Russia’s bombing of a school in the eastern Ukrainian village of Bilohorivka killed two people and left 60 in the debris feared dead, the governor of the Luhansk region said on Sunday.
Governor Serhiy Gaidai said Russian forces dropped a bomb on Saturday afternoon on the school where about 90 people were sheltering, causing a fire that engulfed the building.
“The fire was extinguished after nearly four hours, then the rubble was cleared, and, unfortunately, the bodies of two people were found,” Gaidai wrote on the Telegram messaging app.
“Thirty people were evacuated from the rubble, seven of whom were injured. Sixty people were likely to have died under the rubble of buildings.”
Follow the latest updates below.
09:06 AM
Putin’s forces increasingly ineffective, says MoD
Russian has become “slow to respond to setbacks and unable to alter its approach on the battlefield”, the UK’s Ministry of Defence says.
British military intelligence officials said in their latest briefing: “These issues are likely to endure given the relative lack of operational command experience of the officers promoted in place of those killed.”
Read more below.
08:58 AM
German parliament president arrives in Kyiv
The president of the German parliament Baerbel Bas arrived in Kyiv on Sunday to commemorate victims of World War Two and to hold political talks, a parliament official said on Twitter.
Enrico Brissa, Bundestag’s chief of protocol, posted on Twitter pictures of Baerbel arriving on a train and her meeting with Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal.
08:22 AM
Russia says it hit Ukrainian warship near Odesa and downed two bombers
Russia’s defence ministry said on Sunday it had destroyed a Ukrainian navy ship near Odesa with a missile strike overnight.
The ministry said its missiles had hit a ‘Project 1241’ corvette, a class of Soviet missile corvettes with a NATO reporting name of Tarantul.
Russia’s air defences also shot down two Ukrainian SU-24 bombers and a Mi-24 helicopter over the Snake island in the Black Sea at night, the ministry said in a statement.
It said a total of four Ukrainian warplanes, four helicopters and an assault boat had been destroyed over the past 24 hours. Reuters could not independently verify the report and there was no immediate comment from Ukraine.
08:05 AM
Britain pledges an extra £1.3 billion in military support to Ukraine
Britain will provide an extra £1.3 billion in military support to Ukraine in another escalation of assistance for Volodymyr Zelensky’s forces trying to repel the Russian invasion.
The funding means that the UK military spending on a conflict is at the highest rate since the campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Prime Minister, the US president and leaders from other G7 nations will hold talks with the Ukrainian leader on Sunday to discuss the new round of financial support.
The £1.3 billion package, drawn from the UK’s reserves, includes £300 million of military kit, including anti-battery radar systems to target Russian artillery, GPS-jamming equipment and night vision devices, as promised by Boris Johnson earlier this week.
07:52 AM
Watch: Ukrainian military says drone strikes destroyed Russian warship near Snake Island
[embedded content]
07:48 AM
Russians ‘trying to finish off’ Mariupol’s last defenders to gift Putin
Ukraine’s last soldiers in the port city of Mariupol face a brutal final showdown Sunday with besieging Russian forces, who are hoping to deliver a critical win ahead of the country’s victory day.
President Volodymyr Zelensky is also set to hold talks with G7 leaders via video conference to discuss the situation in his country, which fears a renewed intensity to Moscow’s offensive after the evacuation of civilians from Mariupol’s Azovstal steelworks.
The complex – the final pocket of Ukrainian resistance in the devastated port city – has taken on a symbolic value in the war, with the last soldiers holed up in tunnels and bunkers.
Taking full control of Mariupol would allow Moscow to create a land bridge between the Crimean peninsula, which it annexed in 2014, and regions run by pro-Russian separatists.
“The enemy is trying to finish off the defenders of Azovstal, they are trying to do it before May 9 to give (Russian President) Vladimir Putin a gift,” Oleksiy Arestovych, an aide to Ukraine’s president, said.
