After nearly two months of Russia's war against Ukraine, the Kremlin has taken extraordinary steps to blunt an economic counteroffensive from the West.
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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that the Ukrainian army is not ready to try to break the Russian siege of Mariupol by force, but that Kiev has every right to do so.
He told a news conference in Kiev that it was vital that he meet Russian President Vladimir Putin for talks if Ukraine plans to resolve the war diplomatically.
He also said that the likelihood of further peace negotiations with Russia in Turkey will depend on Putin, but that Kiev wants substantive talks to take place.
He told a news conference in Kiev that eight people, including a three-month-old child, were killed in rocket attacks in the southern port city of Odessa.
Moscow denies targeting civilians.
Zelenski also said that he thinks that Russia could use nuclear weapons, but that he does not want to believe that they will do so.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said that Kiev will end negotiations with Moscow if Russia destroys the Ukrainian people in the city of Mariupol and holds "pseudo-referendums" to create "pseudo-republics" in Russian-occupied areas.
A new attempt to evacuate Ukrainian civilians from war-torn Mariupol failed today, the mayor's assistant wrote on his Telegram channel.
He blamed it on Russian forces.
The official said that 200 Marijupol residents gathered to be evacuated, but that the Russian army told them to disperse and warned of possible shelling.
Russia and Ukraine accuse each other of repeated failures to evacuate people from Mariupol.
In Odesa, Ukraine, there are victims in a rocket attack on the southern port city, regional spokesman Sergej Brachuk said.
"There are victims - dead and wounded," he said, adding that the exact number is still being determined.
The head of the Ukrainian president's office said that according to the latest data, five people were killed and 18 were wounded.
In an artillery attack on the city of Zolote in the eastern Ukrainian region of Lugansk, two civilians were killed and two others were wounded, Governor Serhii Haidai said, according to Reuters.
The regional governor of the Lviv region in Ukraine, Maksim Kozacki, announced that a curfew would come into force in the region on Sunday evening, on the Orthodox Easter itself.
Kozacki stated that the curfew will start tomorrow at 23.00:XNUMX p.m. and last until five in the morning, and so on every night until it is officially lifted.
"Unfortunately, the enemy does not know the concept of the greatest religious holiday. They are such beasts that they do not understand what Easter is," the governor said.
He pointed out that church officials agree with that decision and all liturgies will be served in the morning.
European companies could bypass Russia's requirement to pay for gas delivered in rubles without violating EU sanctions if they pay in euros or dollars that are then converted into Russian currency, the European Commission (EC) announced.
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The adviser to the Ukrainian president, Oleksiy Arestovich, said that Russian forces continued their airstrikes and are trying to invade Azovstal, where resistance is still being offered by Ukrainian forces.
"The enemy is trying to suppress the last resistance of the Marijupol defenders in Azovstal," Arestovich said.
United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres will visit Ukraine next Sunday to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, after meeting in Moscow with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the United Nations announced.
Guterres will meet with Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleb in Ukraine and will be received by Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday, April 28, the UN said.
It was previously reported that Guterres will travel to Moscow on Tuesday to meet with Putin. It will be their first meeting since the Russian invasion of Ukraine began on February 24.
The Russian Ministry of Defense announced that Russian forces shot down a Ukrainian Su-25 and three Mi-8 helicopters in Kharkiv, writes Reuters.
Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Irina Vereshchuk said that if everything goes according to plan, the evacuation from Mariupol will begin at noon.
"Today we will again try to evacuate women, children and the elderly," Vereschuk said, as reported by Reuters.
Canada has announced that it has provided heavy artillery to Ukraine's armed forces, after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau promised to send such aid at the request of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Reuters reports.
So far, Canada has delivered a certain number of M777 howitzers and the corresponding ammunition to the Ukrainian forces, and contracts are being finalized for the supply of armored vehicles that will be sent to Ukraine as soon as possible, the Ministry of Defense said.
Moldova's foreign ministry summoned the Russian ambassador to express deep concern over comments by the military commander, who suggested that the Russian-speaking population was under repression.
"These statements are baseless. Moldova is a neutral country and this principle must be respected by international factors, including the Russian Federation," the ministry said on its website, as reported by Reuters.
It is the fifty-ninth day of the war in Ukraine.
The Ukrainian army announced today that Russian troops are continuing "offensive operations" in eastern Ukraine with the aim of defeating Ukrainian forces, establishing full control over the regions of Donetsk and Luhansk and securing a "land route between those territories and occupied Crimea."
In the past 24 hours, Ukrainian forces repelled eight Russian attacks in those two areas, destroyed nine tanks, 18 armored vehicles and 13 other vehicles, a tanker and three artillery systems, the General Staff of the Ukrainian Army wrote on its Facebook page this morning.
Russian forces continue to partially block and shell Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-largest city, and are active in the Izjum area, the report said.
In the strategic port city of Mariupol, Russian forces "continue to block" Ukrainian units in the Azovstal industrial complex, their last stronghold, and are conducting airstrikes against the city using long-range missiles, the release said.
It is added that the engineering unit arrived in Marijupolj to determine the infrastructure of the port.
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