Russia-Ukraine Crisis: Ukrainian counterattacks slowing Russian offensive in the east

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said on Friday that he "absolutely" expected the United States would eventually re-open its embassy in Ukraine, but stopped short of predicting when that would happen. Meanwhile, Russia said it would fight to take control over all east and south of Ukraine. Stay tuned for live updates.

Russian-speaking Latvians call for war''s end

Hundreds of protesters belonging to Latvia's sizable Russian-speaking community have taken part in a large-scale demonstration in the Baltic nation's capital, Riga, condemning the Kremlin regime and Moscow's aggression on Ukraine.Participants of Saturday's rally entitled “The Russian Voice Against War” waved Ukrainian flags and posters with inscriptions such as “Stop the genocide in Ukraine” and “Complete Russian gas and oil embargo” at the central Freedom Monument, Latvia's public broadcaster LSM reported.

Lviv announces curfew starting Easter night

Lviv regional governor Maksym Kozytskyy has announced a curfew starting on Orthodox Easter night.

Citing “new intelligence”, Kozytskyy said the curfew would run from 11 p.m. Saturday to 5 a.m. Sunday, and then every day between those hours until further notice.

“Unfortunately, the enemy doesn't have such a concept as a major religious holiday,” Kozytskyy wrote. “They are so beastly that they don't understand what Easter is.”

Official says Russian forces are attacking a steel plant that is the last Ukrainian stronghold in the city of Mariupol, reports AP.

'Fierce battles' in eastern Ukraine: Governors

Authorities in two eastern Ukrainian regions said Saturday that fighting with Russian forces was "fierce", as hope fades for a truce over Orthodox Easter weekend.

The governor of the eastern Kharkiv region, Oleg Sinegubov, said on Telegram that Kyiv retook three villages near the Russian border after "fierce battles".

Video shows civilians in underground shelters

A video released by the Azov regiment of Ukraine's National Guard, part of a group currently holed up in the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, shows women and children sheltering underground. Some of them have been hiding in the plant's tunnels for up to two months.

Ukraine says will try to evacuate Mariupol civilians from noon

Ukraine will make a new attempt to evacuate civilians from Mariupol, the heavily destroyed city largely controlled by Russian forces, at noon on Saturday, Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.

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Russia has resumed offensive against Ukrainian forces in Mariupol's Azovstal: Ukrainian official

Russian forces have resumed air strikes on and are trying to storm the Azovstal steel works where Ukraine's remaining forces in Mariupol are holding out, Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych said on Saturday.

"The enemy is trying to strangle the final resistance of the defenders of Mariupol in the Azovstal area," Arestovych said on national television.

Luhansk Governor Serhiy Haidai says that two people were killed by Russian shelling in the city of Popasna.

Haidai said Saturday on the messaging app Telegram that residential buildings in the region were shelled 12 times the previous day, and Popasna “got the most” of it.

“In addition to the fact that street fighting continues in the city for several weeks, the Russian army constantly fires at multistory residential buildings and private houses.

Ukrainian counterattacks slowing Russian offensive in east

Russian troops are pressing their offensive in the eastern Donbas region in an attempt to fully seize Ukraine's industrial heartland but have made little headway as fierce Ukrainian counterattacks have slowed their efforts, Ukrainian and British officials said Saturday.Russia continues to fight for full control of the Donetsk and Luhansk areas that make up the Donbas and seeks to secure “a land route between these territories and the occupied Crimea,” including by wiping out the last pocket of resistance in the besieged port city of Mariupol, Ukraine's General Staff said.

Ukraine to attempt evacuation from Mariupol on April 23

Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk says Ukraine will once again try to evacuate women, children, and the elderly from besieged Mariupol. The evacuation is to start at around 12 noon, near the Port-City shopping mall.

(The Kyiv Independent)

Ukraine says shelling of eastern Luhansk's cities intensifying

All the Ukrainian-controlled cities in the eastern region of Luhansk were constantly being shelled by Russian forces on Saturday and the barrage was intensifying, the region's governor Serhiy Haidai said on television.

Russian forces strike residential areas in Luhansk Oblast 12 times on April 22

The town of Popasna suffered the most, enduring five artillery attacks that killed two people, Luhansk Oblast Governor Serhiy Haidai said.

(The Kyiv Independent)

WHO records 162 attacks on Ukrainian healthcare facilities since Russia's full-scale invasion began

The World Health Organization said attacks on healthcare facilities between February 24 and April 16 have caused 73 deaths and 52 injuries.

(The Kyiv Independent)

Russia has not made 'any major gains', says UK Defence Ministry

Russia shifts forces for battle over Ukrainian heartland

Russiaand Ukraine hurtled toward what could be an epic battle for control of the country's industrial heartland as Ukrainian officials reported that Moscow had shifted a dozen crack military units from the shattered port of Mariupol to eastern Ukraine.

Meanwhile,Russiareported Friday that one serviceman was killed and 27 others were left missing after the fire on board the warship Moskva, which sank a week ago following what the Ukrainians boasted was a missile attack.

US ambassador to the OSCE: Russia may have used chemical weapons during in Mariupol

US Ambassador to the OSCE Michael Carpenter said Russia may have used the weapons to “disable Ukrainian fighters and civilians as part of their aggressive capture campaign against Mariupol.”

(The Kyiv Independent)

‘Ukraine was intended only as a beginning’: Zelenskyy responds to a Russian claim of broader war aims

The wider ambitions a Russian general expressed Friday — to take southern Ukraine all the way to Moldova, Ukraine’s southwest neighbour — reveal larger truths about Moscow’s agenda, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine said Friday.

“This only confirms what I have said many times,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly address to the nation. “The Russian invasion of Ukraine was intended only as a beginning, then they want to capture other countries.”

Russian occupiers raped, killed mother-daughter duo, claims report

Russian invaders raped a woman and her 15-year-old daughter before killing them, as per reports. The 17-year-old daughter of the woman stayed with the two bodies for four days to avoid discovery.

(NEXTA)

UK to reopen embassy in Kyiv

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson made the announcement at a press conference on April 22. The embassy is set to open next week after having relocated to Ukraine’s western city of Lviv before Russia’s full-scale invasion.

(The Kyiv Independent)

Russians seize 42 towns in eastern Ukraine as fighting intensifies

Ukrainian officials acknowledged Friday that Russian forces had taken more than three dozen small towns in their initial drive this week to seize eastern Ukraine, offering the first glimpse of what promises to be a grinding brawl by the Kremlin to achieve broader territorial gains in a new phase of the 2-month-old war.

(NYT)

UN secretary-general to travel to Ukraine next week

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres will travel to Ukraine next week where he is expected to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Thursday, according to a UN spokesperson.

(The Kyiv Indepedent)

G20 cannot function with Russia at the table, Canada says

The Group of 20 major economies cannot effectively function as long as Russia remains a member, Canada's finance minister said on Friday after a week of protests of Moscow's war in Ukraine at the International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings in Washington.

Discord over Russia's presence at the meetings has been on display all week, with officials from the US, Canada, Britain and other Western countries staging walkouts three days in a row whenever Russian officials spoke. - Reuters.

Russia vows to win 'full control' of east, south Ukraine

Russia said Friday it would fight to take control over all east and south of Ukraine but Kyiv pledged to save the country, as the UN documented dozens of civilians killed in one town.

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US will 'absolutely' re-open embassy in Ukraine at some point, Ukrainian PM says

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said on Friday that he "absolutely" expected the United States would eventually re-open its embassy in Ukraine, but stopped short of predicting when that would happen.

"It will happen, absolutely, but we will wait," Shmyhal told reporters at a conclusion of a visit to Washington, when asked whether he had received assurances from the United States that it would re-open its embassy.

Britain announced on Friday it would reopen its embassy in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv next week, joining other European countries that have announced such plans after Russian forces withdrew from the country's north in the face of strong Ukrainian resistance. - Reuters.