Day 96 of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Russia took a huge blow off the battlefield when the Moscow branch of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church cut ties with Moscow.
Another example of why the EU is such a bad idea. You lose your sovereignty. The ambassadors wanted an oil sanctions deal before EU leaders meet in Brussels on Monday afternoon. It did not happen:
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen says the EU is “not there yet” with regards to an agreement on a sixth package of sanctions, including a potential ban on Russian oil imports.”It’s never been easy. It’s the same now with the sixth package,” she told reporters as she arrived ahead of a summit of the 27 EU leaders.”It is very important to have fairness for all, we haven’t found a solution for that yet.”My expectations are low that it will be solved in the next 48 hours. But I’m confident that thereafter there will be a possibility,” she said.The EU requires the approval of all member states to introduce the sanctions, despite announcing them nearly a month ago.
As we’ve been reporting, Hungary, which relies heavily on Russian oil, is the main opponent of a ban in imports.
Hungary is an obstacle but Slovakia and the Czech Republic. both landlocked countries, need “loner phase-out periods.” They rely on Russia oil too much to simply turn it off.
Russian soldiers have dumped the bodies of dozens of Ukrainian civilians in a supermarket in Mariupol and left them to rot.The corpses were washed above ground by Russia’s attempts to restore running water to the ruined city, according to an adviser to the mayor.Photographs from the Shchyryi kum supermarket, which are too graphic to publish, show decomposing and discoloured bodies in civilian clothes littered across the floor.Petro Andryushchenko, the Mariupol mayor’s adviser, said that so many bodies were being washed out of the ground Russia was unable to bury them.“The Russians are bringing the bodies of the dead here [in the supermarket], bodies which were washed out of graves and partially exhumed in an attempt to restore water supply,” Mr Andryushchenko said on his Telegram channel. “They are just dumping them like garbage.”He claimed that Russia had launched a campaign to recruit gravediggers and pathologists.“There is a catastrophic shortage of people to bury the corpses and of power for even makeshift mortuaries,” he said. “To such an extent that a separate recruitment campaign for pathologists has been launched in Moscow. ”
Ukraine holds Kharkiv, but it’s still on shaky ground:
President Volodymyr Zelensky visited frontline troops in northeastern Ukraine on Sunday, marking a success for his forces who this month pushed Russian forces back from the outskirts of the country’s second-largest city, after months of shelling that killed many civilians and forced tens of thousands to flee.Mr. Zelensky received an operational update on the situation in the city, Kharkiv, and presented awards to troops, according to a statement from his office.“I want to thank each of you for your service,” Mr. Zelensky said. “You risk your life for all of us and our state.”Kharkiv, which is close to the Russian border, was a focus of a two-pronged strategy by Moscow in the north of the country when it invaded on Feb. 24, aiming to seize the city as well as the capital, Kyiv. Within weeks, Ukrainian forces had repelled Russian troops from towns north of Kyiv, but widespread shelling of Kharkiv ended only this month.
Then he fired Roman Dudin, who Zelenskyy appointed head of the security service in Kharkiv in 2020:
Quote: “I convened a meeting with the leadership of the [Kharkiv] oblast and the city [of Kharkiv]. I thanked them for having stood and continuing to stand with Kharkiv residents, with Ukraine, and – what’s particularly important right now – with one another. There is perfect cooperation between the army, the police, the mayor of Kharkiv, and the oblast state administration – they are all truly working to bring our victory closer and are doing so very effectively.Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about the local leadership of the Security Service of Ukraine. When I got here, I looked into it, and I fired the head of the Security Service in the oblast for selfishly caring only about his own interests rather than working to defend the city from the first days of the full-scale war. Law enforcement officers will find out what his motivations were.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russian shelling cost Sievierodonetsk its “critical infrastructure“:
Russian shelling has destroyed all of the critical infrastructure in the Ukrainian city of Severdonetsk, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Sunday, describing the taking of the city as Russia’s “principal aim” right now.”As a result of Russian strikes on Sievierodonetsk, all the city’s critical infrastructure is destroyed… More than two-thirds of the city’s housing stock is destroyed,” Zelenskiy said in a televised speech.”Taking Sievierodonetsk is the principal aim of the occupying contingents,” he added.
Luhansk Gov. Serhiy Haidai said officials cannot “assess casualties and damage” due to the intense shelling:
“The situation has extremely escalated,” Serhiy Haidai, the governor of Luhansk region, said on Sunday. Witnesses said the city was being bombed “200 times an hour” as Russian forces try to cut off reinforcement lines and surround its remaining defenders.Ukrainian authorities have described conditions in Sievierodonetsk as reminiscent of Mariupol, the southern port city that fell on 20 May after almost three months of relentless assault.The intensified fighting came as Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, visited Ukrainian troops on the front lines in the north-eastern Kharkiv region, in his first official appearance outside the Kyiv area since the start of the war. “You risk your lives for us all and for our country,” Zelenskiy told soldiers there.He added that Russian shelling has destroyed all of the city’s critical infrastructure and more than two-thirds of its housing stock. Taking Sievierodonetsk was Russia’s “principal aim” right now, the president said.
I don’t have time for the history lesson but there is a Moscow branch of Ukraine’s Orthodox Church. A conflict brewed in 2014, which led to a schism in 2019. Orthodox Christian leaders gave Ukraine permission to form its own church independent of Moscow.
A lot of the churches in the east chose to belong to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church-Moscow Patriarchate.
It’s odd because the disconnect happened due to Russia’s invasion in 2014. But I guess this full-scale is too much even though Russia is now sticking to the east?
You can read the full statement here.
I don’t get it:
The Moscow branch of Kyiv’s Orthodox Church said on Friday it was cutting ties with Russia over its invasion of Ukraine, declaring “full independence” in a historic move against Russia’s spiritual authorities.”We disagree with the position of Patriarch Kirill of Moscow… on the war,” the church said in a statement after holding a council focused on Russia’s “aggression” and declaring the “full independence and autonomy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church”.The Moscow branch of Ukraine’s Orthodox Church has until now formally pledged allegiance to Russia’s Patriarch Kirill, who has expressed clear support for President Vladimir Putin’s offensive in Ukraine.”The Council condemns war as a violation of God’s commandment ‘You shall not kill!’ and expresses condolences to all those who are suffering in the war,” it said.It said its relations with the Moscow leadership had been “complicated or absent” since martial law was declared in Ukraine.
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