were killed in the Donbas region of Ukraine.

“Just a week before he was killed he kept sending us notes, ‘Mom we don’t have the right equipment,'” Kathryn Lucyszyn said.

A Canadian and Swedish fighter were also reported dead in the fighting.

Liza, who had Down syndrome, was en route to see a speech therapist with her mother when Russian missiles struck the city of Vinnytsia on Thursday, far from the front lines. At least 24 people were killed, including Liza and two boys aged 7 and 8, and more than 200 were wounded, including Liza’s mother.

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“Look, my flower! Look how many people came to you,” Liza’s grandmother, Larysa Dmytryshyna, said, caressing Liza as she lay in an open coffin with flowers and teddy bears in Vinnytsia’s 18th-century Transfiguration Cathedral.

Liza’s father, Artem Dmytriev, stood silent, tears flowing down his face.

Liza’s mother, 33-year-old Iryna Dmytrieva, remained in an intensive care unit in grave condition. The family didn’t tell her that Liza was being buried Sunday, fearing it could affect her condition.

“Your mommy didn’t even see how beautiful you are today,” Dmytryshyna said, weeping.

Helena Sydorenko, a longtime family friend, said Liza’s mother “invested a lot of effort in socializing Liza.”

”She wanted her kid to have a full life,” Sydorenko added.

When the war started, Dmytrieva and her family fled Kyiv, the capital, for Vinnytsia, a city 270 kilometers (167 miles) to the southwest which until Thursday was considered relatively safe.

Shortly before the explosion, Dmytrieva had posted a video on social media showing her daughter straining to reach the handlebars to push her own stroller, happily walking through Vinnytsia, wearing a denim jacket and white pants, her hair decorated with a barrette.

After the Russian missile strike, Ukraine’s emergency services shared photos showing her lifeless body on the ground next to her blood-stained stroller. Ukraine’s first lady remembered how cheerful and happy the little girl was when she met her. The videos and photos have gone viral, the latest images from the brutal war in Ukraine to horrify the world.

Liza’s closest relatives sat on both sides of the coffin, and many more crowded Vinnytsia’s Orthodox cathedral to pay their last tributes to the girl.

“I didn’t know Liza, but no person can go through this with calm,” Orthodox priest Vitalii Holoskevych said, bursting into tears. ‘’Because every burial is grief for each of us. We are losing our brothers and sisters.”

He paused and continued in a trembling voice: ‘’We know that evil cannot win.’’

Later at a wind-swept cemetery, relatives and friends bid farewell to Liza under gray skies.

“You loved this song very much, you danced every day. This song sounds for you now,” Dmytrushyna, Liza’s grandmother, said.

The song was “Oh, the Red Viburnum in the Meadow,” which has become a symbol of resistance in Ukraine after Russia’s invasion.

“It’s suffering and despair. There is no forgiveness for them,” said Ilona, another family friend.

A 7-year-old boy killed in the same Russian airstrike was also buried Sunday along with his mother in a village near Vinnytsia. They were at a medical center when the missiles hit the building. Another young boy slain in the same airstrike is to be buried in Vinnytsia on Monday.

The strike late Saturday destroyed three buildings in a residential quarter of the town of Chasiv Yar, inhabited mostly by people who work in nearby factories.

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On Sunday evening, rescuers were able to remove enough of the bricks and concrete to retrieve a man who had been trapped for almost 24 hours. Rescuers laid him on a stretcher and he was quickly taken to hospital.

Ukraine’s Emergency Services said the latest rescue brought to six the number of people dug out of the rubble. Earlier in the day, they made contact with three others still trapped alive beneath the ruins.

Pavlo Kyrylenko, governor of the Donetsk region that includes Chasiv Yar, said an estimated 24 people were believed still trapped, including a 9-year-old child.

Cranes and excavators worked alongside rescue teams to clear away the ruins of one building, its walls completely shorn off by the impact of the strike. The rescuers kept working in the rain despite the dangerous conditions. The thud of artillery on the nearby front line resonated just a few miles away, making some workers flinch and others run for cover.

Kyrylenko said the town of about 12,000 was hit by Uragan rockets that are fired from truck-borne systems. Chasiv Yar is 20 kilometers (12 miles) southeast of Kramatorsk, a city that is a major target of Russian forces as they grind westward.

However, later Sunday, Viacheslav Boitsov, deputy chief of emergency service in the Donetsk Region, told the Associated Press that four shells hit the neighborhood and they were likely Iskander missiles.

Residents said they heard at least three explosions and that many people were badly wounded in the blasts. A group of neighbors sat Sunday in a courtyard quietly discussing who was wounded and who was still missing.

“There was an explosion, all the windows blew out and I was thrown to the ground, said 45-year-old Oksana, who gave only her first name. She was in her third-floor apartment when the missiles struck.

“My kitchen walls and balcony have completely vanished,” she added, struggling to hold back tears. ”I called my children to tell them I was alive.”

Irina Shulimova, a 59-year-old retiree, recalled the terror. “We didn’t hear any incoming sound, we just felt the impact. I ran to hide in the corridor with my dogs. Everyone I knew started calling me to find out what had happened. I was shaking like a leaf,” she said.

Front doors and balconies were torn apart in the blast, and heaps of twisted metal and bricks lay on the ground. Crushed summer cherries lay among shattered window panes.

A 30-year-old technology worker named Oleksandr said his mother was among those injured in the explosion.

“Thank God I wasn’t injured, it was a miracle,” he said, touching the crucifix around his neck.

Although the home he shares with his mother is now shattered, he said he doesn’t plan to leave the neighborhood.

“I only have enough money to support myself for another month. Lots of people are fed up already of refugees coming from the east — no one will feed or support us there. It’s better to stay,” said Oleksandr, who declined to give his surname.

Another resident who gave only his first name, Dima, had lived for more than 20 years on the ground floor of one of the buildings that was hollowed out in the attack. He walked back and forth across the rubble.

“As you can see, my home is lost,” he said.

Saturday’s attack was the latest in a series of strikes against civilian areas in the east, even as Russia repeatedly claims it is only hitting targets of military value in the war.

Twenty-one people were killed earlier this month when an apartment building and recreation area came under rocket fire in the southern Odesa region. Another at least 19 people died when a Russian missile hit a shopping mall in the city of Kremenchuk in late June.

There was no comment about the Chasiv Yar attack at a Russian Defense Ministry briefing on Sunday.

The Donetsk region is one of two provinces along with Luhansk that make up the Donbas region, where separatist rebels have fought Ukrainian forces since 2014. Last week, Russia captured the city of Lysychansk, the last major stronghold of Ukrainian resistance in Luhansk.

Russian forces are raising “true hell” in the Donbas, despite assessments they were taking an operational pause, Luhansk governor Serhiy Haidai said Saturday.

After the seizure of Lysychansk, some analysts predicted that Moscow’s troops likely would take some time to rearm and regroup.

But “so far there has been no operational pause announced by the enemy. He is still attacking and shelling our lands with the same intensity as before,” Haidai said.

He later said Ukrainian forces had destroyed some ammunition depots and barracks used by the Russians.

___

Follow all AP stories on the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine.

The General Staff of Ukraine’s military reported that its forces had withdrawn from Lysychansk in Luhansk province. President Volodymr Zelenskyy acknowledged the withdrawal but said the fight for the city was still raging on its outskirts.

If confirmed, Russia’s complete seizure of Luhansk would provide its troops with a stronger base from which to press their advance in the Donbas, a region of mines and factories that President Vladimir Putin is bent on capturing in a campaign that could determine the course of the entire war.

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Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu told Putin that Russia’s troops, with a local separatist militia, “have established full control over the city of Lysychansk” and now hold all of Luhansk, according to a ministry statement published Sunday.

As is typical with such descriptions, the Russian statement characterized the victories as “the liberation of the Luhansk People’s Republic.” Separatists in Luhansk and neighboring Donetsk, which make up the Donbas and are home to significant Russian-speaking populations, declared independence from Kyiv in 2014 and their forces have battled Ukrainian troops there ever since. Russia formally recognized the self-proclaimed republics days before its Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine.

Ukrainian and Russian forces fought fiercely for Lysychansk in recent days after the neighboring city fell last week. On Sunday evening, the General Staff of Ukraine’s military confirmed on social media that its forces had withdrawn from Lysychansk “to preserve the lives of Ukrainian defenders.”

In his nightly video address, Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelenskyy noted the withdrawal. But he added that “Ukraine does not give anything back” and vowed to return with more modern weapons. Citing his forces’ success in recapturing other territory, he promised, “There will be a day when we will say the same about Donbas.”

Earlier, Zelenskyy said Kyiv’s forces were still battling Russian soldiers on Lysychansk’s outskirts “in a very difficult and dangerous situation.”

“We cannot give you the final judgment. Lysychansk is still being fought for,” Zelenskyy told a news conference in Kyiv given alongside Australia’s visiting prime minister. He noted that territory can move quickly from one side to the other.

Russian forces maintain an advantage in the area, he acknowledged, calling it a Ukrainian military “weak spot.”

The capture of Lysychansk would give the Russians more territory from which to intensify attacks on Donetsk. In recent weeks, Russian forces were thought to hold about half of Donetsk, but it’s not clear where things stand now.

If Russia prevails in the Donbas, Ukraine would lose not only land but perhaps the bulk of its most capable military forces, opening the way for Moscow to grab more territory and strengthen its ability to dictate terms to Kyiv.

Since failing to take Kyiv and other areas in northern and central Ukraine early in the war, Russia has focused on the Donbas, unleashing fierce shelling and engaging in house-to-house combat that devastated Lysychansk, neighboring Sievierodonetsk and nearby villages. Few details emerged from either city during the battles, which decimated their populations as people were killed or fled.

Already Russian forces appeared to be pushing their advance in Donetsk, concentrating rocket attacks on the sizable Ukrainian-held city of Slovyansk, where at least six people were killed, regional government spokeswoman Tatyana Ignatchenko told Ukrainian TV.

Kramatorsk, another major city in the Donetsk region, also came under fire, the regional administration said.

Far from the fighting in the east, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Sunday visited a town near the capital that was severely damaged early in the war. Albanese called the destruction in Irpin “devastating.”

“These are homes and these are livelihoods and indeed lives that have been lost here in this town,” he said.

Meanwhile, the exiled mayor of the Russia-occupied city of Melitopol said Sunday that Ukrainian rockets destroyed one of four Russian military bases in the city.

Attacks were also reported inside Russia, in a revival of sporadic apparent Ukrainian strikes across the border. The governor of the Belgorod region in Western Russia said fragments of an intercepted Ukrainian missile killed four people Sunday. In the Russian city of Kursk, two Ukrainian drones were shot down, according to the Russian Defense Ministry.

Kursk regional governor Roman Starovoit said the town of Tetkino, on the Ukraine border, came under mortar fire.

___

Ebel reported from Prokovsk, Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy expressed similar optimism, calling it a “crucial moment” for Ukraine. Ukraine’s membership bid is the top order of business for EU leaders meeting in Brussels.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration Olha Stefanishyna said the decision could come as soon as Thursday, when the leaders’ summit starts.

Stefanishyna said the Netherlands, Sweden and Denmark had been skeptical about starting accession talks with Ukraine while it is fighting Russia’s invasion but are now supportive. Asked how confident she was that Ukraine would be accepted as an EU candidate, she said: “The day before the summit starts, I can say 100%.”

The EU’s executive arm threw its weight behind Ukraine’s candidacy last week. Stefanishyna described the European Commission’s endorsement as “a game-changer” that had taken the ground out from under “the legs of those most hesitating.”

EU candidate status, which can be granted only if the existing member countries agree unanimously, is the first step toward membership. It does not provide any security guarantees or an automatic right to join the bloc.

Ukraine’s full membership will depend on whether the war-torn country can satisfy political and economic conditions. Potential newcomers need to demonstrate that they meet standards on democratic principles and must absorb 80,000 pages of rules covering everything from trade and immigration to fertilizers and the rule of law.

Stefanishyna told the AP that she thinks Ukraine could be an EU member within years, not the decades that some European officials have forecast.

“We’re already very much integrated in the European Union,” she said. “We want to be a strong and competitive member state, so it may take from two to 10 years.”

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To help candidates, the bloc can provide technical and financial assistance. European officials have said that Ukraine has already implemented about 70% of the EU rules, norms and standards, but have also pointed to corruption and the need for deep political and economic reforms.

In a virtual talk to Canadian university students on Wednesday, Zelenskyy described the Brussels summit as “two decisive days” that he, like Stefanishyna, thinks will result in approval of Ukraine’s EU candidacy.

“That is a very crucial moment for us, for some people in my team are saying this is like going into the light from the darkness,” the Ukrainian president said through an interpreter. “In terms of our army and society, this is a big motivator, a big motivational factor for the unity and victory of the Ukrainian people.”

Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said he spoke with Zelenskyy on Wednesday and guaranteed him that Belgium would support Ukraine’s candidate status.

“Considerable efforts will be needed, especially in the fight against corruption and the establishment of an effective rule of law,” De Cross said. “But I am convinced that it is precisely the (post-war) reconstruction of Ukraine that will provide opportunities to take important steps forward.”

Zelenskyy said he spoke with a total of 11 EU leaders Wednesday, following calls with nine the day before, in another indication of how important EU candidacy is for Ukraine.

In other developments:

— Press freedom group Reporters Without Borders said a Ukrainian photojournalist and a soldier accompanying him appear to have been “coldly executed” during the first weeks of the war as they searched in Russian-occupied woods for a missing camera drone. The group sent investigators to the woods north of the capital, Kyiv, where the bodies of Maks Levin and serviceman Oleksiy Chernyshov were found April 1. The group said its team counted 14 bullet holes in the burned hulk of their car and found litter seemingly left by Russian soldiers.

— Zelenskyy said Russian forces were carrying out very heavy air and artillery strikes in the eastern Donbas. “Step by step they want to destroy all of the Donbas. All of it,” he said in his nightly video address. Ukrainian Defense Ministry spokesman Oleksandr Motuzianyk said in some battles, for every artillery shell Ukrainian forces fire, the Russian army fires at least six. Zelenskyy appealed to Western countries to speed up deliveries of heavy weapons “to stop this diabolical armada.”

— Russian forces captured three villages in the Luhansk region, one of two that make up the Donbas, Gov. Serhiy Haidai told The Associated Press on Wednesday. He said the villages are near Lysychansk, the last city in Luhansk still fully under Ukrainian control. The Russians have also taken a strategic coal village, Toshkivka, enabling them to intensify attacks, Haidai said.

— The Russian Defense Ministry said Wednesday that Russian forces killed up to 500 Ukrainian servicemen in strikes Tuesday against a shipbuilding plant in Mykolaiv. Zelenskyy said the Russians fired seven missiles at Mykolaiv, wounding five people. He gave no details about what was hit. The Russian military also claimed Ukrainian forces evacuated up to 30 wounded and eight dead American and British fighters from near Mykolaivka, a town in the Donetsk region. There was no confirmation of this by Ukraine.

— Satellite images of Snake Island appear to show damage from a Ukrainian attack on the Russian-occupied island in the Black Sea. The Maxar Technologies images taken Tuesday show three new scorched areas that were not there four days earlier. Russia and Ukraine offer conflicting accounts of the attack. The Ukrainian military’s southern command said it inflicted “significant losses” on Russian troops in an attack using “various forces and methods of destruction,” while the Russian Defense Ministry said its air defenses successfully repelled the Ukrainian assault. Russian forces captured the small rocky island in the first days of the war and have used it to strengthen their control over the northwestern part of the sea.

— Russian officials said a drone strike caused a fire at an oil refinery in southwestern Russia on Wednesday. The blaze engulfed a piece of machinery at the Novoshakhtinsk plant in the Rostov-on-Don region. Authorities said dozens of firefighters quickly contained the fire and no one was hurt. Ukrainian authorities have not confirmed the strike.

— Turkey’s defense ministry said Wednesday that a Turkish ship was allowed to leave the Russian-occupied Azov Sea port of Mariupol following talks between Turkish and Russian defense ministry officials. A ministry statement said a Turkish freighter, Azov Concord, was the first foreign ship to be allowed to leave Mariupol. The ministry did not say what the freighter was carrying. The war has halted critical grain exports by sea.

— French armed forces conducted a surprise military exercise in Estonia, deploying more than 100 paratroopers in the Baltic country, the French defense ministry said Wednesday. The exercise in Estonia, a NATO member that neighbors Russia, was executed as an act of “strategic solidarity” during Russia’s war in Ukraine.

___

Associated Press writers Sam Petrequin in Brussels, Hanna Arhirova in Kyiv and Rob Gillies in Toronto contributed to this report.

A Christian-based organization, Samaritan’s Purse deploys field hospitals to some of the neediest areas in the world. Liner has volunteered with the organization for seven years, witnessing earthquakes in Ecuador, hurricanes in Mozambique, and wounded ISIS soldiers in Iraq — but he says his experience in Ukraine was unlike any other.

“It’s always a bad situation we walk into,” Liner said. “What was different about Ukraine was that the people are just mentally shot over there. I mean, you can just imagine if you’re living in Lubbock, Texas, and the Russians can lob a missile in here anywhere they want to anytime they want to. After a few weeks of that, what that does to you mentally, even though maybe you’re not in the fight.”

Liner arrived with a team of doctors and nurses in the first week of Russia’s invasion. They passed desperate crowds of cars and families that spanned for miles heading to the Polish border. They drove into an uncertain battle on one of the only buses heading east, armed with only flak jackets and faith.

To learn more about Liner’s experience, read the full story by KLBK News.

In an uplifting Father’s Day message Sunday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy posted 10 photos of parents and children set against the grim backdrop of war, praising fathers who “protect and defend the most precious.”

There are scenes of childbirth, as a man and woman look toward a swaddled baby in what appears to be a hospital room where the spackled walls show scars of fighting. In another, a man lifts a child over a fence toward a woman with outstretched arms on a train platform.

“Being a father is a great responsibility and a great happiness,” Zelenskyy wrote in English text that followed the Ukrainian on Instagram. “It is strength, wisdom, motivation to go forward and not to give up.”

He urged his nation’s fighters to endure for the “future of your family, your children, and therefore the whole of Ukraine.”

His message came as four months of war in Ukraine appear to be straining the morale of troops on both sides, prompting desertions and rebellion against officers’ orders. NATO’s chief warned the fighting could drag on for “years.”

“Combat units from both sides are committed to intense combat in the Donbas and are likely experiencing variable morale,” Britain’s defense ministry said in its daily assessment of the war.

“Ukrainian forces have likely suffered desertions in recent weeks,” the assessment said, but added that “Russian morale highly likely remains especially troubled.”

It said “cases of whole Russian units refusing orders and armed stand-offs between officers and their troops continue to occur.”

Separately, the Ukrainian Main Intelligence Directorate released what it said were intercepted phone calls in which Russian soldiers complained about front-line conditions, poor equipment, and overall lack of personnel, according to a report by the Institute for the Study of War.

In an interview published on Sunday in the German weekly Bild am Sonntag, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said that “nobody knows” how long the war could last.

“We need to be prepared for it to last for years,” he said.

He also urged allies ”not to weaken support for Ukraine, even if the costs are high, not only in terms of military aid, but also because of the increase in energy and food goods prices.”

In his nightly address Sunday, Zelenskyy said the week ahead would be “historic” and perhaps bring Ukraine closer to membership in the European Union. But that move could portend a more hostile response from Russia, he warned.

EU leaders recommended Friday that Ukraine join the bloc, and their proposal was to go to members for discussion this week in Brussels. Zelenskyy called the outcome of those talks one of the most fateful moments for Ukraine since independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.

“I am sure that only a positive decision meets the interests of the whole of Europe,” he said.

“In such a week we should expect greater hostile activity from Russia,” he added. “And not only against Ukraine, but also against Europe. We are preparing.”

In recent days, Gazprom, the Russian gas company, has reduced supplies to two major European clients — Germany and Italy. In Italy’s case, energy officials are expected to huddle this week about the situation. The head of Italian energy giant ENI said on Saturday that with additional gas purchased from other sources, Italy should make it through the coming winter, but he warned Italians that “restrictions” affecting gas use might be necessary.

Germany will limit the use of gas for electricity production amid concerns about possible shortages caused by a reduction in supplies from Russia, the country’s economy minister said on Sunday. Germany has been trying to fill its gas storage facilities to capacity ahead of the cold winter months.

Economy Minister Robert Habeck said that Germany will try to compensate for the move by increasing the burning of coal, a more polluting fossil fuel. “That’s bitter, but it’s simply necessary in this situation to lower gas usage,” he said.

Stoltenberg stressed, though, that “the costs of food and fuel are nothing compared with those paid daily by the Ukrainians on the front line.”

Stoltenberg added: What’s more, if Russian President Vladimir Putin should reach his objectives in Ukraine, like when he annexed Crimea in 2014, “we would have to pay an even greater price.”

Britain’s defense ministry said that both Russia and Ukraine have continued to conduct heavy artillery bombardments on axes to the north, east and south of the Sieverodonetsk pocket, but with little change in the front line.

Luhansk governor Serhiy Haidai said via Telegram on Sunday: “It is a very difficult situation in Sievierodonetsk, where the enemy in the middle of the city is conducting round-the-clock aerial reconnaissance with drones, adjusting fire, quickly adjusting to our changes.”

Russia’s defense ministry claimed on Sunday that Russian and separatist forces have taken control of Metolkine, a settlement just to the east of Sievierodonetsk.

Bakhmut, a city in the Donbas, is 55 kilometers (33 miles) southwest of the twin cities of Lysyhansk and Siervierodonetsk, where fierce military clashes have been raging. Every day, Russian artillery pummels Bakhmut.

But Bakhmut’s people try to go about their daily lives, including shopping in markets that have opened again in recent weeks.

“In principle, it can be calm in the morning,” said one resident, Oleg Drobelnnikov. ”The shelling starts at about 7 or 8 in the evening.” Still, he said, it has been pretty calm in the last 10 days or so.

“You can buy food at small farmer markets,” said Drobelnnikov, a teacher. ”It is not a problem. In principle, educational institutions, like schools or kindergartens, are not working due to the situation. The institutions moved to other regions. There is no work here.”

Ukraine’s east has been the main focus of Russia’s attacks for more than two months.

On Saturday, Zelenskyy made a trip south from Kyiv to visit troops and hospital workers in the Mykolaiv and Odesa regions along the Black Sea. He handed out awards to dozens of people at every stop, shaking their hands and thanking them again and again for their service.

Zelenskyy, in a recorded address aboard a train back to Kyiv, vowed to defend the country’s south.

“We will not give away the south to anyone. We will return everything that’s ours and the sea will be Ukrainian and safe.”

He added: “Russia does not have as many missiles as our people have a desire to live.”

Zelenskyy also condemned the Russian blockade of Ukraine’s ports amid weeks of inconclusive negotiations on safe corridors so millions of tons of siloed grain can be shipped out before the approaching new harvest season.

In other attacks in the south, Ukraine’s southern military operational command said Sunday that two people were killed in shelling of the Galitsyn community in the Mykolaiv region and that shelling of the Bashtansky district is continuing.

Russia’s defense ministry said seaborne missiles destroyed a plant in Mykolaiv city where Western-supplied howitzers and armored vehicles were stored.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has expressed concerns “that a bit of Ukraine fatigue is starting to set in around the world.”

“It would be a catastrophe if Putin won. He’d love nothing more than to say, ‘Let’s freeze this conflict, let’s have a cease-fire,'” Johnson said on Saturday, a day after a surprise visit to Kyiv, where he met with Zelenskyy and offered offer continued aid and military training.

Western-supplied heavy weapons are reaching front lines. But Ukraine’s leaders have insisted for weeks that they need more arms, and sooner.

___

Julia Rubin in New York, Sylvia Hui in London, Frank Jordans in Berlin, Frances D’Emilio in Rome and Srdjan Nedeljkovic in Bakhmut, Ukraine, contributed to this report.

___

Follow the AP’s coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

At one of the central squares in the city of Kherson, Russian bands played a concert to celebrate Russia Day, the holiday that marks Russia’s emergence as a sovereign state after the collapse of the Soviet Union, according to Russia’s state news agency RIA Novosti.

In the neighboring Zaporizhzhia region, Moscow-installed officials raised a Russian flag in Melitopol’s city center.

Ukrainian media reported that few, if any, local residents attended the Russia Day festivities in the two cities.

Russia Day was also celebrated in other occupied parts of Ukraine, including the ravaged southern port of Mariupol, where a new city sign painted in the colors of the Russian flag was unveiled on the outskirts and Russian flags were flown on a highway leading into the city.

Also, the Russia-aligned administration in Melitopol started handing out Russian passports to those who applied for Russian citizenship. RIA Novosti posted video of a Moscow-backed official congratulating new Russian citizens and telling them: “Russia will not go anywhere. We are here for good.”

President Vladimir Putin earlier this year issued a decree fast-tracking Russian citizenship for residents of the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions. In captured cities in the south and east, Moscow has also introduced the ruble as official currency, aired Russian news broadcasts and taken steps to introduce a Russian school curriculum.

The Kremlin’s administrators in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions have voiced plans to incorporate the areas into Russia, despite protests and signs of an insurgency among local residents.

Russian-installed officials Sunday in Melitopol reported an explosion in a garbage bin near the city’s police headquarters and said two residents were injured.

Another blast was reported at an electrical substation in the city of Berdyansk, which is also under Russian control. The Kremlin-backed administration pronounced it a terrorist attack, and officials said electricity was shut down in parts of the city.

On the battlefield, Russia said it is used missiles to destroy a large depot in western Ukraine that contained anti-tank and air-defense weapons supplied to Kyiv by the U.S. and European countries. It said the attack took place near the city of Chortkiv in the Ternopil region.

Ternopil Gov. Volodymyr Trush said four Russian missiles damaged a military installation and four residential buildings in Chortkiv. More than 20 people were wounded, including a 12-year-old girl, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.

“This strike had no tactical or strategic sense, just like the absolute majority of other Russian strikes. It is terror, just terror,” he said in a video address.

In light of the strike, Zelenskyy made another plea for modern missile defense systems from the U.S. and other Western countries, saying, “These are lives that could have been saved, tragedies that could have been prevented if Ukraine had been listened to.”

Also, heavy fighting continued for control of Sievierodonetsk, an eastern city in Luhansk province with a prewar population of 100,000 that has emerged as central to Russia’s campaign to capture the Donbas, Ukraine’s industrial heartland.

Russian forces shelled a Sievierodonetsk chemical plant where up to 500 civilians, 40 of them children, were holed up, Luhansk Gov. Serhii Haidai said.

An official with the pro-Moscow, self-proclaimed Luhansk People’s Republic, Rodion Miroshnik, said 300 to 400 Ukrainian troops also remained inside the plant. He said that efforts were underway to evacuate the civilians.

Leonid Pasechnik, head of the Luhansk People’s Republic, said the Ukrainians making their stand in Sievierodonetsk should save themselves the trouble.

“If I were them, I would already make a decision” to surrender, he said. “We will achieve our goal in any case.”

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This story has been corrected to show that a 12-year-old girl, not a boy, was wounded in a missile strike on Chortkiv.

Mykhailo Podolyak told the BBC in an interview that aired Thursday the daily loss of between 100 and 200 Ukrainian fighters resulted from a “complete lack of parity” between Ukraine and Russia, which has “thrown pretty much everything non-nuclear” at the war’s front in eastern Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last week put his country’s daily combat death toll at up to 100, but Podolyak said it had grown. Ukrainian officials have pointed at the mounting losses to emphasize their urgent requests for more Western weapons, which have been critical to the country’s unexpected success in holding off Russia’s larger and better-equipped forces.

After a bungled attempt to overrun Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, in the early days of the war, Russia shifted its focus to an eastern region of coal mines and factories known as the Donbas. But its progress there has been plodding.

Podolyak said the delivery of state-of-the-art artillery systems would not only diminish Ukrainian casualties, it would help its the nation’s forces reclaim seized territory. The Ukrainian government also is seeking more multiple-rocket launchers.

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“There’s something really important…that our partners need to understand, and that’s until Russia suffers a serious military defeat, no form of dialogue will be possible, and they will continue to be able to try and take parts of our country,” he said.

Podolyak also addressed Western fears that Ukraine’s forces would use Western-supplied rocket launchers to strike targets inside Russia and potentially escalate the conflict to a wider conflagration: “It won’t happen,” he said.

Street Battles

Fighting in the Donbas has ground on for more than two months, and the slog continued Friday. A provincial governor said Russian and Ukrainian forces battled “for every house and every street” in Sievierodonetsk, a city that recently has been under steady attack.

Sievierodonetsk is in the last pocket of Luhansk province that has not yet been claimed by Russia or Moscow-backed separatists.

Luhansk Gov. Serhiy Haidai told The Associated Press that Ukrainian forces retain control of the industrial zone on the edge of the city and some other sections amid the painstaking block-by-block fighting.

An envoy for the Luhansk People’s Republic, a self-proclaimed separatist territory, reported Friday that some Ukrainian troops were trapped inside a chemical plant on the city’s outskirts.

“All escape routes have been cut off,” Rodion Miroshnik, Moscow ambassador for the unrecognized republic, wrote on social media.

“They are being told that no conditions will be accepted. Only the laying down of arms and surrender,” he said.

Miroshnik echoed earlier claims by a Russian defense official that civilians remained on the plant’s grounds. But he stopped short of reiterating allegations that Ukrainian forces were barring them from leaving.

As of Friday afternoon, there was no response from the Ukrainian side.

Britain Calls Trial of its Citizens a ‘Sham’

The British government said Russia must take responsibility for the “sham trial” of two Britons and a Moroccan who were sentenced to death for fighting against Russian forces in Ukraine.

Britons Aiden Aslin and Shaun Pinner and Moroccan Brahim Saadoun were convicted by a court run by pro-Moscow separatist authorities in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, which is not recognized internationally.

Separatist authorities argued that the men were “mercenaries” not entitled to the usual protections accorded prisoners of war.

Aslin’s and Pinner’s families have said the two men were long-serving members of the Ukrainian military. Saadoun’s father told a Moroccan online newspaper that his son is not a mercenary and holds Ukrainian citizenship.

British government minister Robin Walker said Friday that it was “an illegal court in a sham government” but that the U.K. would use “all diplomatic channels to make the case that these are prisoners of war who should be treated accordingly.”

British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss is due to speak to her Ukrainian counterpart, Dmytro Kuleba, later Friday about the case. The U.K. has not announced any plans to speak to Russian officials. It does not recognize the self-proclaimed Donetsk republic and will not officially contact the authorities there.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the ministry has so far not received any specific appeals about the men from Britain and as such, “we can make an unambiguous conclusion that until now the fate of these citizens was not of interest to London.”

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Karmanau contributed from Lviv, Ukraine. Associated Press writers Jill Lawless in London and Jamey Keaten in Geneva contributed.

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Follow AP’s coverage of the Ukraine war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine