Russian shelling on school, centre leaves 21 dead in east Ukr town
Kyiv: At least 21 people of an east Ukrainian town died on Thursday in shelling by Russian forces, local officials said. Russia's war against the east European nation was its fourth week, leaving hundreds dead and thousands injured, and prompting one of the worst refugee crises in Europe since the Second World War.
According to an AFP report, artillery fire hit a school and a cultural centre in the town of Merefa outside the city of Kharkiv. Of the wounded, 10 people are in serious condition.
Russian forces have continued to batter Ukrainian cities even as talks between the two sides continue.
Hundreds of civilians are feared trapped inside a theatre that has been smashed by a Russian airstrike in the besieged city of Mariupol, Ukrainian officials said. A photo released by Mariupol's city council showed an entire section of the 3-storeyed theatre — where the civilians had taken shelter — collapsed after the strike on Wednesday evening. However, some hope emerged as one of the officials said some people had managed to survive the strike.
Rubble had buried the entrance to the shelter inside the theatre, and the number of casualties was unclear, Pavlo Kyrylenko, head of the Donetsk regional administration, said on Telegram. Ukrainian parliament member Sergiy Taruta, a former governor of the Donetsk region where Mariupol is located, later said on Facebook that some people had managed to escape alive from the destroyed building. He did not provide any further details.
Kyrylenko said Russian airstrikes also hit a municipal swimming pool complex in Mariupol where civilians, including women and children, had been sheltering. Now there are pregnant women and women with children under the rubble there, he wrote, thought the number of casualties was not immediately known.
The airstrike ripped apart the centre of the once-elegant building, where hundreds of civilians had been living since their homes had been destroyed in the fighting, Ukraine's foreign ministry said in a statement.
Many people were buried in the rubble, the statement said, though there was no immediate word on how many had been killed or injured. Satellite imagery from Monday showed the word CHILDREN written in Russian in large, white capital letters on the pavement in front of and behind the building, the Maxar space technology company said.
"My heart breaks from what Russia is doing to our people," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly address, calling for more sanctions on Russia after the bombing.
Zelenskyy called for more help for his country in a video address to German lawmakers on Thursday, saying thousands of people have been killed in the war that started almost a month ago, including 108 children.
The Ukrainian President called on Germany in an emotional video address before Parliament on Thursday to help destroy a new "wall" Russia was erecting in Europe.
"It's not a Berlin Wall - it is a Wall in central Europe between freedom and bondage and this Wall is growing bigger with every bomb" dropped on Ukraine," Zelenskyy told MPs.
Appearing on a screen in his now trademark khaki t-shirt with dark rings under his eyes, he was welcomed by MPs in the Bundestag lower house with a standing ovation.
In a speech steeped in historical imagery from Germany's triumph over its Cold War division, Zelenskyy addressed German chancellor Olaf Scholz directly with a call for greater solidarity with Ukraine.
"Dear Mr Scholz, tear down this Wall," he implored, evoking US President Ronald Reagan's 1987 appeal in Berlin.
"Give Germany the leadership role that you in Germany deserve."
However, he coupled his flattery with a strong rebuke of Berlin's years-long reluctance to stand up to Moscow and sever its strong energy and business ties with Russia.
"We turned to you," he said. "We told you that Nord Stream (gas pipelines) was a kind of preparation for the war."
"And the answer we got was purely economic - it is economy, economy, economy but that was the mortar for the new Wall."
The Russian defense ministry, however, denied bombing the theatre or anywhere else in Mariupol on Wednesday.
Reacting to US President referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin as a "war criminal," Kremlin Press Secretary said that Biden's comments as "unacceptable and unforgivable rhetoric".
The Kremlin on Thursday also dismissed reports of "major progress" in ongoing talks with Ukraine to end the war that was now in its fourth week. Moscow blamed Kyiv for slowing the negotiations. The fresh round of talks between representatives of the two warring nations that began on Monday, after multiple failed attempts, will continue on Thursday.
"On the whole, that's wrong," Bloomberg quoted Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov as saying. Peskov further said Ukraine seemed to be "in no rush", while Russian negotiators were ready to work around the clock.
Meanwhile, at least one person was killed and three wounded after the remains of a downed missile hit a residential building in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, Ukraine's emergency service said on Thursday.
In Kyiv, residents huddled in homes and shelters during a citywide curfew that was set to run until Thursday morning, as Russian troops shelled areas in and around the city, including a residential neighbourhood 2.5 kilometres (1.5 miles) from the presidential palace. A 12-storeyed apartment building in central Kyiv erupted in flames after being hit by shrapnel.
Meanwhile, the UN's top court on Wednesday ordered Russia to suspend its invasion of Ukraine, saying it was "profoundly concerned" by Moscow's use of force. "The Russian Federation shall immediately suspend military operations that it commenced on 24 February on the territory of Ukraine," pending the final decision in the case, presiding judge Joan Donoghue told the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
India's judge at the ICJ, Justice Dalveer Bhandari, also voted against Russia. Justice Bhandari was nominated to the ICJ entirely on the support of the government and various missions over a period of time.
