The president of Ukraine, Volodimir Zelensky, denounced hundreds of sexual abuses of women and children in areas occupied by the Russian army. Meanwhile, UNICEF asserted that the situation of the at least 3.2 million children who remain in Ukraine is increasingly dramatic, and that half of them could soon be left without access to food.
There have been almost two months of conflict and Russia, despite still not being able to take over Ukrainian territory, the government of Vladimir Putin maintains the invasion. This April 12 at a government event for Cosmonautics Day, the Russian president assured that his country “will no longer depend on the West”, and pointed out that he has “no doubts about achieving his goals in Ukraine”. .
The Kremlin leader also dismissed reports of hundreds of civilians killed in Bucha and called allegations of Russia’s use of chemical weapons “false accusations.”
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Putin also assured that it is “impossible” to isolate Russia through sanctions and said that the country will work with those partners that still support it.
“We are not going to isolate ourselves. In the modern world there is no way to strictly isolate someone and it is completely impossible to isolate a country as big as Russia,” he noted during a visit to the Vostochny Cosmodrome, the Russian space center in the far east of the country.
Putin assured that, even under Western sanctions imposed in 2014 after the annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and its support for pro-Russian separatists in Donbas, Russia’s agriculture has become a high-tech industry, reported the D.W..
abuses
The president of Ukraine, Volodimir Zelensky, denounced hundreds of sexual abuses of women and children in areas occupied by the Russian army. The president said there are thousands of victims of this crime. He also indicated that hundreds of cases of torture were recorded.
“In the areas liberated from the occupiers, the registration and investigation of war crimes committed by Russia continues. New mass graves are found almost daily,” he said in a message to the Lithuanian Parliament via videoconference.
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda stated, for his part, that “it is simply impossible to imagine greater horrors” and lamented that “some countries of the European Union still do not dare to decide when they are going to limit purchases of Russian oil.”
Several testimonies collected by the media corroborate the fears of the NGOs, who point to indications of the use of rape as a “weapon of war”. A Ukrainian woman told AFP that she was raped by two Russian soldiers when they learned that she was the wife of a Ukrainian military man.
Unicef evaluates the situation of infants
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the High Commissioner for Human Rights asserted that the situation of the at least 3.2 million children who remain in Ukraine is increasingly dramatic, and half of them could soon be left without access to food, and almost two out of three had to leave their homes.
Both organizations documented 142 dead children and another 229 wounded in the middle of the conflict. According to a Unicef statement, children, families and communities in Ukraine are under attack. And the pumps to the water system infrastructure and the lack of electricity left at least 1.4 million people without access to water in Ukraine, and another 4.6 million have limited access.
UNICEF’s director of programs, Manuel Fontaine of France, said he had been impressed by the extent of the destruction caused by the Russian invasion. “I just got back from a mission in the Ukraine. In my 31 years of service as a humanitarian operator, I have rarely seen so much damage done in such a short time,” Fontaine writes in the statement.
The entity official specified that the situation is worse in cities such as Mariupol and Kherson, where minors and their families were left for weeks without running water and sanitation services, as well as food and medical care.
The Frenchman warned that the number of casualties is likely to be higher, many caused by crossfire or the use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Even the systems that help children survive are under attack.
Bulk of displaced people from Ukraine
On the other hand, this April 12 it was learned that 90% of the Ukrainian displaced persons and refugees are women and children. This was reported by the Commissioner for Gender Parity in Ukraine, Kateryna Levchenko.
“The Ukrainian people are going through a dramatic moment and enduring heinous crimes committed by Russian soldiers. Thousands of women and children have been killed and women and children make up 90% of the displaced », he said.
The official indicated that of the total displaced, seven million had to move to other areas of the country and 4.5 million abroad.
“Ukrainian refugee women are not just victims. They have enormous human and economic potential, and that is why rapid recognition of professional and academic titles must be helped, so that they can enter the world of work in the countries that receive them,” he said, speaking via videoconference at a meeting convened by the Italian Foreign Ministry on work and female empowerment.
Russian chemical attacks
In the midst of the clashes, the deputy mayor of the city of Mariupol, Serghei Orlov, today confirmed the Azov battalion’s complaint about an alleged chemical attack on the city, which would have been carried out with phosphorus bombs.
“We cannot provide more detailed information about the nature of the bombs, but we have confirmation from the military that it happened,” Orlov told the Unian agency. He reviewed ANSA.
If Russia crosses the red line
The tensions due to the conflict remain. The former commander of the US armed forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, General David Petraeus, believes that if Russian President Vladimir Putin is proven to have ordered the use of chemical weapons in Ukraine, NATO will become involved in the conflict.
“Yes, I think there is a red line that can cause a very harsh reaction from NATO, but I don’t know where to define it. Putin has already authorized the use of chemical weapons in the past and we know that he has tactical nuclear weapons, and I believe that the world cannot turn its back if he uses them, “Petraeus said.
The general avoided answering whether US intelligence is working on the option of a Russia without Putin. “With all due respect, even if we thought about it, we wouldn’t share our plans with you or your viewers. But, finally, all the leaders leave the scene », he affirmed before the consultation.
Petraeus warned that more massacres will be discovered in Ukraine. “There will be many Bucha, because that was not a mistake, it is the modus operandi of the Russians. The atrocities will build up to the point where there will be a Srebrenica effect that will awaken the collective consciousness,” he said.
Belarus bans
For its part, the Belarusian government banned the export of salt, sugar, flour and other food products due to high demand in border areas, the government press service reported. The decision was made to protect the domestic market due to the increased demand in the border areas for food products, the presidency said in a statement.
According to the new legislation, no more than one kilogram of salt, sugar, flour, some types of cereals (buckwheat, rice, semolina, oatmeal, oat flakes, millet) can be exported from Belarus outside the Eurasian economy.
The restriction does not apply to goods purchased in duty-free shops, which are located at the border posts of Belarus, reported ANSA.
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