- March 16, 2024
- Posted by: AliensFaith
- Category: OBJECTIVE PRESS
Attack in Belgorod comes day after at least 20 people were killed in a strike on Odesa and amid voting in Russia’s election
Welcome to our live coverage on Ukraine. It has just gone noon in Kyiv and 1pm in Moscow. Here are the headlines:
Ukrainian shelling of the Russian city of Belgorod, close to the border, killed two people on Saturday, regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Telegram.
Ukrainian drones struck two Rosneft oil refineries in Russia’s Samara region, leaving one facility on fire on Saturday, the region’s governor said. The Volga river region’s Syzran refinery was on fire, Dmitry Azarov said on Telegram. His comments also confirmed an attack on the Novokubyshev refinery. Workers at both plants had been evacuated and there were no casualties, Azarov claimed.
A Russian ballistic missile attack hit civilian infrastructure in Ukraine’s Black Sea port city of Odesa on Friday, killing at least 20 people – including rescuers – and wounding more than 75 in Moscow’s deadliest attack in weeks, Ukrainian officials said. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, called the attack “vile”. A three-storey recreational facility was destroyed in the attack, as well as at least 10 private houses, the southern military command said. Saturday was declared a local day of mourning.
Voters in Russia headed to the polls across the country’s 11 time zones on Friday in a three-day presidential election that is all but certain to extend Vladimir Putin’s 24-year rule until at least 2030. Putin is running against Communist Nikolai Kharitonov, Leonid Slutsky, leader of the nationalist Liberal Democratic Party, and Vladislav Davankov of the New People party. Two anti-war candidates, Boris Nadezhdin and Yekaterina Duntsova were barred from running by the electoral commission.
Voting is also taking place in the four occupied regions of Ukraine which Russia claims to have annexed despite its forces only partially controlling the territory. Ukraine has said the election there is illegal. Speaking at a meeting of Russia’s security council, Putin accused Ukraine of trying to disrupt the voting process and people in the border regions with “a number of criminal armed actions”. Putin said the attempts to break into Russia did not succeed. He said the acts would not go unpunished.
Germany’s chancellor, France’s president and Poland’s prime minister met in Berlin and, in a public briefing, said Europe was united and determined in its support for Ukraine. Olaf Scholz, Emmanuel Macron and Donald Tusk also said they would use frozen Russian assets to purchase more weapons for Ukraine on the world market. The meeting follows tensions between France and Germany over Russia.
One person was killed by Ukrainian shelling in the Russian city of Grayvoron in the Belgorod region, the governor said on Telegram. Earlier, Russia claimed it had thwarted attempts by Ukraine to stage cross-border raids into the territory, but produced no evidence to support this, while a senior Ukrainian intelligence official claimed that Kursk and Belgorod regions were “active combat zones”.
Two people were reported killed and five injured by Russian shelling in northern Ukraine’s Sumy region overnight to Friday, with houses and cars damaged. As well there were missile strikes in the Kharkiv, Poltava and Donetsk regions.
The EU is set to agree sanctions on several people seen as involved in the mistreatment and death of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny in an Arctic penal colony, three diplomats said on Friday.
