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Ukraine to boost defences along border with Belarus
Ukrainian forces are working to strengthen defensive lines and positions along the border with Belarus and Russia, the defence ministry has said.
The ministry, citing Lt Gen Serhiy Nayev, commander of the joint forces of Ukraine’s armed forces, posted to Facebook:
The expansion of the system of engineering barriers in the areas bordering Belarus and Russia is ongoing. Anti-tank minefields are being created in tank accessible areas and probable paths of pushing the enemy deep into our territory which are roads, forest lanes, bridges, power lines, etc.
Nayev added that Ukrainian engineering units have equipped several dozens of mine fields using more than 6,000 anti-tank mines in the past week. Ukrainian soldiers were working “around the clock, despite the weather conditions”, he said.
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, met with his Belarusian counterpart and close ally, Alexander Lukashenko, for talks in Moscow on Wednesday. Moscow is Minsk’s closest political and financial backer.
Lukashenko allowed Putin to use the territory of Belarus as a launch pad for the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Last month, Putin announced that Russia would deploy tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus.
Key events
Ukraine’s ministry of defence with the latest figures on the conflict:
“Whenever you do a thing, act as if all the world were watching.”
Thomas JeffersonTotal combat losses of the enemy from February 24, 2022 to April 8, 2023: pic.twitter.com/Z1TUHuSN2S
— Defense of Ukraine (@DefenceU) April 8, 2023
Mykola Kuleba, the founder of the humanitarian organisation Save Ukraine, has provided an update after 31 children were reunited with their families in Ukraine this week after a long operation to bring them back from Russia where they had been taken from occupied areas during the war.
“Now the fifth rescue mission is nearing its completion. It was special regarding the number of children we managed to return and also because of its complexity,” Kuleba said.
A grandmother who had been due to reunite with two of her grandchildren died suddenly on the trip and the children had to remain in Russia, Kuleba, Ukraine’s former commissioner for children’s rights, told a media briefing in Kyiv.
He said all of the children who had been brought back to Ukraine by Save Ukraine had said no one in Russia was trying to find their parents in Ukraine, Reuters reports.
“There were kids who changed their locations five times in five months, some children say that they were living with rats and cockroaches,” he said.
The children were taken to what Russians called stays in summer camps from occupied parts of Ukraine’s Kharkiv and Kherson regions, Kuleba said.
Moscow, which controls chunks of Ukraine’s east and south, denies abducting children and says they have been transported away for their own safety.
Summary of the day so far
It’s 6pm in Kyiv. Here’s where we stand:
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Ukrainian forces are working to strengthen defensive lines and positions along the border with Belarus and Russia, the defence ministry has said, citing Lt Gen Serhiy Nayev, commander of the joint forces of Ukraine’s armed forces.
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More than 30 children have returned to Ukraine and reunited with their families after they were taken illegally to Russia, according to the Ukrainian organisation Save Ukraine. “Сhildren abducted by Russians from the Kherson and Kharkiv regions have been reunited with their families after several months of separation,” it said.
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Russia’s campaign to break down Ukraine’s unified energy system within the past winter period has “highly likely failed”, the UK’s Ministry of Defence said in its latest intelligence update. Large-scale long-range attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure have become rare since early March, it said.
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Ukrainians have been marking the first anniversary of a missile strike on Kramatorsk railway station in eastern Ukraine, which killed at least 58 people, including several children. The attack took place on 8 April 2022, when the station was packed with women, children and elderly people waiting to be evacuated.
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The Russian-backed head of Crimea’s administration, Sergei Aksyonov, said a missile fired from Ukraine was shot down over the Black Sea town of Feodosia. An adviser to Aksyonov was cited as saying that debris had fallen in a Crimean town, but no damage or casualties have been reported.
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A Ukrainian government minister is due to visit India on Monday and will seek humanitarian aid and equipment to repair energy infrastructure damaged during Russia’s invasion, the Hindu newspaper said on Saturday. Ukraine’s first deputy foreign minister, Emine Dzhaparova, will make the first visit to India by a Ukrainian government minister since Russia’s invasion.
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The US justice department has launched an investigation into the possible release of Pentagon documents. Documents posted on several social media sites including Twitter appear to detail US and Nato aid to Ukraine, but may have been altered or used as part of a misinformation campaign.
Andriy Yermak, the head of the Ukrainian presidency’s office, held a call with human rights lawyer Amal Clooney to discuss protecting Ukrainian children, a statement released by his office said.
The pair “discussed the issue of protecting the rights of Ukrainian children and holding Russia accountable for crimes committed against them”, Yermak tweeted.
Had an online call with the prominent human rights defender and @ClooneyFDN co-founder Amal Clooney. Discussed the issue of protecting the rights of 🇺🇦 children and holding Russia accountable for crimes committed against them. pic.twitter.com/beAb5dZEIR
— Andriy Yermak (@AndriyYermak) April 8, 2023
The statement continued:
According to official data alone, at least 20,000 children have been forcibly removed by the Russian military from the temporarily occupied territories (of Ukraine), separated from their parents and forcibly transferred to Russian families.
Ukraine to boost defences along border with Belarus
Ukrainian forces are working to strengthen defensive lines and positions along the border with Belarus and Russia, the defence ministry has said.
The ministry, citing Lt Gen Serhiy Nayev, commander of the joint forces of Ukraine’s armed forces, posted to Facebook:
The expansion of the system of engineering barriers in the areas bordering Belarus and Russia is ongoing. Anti-tank minefields are being created in tank accessible areas and probable paths of pushing the enemy deep into our territory which are roads, forest lanes, bridges, power lines, etc.
Nayev added that Ukrainian engineering units have equipped several dozens of mine fields using more than 6,000 anti-tank mines in the past week. Ukrainian soldiers were working “around the clock, despite the weather conditions”, he said.
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, met with his Belarusian counterpart and close ally, Alexander Lukashenko, for talks in Moscow on Wednesday. Moscow is Minsk’s closest political and financial backer.
Lukashenko allowed Putin to use the territory of Belarus as a launch pad for the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Last month, Putin announced that Russia would deploy tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus.
Here are some of the latest images we have received from the news wires from Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy shared Iftar with Ukrainian Muslim soldiers observing Ramadan on Friday, in what he said would become an annual “new tradition of respect”.
The Ukrainian leader said he participated in the first “official” Iftar alongside representatives of the Muslim clergy and leaders of the Mejlis, the single highest executive-representative body of the Crimean Tatars.
Addressing participants at the dinner, Zelenskiy said “we affirm that Ukraine values every person, values every community”, adding that “diversity is part of Ukraine’s character”.
Ukraine marks anniversary of Kramatorsk station attack
Ukrainians have been marking the one-year anniversary of a missile strike on a Kramatorsk railway station in eastern Ukraine, which killed at least 58 people, including several children.
Ukrainians honored victims of 🇷🇺missile attack at Kramatorsk train station that happened last year.
On April 8, 2022, at 10:28 a.m., the Russian army shelled the train station, where thousands of civilians were waiting to be evacuated. At least, 58 people died, 121 were injured. pic.twitter.com/epGdn5OOu6— Iuliia Mendel (@IuliiaMendel) April 8, 2023
The attack took place on 8 April 2022, when the station was packed with women, children and elderly waiting to be evacuated. The authorities had urged residents to leave the region before an expected Russian military assault.
More than 100 people were wounded in the strike, Human Rights Watch said. Many lost limbs.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said at the time that it was a deliberate attack on civilians using a Tochka U short-range ballistic missile. The US also blamed Russia, saying it believes it used a short range ballistic missile. Russia has denied responsibility.
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