for more than a million Ukrainians. The road to safety in Poland is filled with checkpoints, bumper to bumper traffic and seemingly endless anticipation. Valentina di sectarian co and her family have been waiting to cross the border for more than 24 hours. They’re still nowhere near the front of the line. I don’t know what’s waiting for me and my family. We’re going into the unknown and it scares us. Everyone in their cars is willing to wait closer to the border. Even hobble busses drop people off by the dozens to cross on foot joining lines that stretched for blocks and for hours max online is taping and zip tying leftover insulation from his heating business to his daughter’s feet to make sure she’s warm while she waits for hours in the frigid cold. You just wanted to make sure that your family got here safe. Yes, he saves us. And that’s all. When they get to the front of the line max will have to stay behind. As a man of fighting age. His in laws aren’t leaving either. It’s very difficult. It’s so hard. My heart is ripped into pieces. My parents stayed back in Kiev region. I don’t know even what is going with them now. It’s so scary. Alona goodness jenko with her young daughter and God’s son in tow fled the heavy shelling of your pen just outside Kiev. It was terrible. And we left only two days ago SAT on the last train. We didn’t believe that in 24th century. It can be the real war. Valentina also fled keith. She’s never been forced from her home, but she is no stranger to tragedy. My husband died at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. Do you understand? And that’s what they are doing now. They are destroying the whole world. It is outrageous. People around the world shall not be silent. This elderly couple fled Kharkiv, but only after spending eight days sheltering in a metro station on the eighth day, an explosion shook their underground hideout. The women were hysterical. I understood this is not going to pass. This horror cannot be endured. I cannot express it. The fear the crying Children. When I saw a pregnant woman entering the metro, I understood this cannot be forgiven from here. Many have no idea where they’ll go when they get to Poland or when they might be able to come back scott mclean CNN near the polish border in Ukraine.
The Latest: Air alert declared in and around Kyiv, residents urged to get to bomb shelters quickly
An air alert was declared Wednesday morning in and around Kyiv, with residents urged to get to bomb shelters as quickly as possible.“Kyiv region – air alert. Threat of a missile attack. Everyone immediately to shelters,” regional administration head Oleksiy Kuleba said on Telegram.Here’s the latest on the Ukraine-Russia conflict as of 1:00 a.m. (Eastern):Additional air defense capabilities are the number one priority for Ukraine’s military right now, the country’s U.S. defense attache, Maj. Gen. Borys Kremenetskyi, said Tuesday after returning from a meeting at the Pentagon.An attempt to evacuate civilians and deliver badly needed food, water and medicine through a designated safe corridor failed.Poland said it would give all of its MiG-29 fighter jets to the U.S., apparently agreeing to an arrangement that would allow them to be used by Ukraine’s military.President Joe Biden announced Tuesday that the U.S. is “targeting the main artery of Russia’s economy” by banning imports of Russian oil, the latest sanction intended to punish Moscow.The U.N. human rights office says it has confirmed 474 civilian deaths in Ukraine since the Russian invasion began on Feb. 24. The office said Tuesday that the number of confirmed civilian injuries now stands at 861.The number of refugees fleeing Ukraine reached 2 million on Tuesday, according to the United Nations, the fastest exodus Europe has seen since World War II.A humanitarian crisis is unfolding in this encircled city of 430,000, and Tuesday brought no relief: An attempt to evacuate civilians and deliver badly needed food, water and medicine through a designated safe corridor failed, with Ukrainian officials saying Russian forces had fired on the convoy before it reached the city.Nearly two weeks into the invasion, the Russians have advanced deep along Ukraine’s coastline in what could establish a land bridge to Crimea, which Moscow seized from Ukraine in 2014. Mariupol, which sits on the Azov Sea, has been surrounded by Russian soldiers for days.Mariupol, said Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk, is in a “catastrophic situation.” For days, as Moscow’s forces have laid siege to Ukrainian cities, attempts to create corridors to safely evacuate civilians have stumbled amid continuing fighting and objections to the proposed routes. Ukraine has rejected Moscow’s offers of corridors that lead civilians to Russia or its ally Belarus.The Russian military has denied firing on convoys and charged that the Ukrainian side is blocking evacuation efforts.One evacuation did appear successful Tuesday, with Vereshchuk saying that 5,000 civilians, including 1,700 foreign students, had been brought out via a safe corridor from Sumy, an embattled northeastern city of a quarter-million people where overnight strikes killed 21, including two children.Natalia Mudrenko, the highest-ranking woman at Ukraine’s U.N. Mission, told the Security Council that the people of Mariupol have “been effectively taken hostage,” by the siege. Her voice shook with emotion as she described how a 6-year-old died shortly after her mother was killed by Russian shelling. “She was alone in the last moments of her life,” she said. Authorities in Mariupol planned to start digging mass graves for all the dead, though the number is unclear. The shelling has shattered buildings, and the city has no water, heat, working sewage systems or phone service.Theft has become widespread for food, clothes, even furniture, with locals referring to the practice as “getting a discount.” Some residents are reduced to scooping water from streams.With the electricity out, many people are relying on their car radios for information, picking up news from stations broadcast from areas controlled by Russian forces or Russian-backed separatists.Ludmila Amelkina, who was walking along an alley strewn with rubble and walls pocked by gunfire, said the destruction had been devastating.”We don’t have electricity, we don’t have anything to eat, we don’t have medicine. We’ve got nothing,” she said, looking skyward.Across the country, thousands are thought to have been killed, both civilians and soldiers, in nearly two weeks of fighting. Russian forces have seen their advances stopped in certain areas — including around Kyiv, the capital, where a vast armored column has been stalled for days — by fiercer resistance than expected from the Ukrainians.Late Tuesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy released a video showing him standing near the presidential offices in Kyiv. Behind him were piles of sandbags, a snow-dusted fir tree and a few cars.It was the second video in 24 hours showing him near the country’s seat of power, apparently made to dispel any doubts about whether he had fled the city.”Snow fell. It’s that kind of springtime,” he said in a soft voice. “You see, it’s that kind of wartime, that kind of springtime. Harsh. But we will win.”___Associated Press reporters from around the world contributed to this report.
An air alert was declared Wednesday morning in and around Kyiv, with residents urged to get to bomb shelters as quickly as possible.
“Kyiv region – air alert. Threat of a missile attack. Everyone immediately to shelters,” regional administration head Oleksiy Kuleba said on Telegram.
Here’s the latest on the Ukraine-Russia conflict as of 1:00 a.m. (Eastern):
- Additional air defense capabilities are the number one priority for Ukraine’s military right now, the country’s U.S. defense attache, Maj. Gen. Borys Kremenetskyi, said Tuesday after returning from a meeting at the Pentagon.
- An attempt to evacuate civilians and deliver badly needed food, water and medicine through a designated safe corridor failed.
- Poland said it would give all of its MiG-29 fighter jets to the U.S., apparently agreeing to an arrangement that would allow them to be used by Ukraine’s military.
- President Joe Biden announced Tuesday that the U.S. is “targeting the main artery of Russia’s economy” by banning imports of Russian oil, the latest sanction intended to punish Moscow.
- The U.N. human rights office says it has confirmed 474 civilian deaths in Ukraine since the Russian invasion began on Feb. 24. The office said Tuesday that the number of confirmed civilian injuries now stands at 861.
- The number of refugees fleeing Ukraine reached 2 million on Tuesday, according to the United Nations, the fastest exodus Europe has seen since World War II.
A humanitarian crisis is unfolding in this encircled city of 430,000, and Tuesday brought no relief: An attempt to evacuate civilians and deliver badly needed food, water and medicine through a designated safe corridor failed, with Ukrainian officials saying Russian forces had fired on the convoy before it reached the city.
Nearly two weeks into the invasion, the Russians have advanced deep along Ukraine’s coastline in what could establish a land bridge to Crimea, which Moscow seized from Ukraine in 2014. Mariupol, which sits on the Azov Sea, has been surrounded by Russian soldiers for days.
Mariupol, said Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk, is in a “catastrophic situation.”
For days, as Moscow’s forces have laid siege to Ukrainian cities, attempts to create corridors to safely evacuate civilians have stumbled amid continuing fighting and objections to the proposed routes. Ukraine has rejected Moscow’s offers of corridors that lead civilians to Russia or its ally Belarus.
The Russian military has denied firing on convoys and charged that the Ukrainian side is blocking evacuation efforts.
One evacuation did appear successful Tuesday, with Vereshchuk saying that 5,000 civilians, including 1,700 foreign students, had been brought out via a safe corridor from Sumy, an embattled northeastern city of a quarter-million people where overnight strikes killed 21, including two children.
Natalia Mudrenko, the highest-ranking woman at Ukraine’s U.N. Mission, told the Security Council that the people of Mariupol have “been effectively taken hostage,” by the siege. Her voice shook with emotion as she described how a 6-year-old died shortly after her mother was killed by Russian shelling. “She was alone in the last moments of her life,” she said.
Authorities in Mariupol planned to start digging mass graves for all the dead, though the number is unclear. The shelling has shattered buildings, and the city has no water, heat, working sewage systems or phone service.
Theft has become widespread for food, clothes, even furniture, with locals referring to the practice as “getting a discount.” Some residents are reduced to scooping water from streams.
With the electricity out, many people are relying on their car radios for information, picking up news from stations broadcast from areas controlled by Russian forces or Russian-backed separatists.
Ludmila Amelkina, who was walking along an alley strewn with rubble and walls pocked by gunfire, said the destruction had been devastating.
“We don’t have electricity, we don’t have anything to eat, we don’t have medicine. We’ve got nothing,” she said, looking skyward.
Across the country, thousands are thought to have been killed, both civilians and soldiers, in nearly two weeks of fighting. Russian forces have seen their advances stopped in certain areas — including around Kyiv, the capital, where a vast armored column has been stalled for days — by fiercer resistance than expected from the Ukrainians.
Late Tuesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy released a video showing him standing near the presidential offices in Kyiv. Behind him were piles of sandbags, a snow-dusted fir tree and a few cars.
It was the second video in 24 hours showing him near the country’s seat of power, apparently made to dispel any doubts about whether he had fled the city.
“Snow fell. It’s that kind of springtime,” he said in a soft voice. “You see, it’s that kind of wartime, that kind of springtime. Harsh. But we will win.”
___
Associated Press reporters from around the world contributed to this report.
Air alert declared in and around Kyiv, residents urged to get to bomb shelters quickly Source link Air alert declared in and around Kyiv, residents urged to get to bomb shelters quickly