April 27, 2024
The battle for Ukraine's cities is thundering across its suburbs, with the Ukrainian military retaking a key neighborhood near Kyiv and the invading Russian forces increasing air raids that have caused uncounted deaths and sent more than 3.5 million people fleeing.
Ukraine's military said early Tuesday it had forced Russian troops out of a strategically important Kyiv suburb. However, Russian forces were partially able to take three northwest suburbs where there's been fighting for weeks.
Civilians making the dangerous escape from the embattled southern port city of Mariupol described fleeing through street-to-street gun battles and past unburied corpses as steady Russian bombardment tried to pound the city into submission. There was no immediate sign of a diplomatic breakthrough that could bring even temporary relief.
Here are some key things to know about the conflict:
WHY ARE SUBURBS TURNING INTO BATTLEFIELDS?
The suburbs could be a barrier to Ukraine's cities or a doorway for Russian troops, with the capital of Kyiv believed to be Moscow's primary military objective in Vladimir Putin's war.
Outside devastated Mariupol, the Kremlin’s ground offensive has advanced slowly, knocked back by lethal hit-and-run attacks by the Ukrainians.
The regained Kyiv suburb allowed Ukrainian forces to retake control of a key highway to the west and block Russian troops from surrounding the capital from the northwest.
Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said Russian forces advancing toward Kyiv were able to partially take northwest suburbs of Bucha, Hostomel and Irpin, some of which had been under attack almost since Russia’s military invaded on Feb. 24.
Still, Putin’s forces are increasingly concentrating their air power and artillery on Ukraine’s cities and the civilians living there.
A senior U.S. defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the military’s assessment, said Russia had increased air sorties in recent days, carrying out as many as 300 through the weekend.
WHAT'S THE LATEST ON MARIUPOL?
The Russian assault has turned living in Mariupol into a fight for survival.
Electricity, water and food supplies have been cut off, as well as communication with the outside world. It's unclear how many of the city with a prewar population of 430,000 remain. Around a quarter were believed to have fled early in the war and tens of thousands more have escaped over the past week by way of humanitarian corridors. The Mariupol City Council says several thousand residents were taken into Russia against their will.
Other attempts to leave have been thwarted by Russian efforts to pound Mariupol into submission. On that, Moscow has not succeeded, Britain’s defense ministry said Tuesday in a posting on social media. But Russia for now controls the land corridor from Crimea, the peninsula it annexed in 2014, and is blocking Ukraine’s access to the Sea of Azov.
The United Nations refugee agency said Tuesday that more than 3.5 million people have fled Ukraine since Russia invaded.
Those who have made it out of Mariupol described a devastated landscape.
“There are no buildings there anymore,” said 77-year-old Maria Fiodorova, who crossed the border to Poland on Monday after five days of travel.
Olga Nikitina, who fled Mariupol for the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, said gunfire blew out her windows, and her apartment dropped below freezing.
“Battles took place over every street. Every house became a target,” she said.
WHAT HAS THE AP DIRECTLY WITNESSED OR CONFIRMED?
In the Russian-occupied southern city of Kherson on Monday, Russian forces shot into the air and fired stun grenades at protestors who were chanting “Go home!” Kherson early this month became the first major city to fall to Russia’s offensive.
In Kyiv, a shopping center in the densely populated Podil district near the city center remained a smoking ruin after being hit late Sunday by shelling that killed eight people, according to emergency officials. The attack shattered every window in a neighboring high-rise.
WHERE'S THE WHEAT?
Russia's war on Ukraine has jeopardized grain supplies from a region known as “the breadbasket of the world," forcing farmers and governments to rethink crop planning to offset losses from the conflict, drought and rising fuel prices .
Ukraine and Russia account for a third of global wheat and barley exports, which countries in Asia, Africa and the Middle East rely on to feed millions of needy people. About half of the grain the World Food Program buys to feed 125 million people worldwide comes from Ukraine. The double blow of rising food prices and depressed wheat exports from the war is a recipe for “catastrophe not just in Ukraine, but potentially globally,” the head of the U.N. food assistance agency warned.
Major grain producers like the United States, Canada, France, Australia and Argentina are being closely watched to see if they can quickly ramp up production to fill in the gaps from lost Ukrainian and Russian supplies.
WHAT ABOUT DIPLOMACY?
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said late Monday he was prepared to discuss a commitment from Ukraine not to seek NATO membership in exchange for a cease-fire, the withdrawal of Russian troops and a guarantee of Ukraine’s security.
“It’s a compromise for everyone: for the West, which doesn’t know what to do with us with regard to NATO, for Ukraine, which wants security guarantees, and for Russia, which doesn’t want further NATO expansion,” Zelenskyy said.
He also repeated his call for direct talks with Putin. Unless he meets with the Russian president, it is impossible to understand whether Russia even wants to stop the war, Zelenskyy said.
Zelenskyy also said that Kyiv will be ready to discuss the status of Crimea and the eastern Donbas region held by Russian-backed separatists after a cease-fire and steps toward providing security guarantees.
The Kremlin is demanding Ukraine disarm and declare itself neutral.
U.S. President Joe Biden travels to Europe this week, where he will attend a summit with NATO leaders looking for ways to strengthen the bloc’s own deterrence and defense to deal with the now openly confrontational Putin.
The Kremlin has bristled at remarks coming from the Americans. The Russian Foreign Ministry has warned that relations with the U.S. are “on the verge of a breach" and summoned the U.S. ambassador.
Biden has added a stop to Poland during his trip, visiting a crucial ally of Ukraine which has taken in more than 2 million Ukrainian refugees.
TAKE MY NOBEL
Russian journalist Dmitry Muratov says he wants to auction off his 2021 Nobel Peace Prize medal to raise funds for Ukrainian refugees.
Muratov called Tuesday in the independent Novaya Gazeta newspaper, which he edits, for people to “share with refugees, the wounded and children who need urgent treatment." Last year, he said he was giving away his share of the Nobel prize money to causes including independent media, a Moscow hospice, and care for children with spinal problems.
WHAT ABOUT SUPPORT FOR RUSSIA?
A Serbian government minister says Belgrade will never impose sanctions or join the Western “hysteria” against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, echoing Moscow's pro-war propaganda.
“Serbia will never be part of the anti-Russian hysteria in which the property of Russian citizens and the property of the Russian Federation is stolen," Interior Minister Aleksandar Vulin said Tuesday.
Serbia, Russia’s traditional Balkan ally, voted in favor of a U.N. General Assembly resolution condemning the invasion of Ukraine but is the only European nation that has refused to join international sanctions against the Kremlin.
