The mayor of southern Ukraine’s Melitopol was kidnapped on Friday by Russian soldiers occupying the city, Volodymyr Zelensky said.
“A group of 10 occupiers kidnapped the mayor of Melitopol Ivan Fedorov,” Ukraine’s parliament said on Twitter.
It said the mayor was seized when he was at the city’s crisis centre dealing with supply issues.
In a video message late on Friday, Mr Zelensky confirmed the abduction, calling Mr Fedorov “a mayor who bravely defends Ukraine and the members of his community”.
“This is obviously a sign of weakness of the invaders… They have moved to a new stage of terror in which they are trying to physically eliminate representatives of legitimate local Ukrainian authorities,” he said.
“The capture of the mayor of Melitopol is therefore a crime, not only against a particular person, against a particular community, and not only against Ukraine. It is a crime against democracy itself… The acts of the Russian invaders will be regarded like those of Islamic State terrorists.”
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03:12 AM
UN experts say Russian media law amounts to information ‘blackout’
A Russian law giving Moscow stronger powers to crack down on independent journalism is placing Russia under a “total information blackout” on the war in Ukraine, UN independent experts said on Friday.
Moscow last week blocked Facebook and other websites and passed a law that imposed a prison term of up to 15 years for spreading intentionally “fake” news about the military.
The move prompted the BBC, Bloomberg and other foreign media to suspend reporting in the country, although the BBC said it was resuming English-language reporting from Russia on March 8 because of the “urgent need to report from inside Russia”.
“Russia’s recent adoption of a punitive ‘fake war news’ law is an alarming move by the government to gag and blindfold an entire population,” three independent U.N. experts appointed by the top U.N. rights body, the Human Rights Council, said in a statement.
03:09 AM
Russian rapper Face denounces the war on Instagram
The popular Russian rapper Face has taken to Instagram where he has 1.7 million followers to denounce the war on Ukraine, according to local media.
He joins a growing number of Russian performers taking a stance against the war.
Nadya Tolokonnikova, the founding member of the anti-government band Pussy Riot recently shouted “F**** Putin” at a concert in New York.
Russia has threatened to imprison anyone who criticises the war for up to 15 years.
02:50 AM
$700m superyacht may belong to Putin, say US officials
A $700m superyacht being repaired in an Italian dry dock may belong to Vladimir Putin, according to US intelligence officials.
The ownership of the 459ft Scheherazade has come under close scrutiny since Russia’s unprovoked assault on Ukraine, and the vessel could be associated with Mr Putin, intelligence officials told The New York Times.
American officials told the newspaper that no final conclusions on ownership have been made, but the link backs up a claim made by a former crew member that it was for Mr Putin’s use.
The officials say that Mr Putin keeps little of his personal wealth in his own name, instead using homes and boats that are held in the name of Russian oligarchs.
02:42 AM
Pictured: Scenes of devastation in the city of Kharkiv as a building that housed a school is ruined by Russian attacks
02:24 AM
Russia squeezes Kyiv as ‘unimaginable’ tragedy looms in Ukraine
Russian forces inched towards Kyiv and pounded civilian areas in other Ukrainian cities Friday, drawing warnings of “unimaginable tragedy”.
Sixteen days after Moscow shocked the world by invading Ukraine, the United Nations and others said it may be committing war crimes in cities such as Mariupol, which for days now has been besieged by Vladimir Putin’s forces.
On Friday officials in the southern port said more than 1,500 people had been killed during 12 days of attacks.
Survivors have been trying to flee Russian bombardment in a freezing city left without water or heating, and running out of food. The situation is “desperate,” a Doctors Without Borders official said.
“Hundreds of thousands of people… are for all intents and purposes besieged,” Stephen Cornish, one of those heading the medical charity’s Ukraine operation, told AFP in an interview.
“Sieges are a medieval practice that have been outlawed by the modern rules of war for good reason.”
As Russia widens its bombardment and talks between Moscow and Kyiv seemingly go nowhere, Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelensky’s pleas for NATO to intervene have grown increasingly desperate.
02:14 AM
US sanctions Russian board members at Novikombank and ABR Management
The US on Friday sanctioned several board members at Novikombank and ABR Management, including Vice Governor of St. Petersburg Vladimir Nikolaevich Knyaginin, over the Ukraine crisis, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said.
In mid-February, Russia’s lower house of parliament voted to ask Mr Putin to recognise two Russian-backed breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine as independent.
Eleven members and speaker Vyacheslav Volodin were added to the sanctions list on Friday.
“Today’s designations further hold to account those actors who were directly responsible for Russia’s illegitimate and unlawful recognition … and facilitating the sham pretext used by Putin to justify the … unprovoked war against Ukraine,” the Treasury said.
Justifying the move at the time, Mr Volodin said: “Kyiv is not observing the Minsk agreements. Our citizens and compatriots who live in Donbass need our help and support.” The Minsk agreements are a pair of accords signed in 2014 and 2015 in the hope of ending violence between pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine and the Kyiv government.
Russia calls its actions in Ukraine a “special operation” that it says is not designed to occupy territory but to destroy its southern neighbor’s military capabilities and capture what it regards as dangerous nationalists.
02:04 AM
US imposes new sanctions on Russian billionaire and members of Putin spokesman’s family
The United States on Friday imposed sanctions on Russian billionaire Viktor Vekselberg, three family members of President Vladimir Putin’s spokesperson and lawmakers in the latest punishment for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Those hit by Friday’s sanctions include 10 people on the board of VTB Bank, the second-largest lender in Russia, and 12 members of the Duma, Russia’s lower house of parliament, the U.S. Treasury Department said in a statement.
“Treasury continues to hold Russian officials to account for enabling Putin’s unjustified and unprovoked war,” Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said.
Putin’s spokesperson Dmitry Peskov was targeted on March 3. Friday’s measures extend to his wife and two adult children. They lead “luxurious lifestyles that are incongruous with Peskov’s civil servant salary,” the Treasury said in a news release.
The Kremlin did not immediately reply to a Reuters request for comment.
01:45 AM
Don’t send your children, Zelensky tells Russian mothers
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky on Saturday called on the mothers of Russian soldiers to prevent their sons being sent to war in Ukraine.
“I want to say this once again to Russian mothers, especially mothers of conscripts. Do not send your children to war in a foreign country,” Zelensky said in a video address released on Telegram.
“Check where your son is. And if you have the slightest suspicion that your son could be sent to war against Ukraine, act immediately” to prevent him being killed or captured, he said.
“Ukraine never wanted this terrible war. And Ukraine does not want it. But it will defend itself as much as necessary,” he added.
On Wednesday, Russia for the first time acknowledged the presence of conscripts in Ukraine and announced that a number of them had been taken prisoner.
