LVIV, Ukraine, April 12 (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday defended the war in Ukraine as a “noble” mission that would achieve its goals as his troops massed for a new offensive amid allegations of rape, brutality against civilians and possible use of chemical weapons.
Ukrainian officials urged civilians to flee eastern areas ahead of the anticipated offensive, while the battle for the southern port city of Mariupol was reaching a decisive phase, with Ukrainian marines holed up in the Azovstal industrial district.
“Its goals are absolutely clear and noble,” Putin said. “We didn’t have a choice. It was the right decision.”
He was due to meet his ally, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, to discuss Ukraine and Western sanctions while there.
Putin has cast what he calls a “special military operation” as a confrontation with the United States which he says is threatening Russia by meddling in its backyard. The West says it is a brutal land grab of a sovereign country.
Russian MP Alexei Veller claims Ukraine had to be invaded because "in essence, the US has been conducting its own special operation [against Russia] for many decades" pic.twitter.com/cHUKykommU
— Francis Scarr (@francska1) April 12, 2022
Since he sent his troops over the border on Feb. 24, about a quarter of Ukraine’s 44 million population have been forced from their homes, cities turned into rubble, and thousands of people have been killed or injured – many of them civilians.
PHOSPHOROUS
Ukrainian Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Malyar said the government was checking unverified information that Russia may have used chemical weapons while besieging Mariupol.
“There is a theory that these could be phosphorous munitions,” Malyar said in televised comments.
The governor of the eastern Donetsk region, Pavlo Kyrylenko, said he had seen incident reports on possible chemical weapons use in Mariupol but could not confirm them.
“We know that last night around midnight a drone dropped some so-far unknown explosive device, and the people that were in and around the Mariupol metal plant, there were three people, they began to feel unwell,” he told CNN.
They were taken to hospital and their lives were not in danger, he said.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy had said on Monday night that Russia could resort to chemical weapons as it massed troops in Donbas for a new assault. He did not say if they actually had been used. The United States and Britain said they were trying to verify the reports.
Chemical weapons production, use and stockpiling is banned under the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention. Although condemned by human rights groups, white phosphorous is not banned under the convention.
Russia’s defence ministry has not responded to a Reuters request for comment. Russian-backed separatist forces in the east denied using chemical weapons in Mariupol, the Interfax news agency reported.
REDOUBLING EFFORTS
After their troops got bogged down in the face of Ukrainian resistance, the Russians abandoned their bid to capture the capital Kyiv. But they are redoubling their efforts in the east.
The governor of Luhansk region, Serhiy Gaidai, urged residents to evacuate using agreed humanitarian corridors.
“It’s far more scary to remain and burn in your sleep from a Russian shell,” he wrote on social media. “Evacuate, with every day the situation is getting worse. Take your essential items and head to the pickup point.”
A humanitarian corridor had also been agreed from Mariupol, Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.
Zelenskiy pleaded overnight for more weapons from the West to help it end the siege of Mariupol and fend off the expected eastern offensive.
“Unfortunately we are not getting as much as we need to end this war faster…in particular, to lift the blockade of Mariupol,” he said.
In an address to the Lithuanian parliament, Zelenskiy urged the European Union to impose sanctions on all Russian banks and Russian oil and to set a deadline for ending imports of Russian gas.
“We cannot wait,” he said.
The withdrawal of Russian forces from the outskirts of Kyiv brought more allegations of war crimes, including executions and rape of women.
United Nations official Sima Bahous told the Security Council on Monday: “We are increasingly hearing of rape and sexual violence.” read more
Kateryna Cherepakha, president of rights group La Strada-Ukraine, told the council via video: “Violence and rape is used now as a weapon of war by Russian invaders in Ukraine.”
Russia’s deputy U.N. ambassador denied the allegations. The
Russian defence ministry said Ukraine’s government was being directed by the United States to sow false evidence of Russian violence against civilians despite what it said was Moscow’s “unprecedented measures to save civilians”.
Euan MacDonald tweeted “It looks like the Kremlin wants to repopulate parts of the Russian Far East with deported Ukrainians. It probably then wants to send Russians to repopulate the areas of Ukraine cleared of Ukrainians (like was done in Crimea), in a sort of ethnic-cleansing merry-go-round.”
It looks like the Kremlin wants to repopulate parts of the Russian Far East with deported Ukrainians. It probably then wants to send Russians to repopulate the areas of Ukraine cleared of Ukrainians (like was done in Crimea), in a sort of ethnic-cleansing merry-go-round. https://t.co/rbhR1hkVUy
— Euan MacDonald (@Euan_MacDonald) April 12, 2022
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Source: Reuters, Reporting by Reuters bureaus; Writing by Simon Cameron-Moore and Angus MacSwan; Editing by Lincoln Feast and Nick Macfie