The conquest of the eastern Ukrainian city of Sievjerodonetsk by Russian troops is imminent. The US is supplying modern missile systems to Ukraine. What happened that night in the Ukraine war.
Ukraine will not rush to recapture its territories if that means tens of thousands of victims, but will rather wait for the necessary weapons, Zelenskyy said in Kyiv on Tuesday at a meeting with Slovakian President Zuzana Caputova. For weeks he has been demanding the delivery of heavy weapons from the West in order to ward off the Russian attacks in eastern Ukraine and push back the Russian troops. As soon as these heavy weapons are available, the army should start liberating the territories occupied by Russia.
The US government will deliver advanced missile systems to Ukraine, according to President Joe Biden. Biden wrote in an op-ed for the New York Times published on Tuesday evening (local time) that the attacked country should be able to hit “key targets on the battlefield in Ukraine” more precisely. At the same time, Biden assured: “We don’t want a war between NATO and Russia.” Nor did the US attempt to overthrow Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The White House said on Tuesday evening (local time) that Ukraine had pledged not to attack targets on Russian territory with the US-made HIMARS artillery system. The system is part of a $700 million package that also includes missiles, radar systems, Javelin anti-tank weapons, helicopters, vehicles and spare parts. A senior US official said the US would supply missiles with the HIMARS system that would only have a range of around 80 kilometers.
Biden underscored that there is currently no evidence that Russia intends to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine. Russia’s “occasional nuclear saber-rattling rhetoric” is in itself dangerous and irresponsible.
The Polish government has criticized the phone calls between German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron and Russian President Vladimir Putin. “We think it’s absolutely pointless,” said Deputy Foreign Minister Szymon Szynkowski vel Sek on Tuesday on the ARD program “Maischberger”. Instead of traveling to Kyiv, Scholz calls the Kremlin boss “quite regularly” – but that doesn’t do Ukraine any good. On the contrary, it helps Russia. The talks would bring nothing more than Putin’s new credibility.
Russia’s army attacked the neighboring country at the end of February, and since then Scholz has called Putin several times. When the massacre in the Kiev suburb of Bucha became known a few days after a phone call at the end of March, radio silence reigned for six weeks. Scholz and Macron last spoke to Putin on Saturday and called for an end to the war.
With regard to arms deliveries, Germany must “finally do more” for Ukraine, Szynkowski vel Sek demanded, addressing both direct arms deliveries and ring exchange procedures. “We need concrete actions and not just words and declarations.” Nothing promised by the German side has been kept.
In the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk, Russian troops are poised to overthrow the last bastion of Ukrainian forces. If the embattled regional capital Sievjerodonetsk falls, Russia would have achieved one of its war aims: complete control of the Luhansk region. From there, the Russian troops and the Moscow-loyal separatists could advance further west to capture the strategically important cities of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk in the Donetsk region.
During the fighting in Sieverodonetsk, an incident occurred at a nitric acid chemical plant. The Ukrainian authorities spoke on Tuesday of a Russian airstrike on the plant. The pro-Russian separatists, on the other hand, announced that there had been an explosion there. A large plume of smoke could be seen in photos published by the Ukrainian governor of the Luhansk region, Serhiy Hajday, on his Telegram news channel.
Sieverodonetsk, the administrative center in the Luhansk region controlled by the Ukrainian authorities, has been contested for days. The leader of the People’s Republic of Luhansk, recognized by Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin as a state, Leonid Pasechnik, said that two-thirds of the city was now under the control of pro-Russian forces.
Ukraine’s governor Hajday said most of Sieverodonetsk is now under Russian control. Still, the Ukrainian defenders didn’t give up. Ninety percent of the city’s buildings are damaged, and 60 percent are not worth rebuilding, he said. Of the once 100,000 inhabitants, 12,000 are said to have stayed there.
President Selenskyj was combative. In his video speech he said that the Ukrainian armed forces are in a difficult situation due to the lack of weapons. Ukraine will, however, take back its territories guaranteed under international law.
The Cherson region, occupied by Russian troops, is currently cut off from the outside world. According to the Ukrainian Authority for Communications and Data Protection, all communication channels have been cut. “Residents of the region are currently without Ukrainian mobile and internet access,” it said. Landline calls at home or abroad are also not possible.
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has promised Ukraine extensive aid for reconstruction. “We not only have a moral responsibility, but also a strategic interest in taking a leading role in the reconstruction of Ukraine,” said von der Leyen in a video recording of the “Business Day” of the CDU Economic Council on Tuesday in Berlin. “We want a democratic and stable neighbor on our eastern flank who shares our values - and not a failed state at the mercy of Putin’s tyranny.”
The European Commission has therefore proposed a platform for reconstruction together with Ukraine. The aim is to bring countries, institutions and the private sector together.
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