Russia’s attack on Ukraine kills 10 million people

Pope Francis on Sunday denounced the “violent aggression against Ukraine … a senseless massacre where chaos and atrocities are repeated every day,” and called on the international community to put an end to “this abhorrent war.” The Pope, speaking from a window overlooking St. Peter’s Square after the usual noon prayer, continued his practice of: Not calling Russia the aggressor in the war, but emphasized the horrors inflicted on the Ukrainian population by the invasion.

“This week, rockets and bombs have hit civilians, the elderly, children and pregnant women,” the Pope said. “Many grandparents, sick and poor, separated from their families, many children and vulnerable people are still dying under the bombing.”

About 3.4 million people have left Ukraine since the Russian offensive began on February 24, most of them women and children heading to Poland, according to the United Nations, which says the number of refugees could reach 4 million. The flow of people has decreased in recent days, but still exceeds 50,000 refugees per day, according to the latest United Nations figures.

The streets of the capital, Kyiv, are mostly deserted. Some city officials suspect that more than half of its residents have left, though exact numbers are not known. Infantry and motor vehicles were largely replaced by concrete slabs, mounds of dirt, and I-beams welded together at individual angles to create tank traps to impede an expected Russian attack. Garbage continues to be received from the municipality, but abandoned cars wrecked throughout the city are a common site. After an accident, there are no debris removal services.

The Russian Defense Ministry showed There is no sign of giving up Even as her army suffered great losses. On Sunday, it said its forces carried out a range of activities, including firing a number of long-range weapons at targets in Ukraine, striking a military base in the country’s Zhytomyr region, where they claimed foreign fighters, and attacking a large number. Military installations in helicopter raids.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Sunday that his country’s army is inflicting heavy losses on Russian forces, but added, “We are well aware that Russia has limitless human resources and a lot of equipment, missiles and bombs.”

In Mariupol, where The fight has reached the streetsThe humanitarian situation worsened. Ukrainian officials said Russia bombed an art school where about 400 people were sheltering, trapping people under rubble. Their condition cannot be determined.

The incident comes days after the bombing of a theater in the city. rescue workers Release 130 people From under the rubble as of Friday, although 1,300 people were still trapped in the basement of the theater, a local official said.

On Sunday, the Mariupol city council said about 4,000 civilians had been killed in the city since the fighting began. Russian forces were also accused of forcibly evacuating some of the city’s residents to Russia and to the territories of Donetsk and Luhansk, the two pro-Russian breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine.

“People who are forcibly transferred to Russian territory, their Ukrainian passports have been confiscated and given papers that have no legal weight and are not accepted in the civilized world,” the council said in a statement posted to Telegram on Sunday.

Russia has not commented on reports of forced evacuation from Mariupol.

Mariupol is a strategic target for Moscow as it attempts to open a land corridor to Russia’s annexed Crimea and divert the momentum in its three-week-old conquest. Ukrainian officials said, during weeks of bombing and attack, they had kept Russian forces at bay on the outskirts of Mariupol, but that changed on Saturday.

The capture of Mariupol will be a victory for Russia, which has achieved so far They failed to take any large Ukrainian cities since the beginning of its conquest.

Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Irina Vereshuk said Sunday that Russia and Ukraine have agreed on a humanitarian corridor to evacuate residents from Mariupol and send aid. It added that it was one of seven humanitarian corridors agreed on Sunday. Sometimes those lanes had to be abandoned after they had come under fire.

Mr. Zelensky said that more than 4,000 Mariupol residents managed to escape through this pass on Saturday.

Meanwhile, Mr. Zelensky suspended the activities of 11 political parties with ties to Russia on Sunday, which Ukrainian officials have long believed served as fronts for the Kremlin. Moscow seeks to install pro-Russian leaders in the areas it has occupied since the start of its invasion.

One party leader, Viktor Medvedchuk, fled his home where he was under house arrest in Kyiv days after the Russian invasion began last month, according to Ukrainian officials.

Vyacheslav Volodin, the speaker of Russia’s lower house of parliament, condemned the move and said Mr. Zelensky’s action was a mistake that divided the country.

On the other hand, Oleksandr Kamyshin, head of the Ukrainian State Railways Corporation, told a TV channel that there is no longer a rail connection between his country and Belarus. Mr. Kamyshin declined to provide any details on how the line would be cut, but thanked Belarusian railway operators “for what they are doing”.

Russia was using Belarus as a springboard for its attack on Ukraine.

Areas no longer controlled by Ukraine as of Friday

The direction of the invasion forces

Under the control of or allied with Russia

Main refugee transit sites

Chernobyl

Not in operation

The territory of Ukraine, recognized by Putin as independent

converts it

separatists

Areas no longer controlled by Ukraine as of Friday

The direction of the invasion forces

Under the control of or allied with Russia

The territory of Ukraine, recognized by Putin as independent

Main refugee transit sites

Chernobyl

Not in operation

controlled by

separatists

Areas no longer controlled by Ukraine as of Friday

The direction of the invasion forces

Under the control of or allied with Russia

Main refugee transit sites

The territory of Ukraine, recognized by Putin as independent

Chernobyl

Not in operation

controlled by

separatists

Areas no longer controlled by Ukraine as of Friday

The direction of the invasion forces

Under the control of or allied with Russia

Main refugee transit sites

The territory of Ukraine, recognized by Putin as independent

Areas no longer controlled by Ukraine as of Friday

The direction of the invasion forces

Under the control of or allied with Russia

Main refugee transit sites

The territory of Ukraine, recognized by Putin as independent

– Matthew Luxmore and Frances X Roca contributed to this article.

write to Alan Collison at [email protected] and Isabel Coles at [email protected]