ADMITED RAPIST

Court refuses to drop rape charge against actor Gerard Depardieu


Prosecutors say there is 'serious' evidence against Gerard Depardieu

 (AFP/Tiziana FABI)

Guillaume DAUDIN, Jurgen HECKER
Thu, March 10, 2022

A Paris court on Thursday rejected a bid by Gerard Depardieu to have rape charges against him dropped, the chief prosecutor in the case said, raising the prospect of a trial for the iconic French actor.

Depardieu, 73, was charged with raping and sexually assaulting a young French actress at his home in Paris in 2018, an accusation he has called "baseless".

But Paris chief prosecutor Remy Heitz said in a statement that there was "serious and confirmed evidence that justifies Gerard Depardieu to remain charged" in the case brought by the actress, Charlotte Arnould.

The case will now go back to the prosecuting magistrate who is to resume her work on the case, Heitz said.

Arnould, who was present in the courthouse, declined to comment on the decision, but her lawyer, Carine Durrieu-Diebolt, told AFP that her client was "relieved".

Depardieu's lawyer, Herve Temime, declined to comment.

Arnould filed her complaint in the summer of 2018 when she was 22, saying she had been raped twice by Depardieu in his swank Left Bank mansion in the French capital a few days earlier.

Prosecutors dropped the case in June 2019, citing lack of evidence, but it was reopened the following year after Arnould filed a new complaint.

- 'Trying to survive' -

The actor was charged in December 2020 but not jailed, or even ordered under judicial supervision.

One year later, Arnould revealed her identity on Twitter, saying: "I am Depardieu's victim. He was charged one year ago. He is working, while all I am doing is trying to survive."

Depardieu is a friend of Arnould's family and has known her since she was a child.

In 1991, Time magazine asked Depardieu about a 1978 interview in Film Comment magazine in which he described his rough childhood and was quoted as saying "I had plenty of rapes, too many to count".

Asked if he had participated in the rapes, he told Time that he had. "But it was absolutely normal in those times," the actor said.

Depardieu later denied making the remarks and threatened to sue the magazine, but Time refused to retract the passage, saying the interview had been recorded on tape.

Depardieu became a star in France from the 1980s with roles in "The Last Metro", "Police" and "Cyrano de Bergerac", before Peter Weir's "Green Card" also made him a Hollywood celebrity.

He later acted in global productions, including Kenneth Branagh's "Hamlet", Ang Lee's "Life of Pi" and Netflix's "Marseille" series.

In 2013, he sparked an outcry by leaving France and taking Russian nationality to protest a proposed tax hike on the rich in his homeland.

Depardieu, a friend of Russian President Vladimir Putin, last week came out against the war in Ukraine and called for negotiations.

"I am against this fratricidal war. I say 'stop the weapons and negotiate'," Depardieu said.

Depardieu currently stars in two films showing in French cinemas. In one he plays the role of Maigret, the fictional police detective created by writer Georges Simenon, who investigates the murder of a young girl.

In the other, "Robust", he plays an ageing, jaded actor who develops a relationship with a young female security guard.

gd-jpa/jh/yad

 THE WAR IN UKRAINE TWO VIEWS

UKRAINE

RUSSIA

WAR DESTROYS CAPITAL FOR CAPITALI$TS
War has destroyed $100 bn in Ukraine assets so far: official


Ukraine needs a "recovery fund" to rebuild the economy after the damage already inflicted by the Russian invasion (AFP/Aris Messinis) (Aris Messinis)

Thu, March 10, 2022, 8:02 AM·2 min read

The Russian invasion has so far destroyed about $100 billion in roads, bridges and businesses in Ukraine, dealing a huge hit to its economy, a Kyiv government official said Thursday.

"Currently around 50 percent of our businesses are not operating, and those which are still operating are not operating at 100 percent," said Oleg Ustenko, chief economic advisor to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

"The situation in terms of economic growth, is going to be really very depressing, even if the war immediately stops," he said in a virtual speech to the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

Ustenko repeated his call for European and other governments to cut off Moscow's access to "blood money" by boycotting Russian oil and natural gas.

"Europeans are still paying to this monster in order to kill our people, innocent people," he said.

While European nations rely on Russian energy for heat, "I can assure you it's much, much, much colder in the underground of Ukraine where the people are hidden."

The official praised the US for halting imports of Russian oil and said he hoped Washington would also help create a "recovery fund" for Ukraine.

Kyiv also could use the approximately $300 billion in Russian central bank reserves frozen as a result of Western sanctions, as well as funds seized from oligarchs who are allies of President Vladimir Putin.

"We have to rebuild the economy," he said.

The International Monetary Fund on Wednesday approved $1.4 billion in fast-disbursing aid for Ukraine, and the World Bank this week released nearly $500 million of what is expected to be a $3 billion financing package.

In addition, the US Congress on Wednesday approved $14 billion in aid for Ukraine.

But Ustenko said, "what we need most of all is more weapons and ammunition. This is critically important."

hs/dw

Kyiv maternity unit becomes frontline clinic after attack






Shrapnel smashed a window at the Leleka clinic in northern Kyiv as a young mother was resting after giving birth (AFP/Sergei SUPINSKY)

Dave CLARK
Thu, March 10, 2022, 

A young Ukrainian mother was recovering after giving birth to twins in one of Kyiv's top maternity hospitals when shrapnel punched a hole in the window, scattering shattered glass inside.

The next day, after a night in a bunker, she and the other mothers and babies were evacuated and the clinic became a frontline aid station for wounded soldiers and civilians.

On Thursday, with the world stunned by the far more devastating Russian strike on another maternity unit in the southern city of Mariupol, the hospital director had a message for Western leaders.

Valeriy Zukin was a world-renowned expert in maternal health and CEO of a private clinic in the wooded suburbs of northern Kyiv. Now he is running emergency care for the war wounded.

He does not want humanitarian aid from the West -- he wants Ukraine to have political and military support, to enable it to see off the Russian invasion without surrender.

"I have lots of questions from abroad: 'Which kinds of humanitarian therapy do you need?' I prefer to buy the pills, not to receive from charity," he told AFP.

"It's like asking a man with a noose round his neck if he needs water. First get the noose off our necks."

Zukin's Leleka clinic, a short distance from the frontline village of Horenka, has not suffered the massive destruction of the Mariupol maternity hospital which was hit by Russian air strikes on Wednesday, triggering global outrage.

But the glass in the front door of the hospital was shattered by shrapnel, and there are two holes in the facade, one where the post-natal recovery room hosting the recovering mother was hit.

Now the mothers and babies are gone, sent home or moved to hospitals further from the guns, in central Kyiv.

But Leleka remains open, and an olive green military ambulance -- itself pockmarked by shrapnel hits -- is parked behind the statue of a stork bearing a child.

- Outgoing artillery -

And in the wintry woods around the clinic there's the dull thud of outgoing artillery and mortar fire -- the Russian forces are now barely six kilometres (four miles) away.

The job of bringing wounded civilians to the clinic falls to 43-year-old Vasyl Oksak, the local commander in Ukraine's civil rescue service.

"There have been harsh clashes some six kilometres from here," the 43-year-old told AFP.

"Our soldiers are here, repelling the enemy. The evacuation of civilians is underway from the parts of the village where there is no fighting currently."

His area includes the village of Horenka, a loosely spread community of modest detached homes and gardens on the edge of the municipal boundary.

Several of the homes have been hit by Grad missiles, fired from Russian truck-mounted multiple-launch rocket systems.

One house stands roofless and burnt out while behind it the plastic walls of a greenhouse have been ripped by the blast, exposing a full crop of spring crocuses to the chill blast of winter.

Many of the damaged homes are deserted, with listless dogs and cats wandering among the broken glass, begging for food from strangers and nosing at the frozen water in their bowls.

Chickens have the run of debris-strewn gardens, which often have corrugated metal fences, now twisted and flapping in the wind and punctured with holes from missile shrapnel.

- Direct hit -

"The shell hit this wall and there was a natural gas pipe," Oksak told AFP during a tour of the wreckage, uncovering a twisted lump of metal that had been ripped into dangerous projectiles.

"This is a child's chair, these are a child's shoes," he said. "See this, this was a child's room. Children were living here."

Nearby, a white minibus was completely destroyed by a direct hit, but soldiers walking between their checkpoints paid it no more attention than they do to the sound of tanks manoeuvring in the woods.

According to local retiree Nataliya Mykolaivna, 64, the minibus had belonged to volunteers bringing supplies and gifts to frontline soldiers and hard-pressed residents.

"These guys drove here and stopped their van. They had some boxes with sweets. We were standing over there and they told us, 'Come here, let us give you some sweets'," she said.

"We approached, five or six people. They were about to give us some boxes and suddenly they were targeted," she said. "Yes, they were targeted, it was a direct hit."

dc/er/imm

War in Ukraine: In Kyiv, residents and foreign fighters are determined to defend the city

Half the population of Kyiv has fled since the Russian invasion began, its mayor Vitali Klitschko said Thursday (March 10), as Moscow's forces press ever closer to the Ukrainian capital. "A little less than two million people have currently left. However, Kyiv has been transformed into a fortress. Every street, every building, every checkpoint has been fortified," he told Ukraine television.

HINDU NATIONALISM ON THE RISE
Modi's party retains Indian mega-state





Media projections indicated the BJP would be the first party to retain power in India's most populous state since 1985

 (AFP/SANJAY KANOJIA)


Archana THIYAGARAJAN
Thu, March 10, 2022,

A firebrand monk and poster boy of Hindu nationalism retained power in India's most populous state Thursday, in a triumph for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's ruling party.

With just two delayed results outstanding the BJP had 254 seats in the 403-seat Uttar Pradesh state parliament, the election commission website showed.

Its majority was reduced but it was the first party to be re-elected in the state of more than 200 million people for 37 years.

The win strengthens local BJP chief Yogi Adityanath's chances of eventually succeeding Modi as an even more divisive prime minister of the world's largest democracy.


It was a "historic victory", Adityanath tweeted after addressing celebrating supporters in state capital Lucknow, attributing it to "the good governance, security, nationalism and the heartwarming guidance of respected PM Narendra Modi".

The BJP, helped by its deep pockets and influence on social media -- including through misinformation, according to AFP and other fact-checking organisations -- also held the other three states where it was the incumbent.

In the last of the five polls being held, Punjab, the opposition Congress -- the only other pan-national party -- was crushed by the left-leaning Aam Aadmi Party in a humiliating defeat.

At the BJP national headquarters in New Delhi, Modi said pundits would proclaim the results had "sealed the fate" of the next general election, due in 2024.

- 'Darker shade of saffron' -

Uttar Pradesh, home to more people than Brazil, is India's biggest state-level political prize, sending the most MPs to the national parliament.

Adityanath's sectarian rhetoric -- coupled with a hardline approach on crime and claims of economic performance in one of India's poorest states -- proved a vote winner, experts said.

"Just like there are Islamic countries and Buddhist countries, we should become a Hindu country," BJP supporter Neera Sinha Varsha told AFP in Uttar Pradesh state capital Lucknow.

During the campaign, Adityanath railed against "anti-nationals" -- seen as a euphemism for Muslims who make up around one-fifth of the northern state's population.

News network The Wire analysed Adityanath's public speeches and found 100 distinct instances of "patterns of straightforward hate speech, anti-Muslim dog-whistling... and a chilling focus on Hindu supremacist rhetoric".

"Yogi has positioned himself as a darker shade of saffron (the colour of Hinduism) than Modi in the last five years," said journalist and Modi biographer Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.

The victory is a "big endorsement of the kind of aggressive and hard-nosed politics that he has been pursuing", he told AFP.

- 'Biggest winner' -

Adityanath, 49, rose from humble beginnings to become head priest of an important Hindu temple and founded a vigilante youth group.

Its volunteers regularly rough up Muslims and low-caste Dalits accused of slaughtering cows -- sacred to Hindus -- or of seeking to seduce women from India's majority religion.

After coming to power in Uttar Pradesh in 2017, his administration brought in a law to ban "love jihad" -- Muslims marrying Hindus to convert them -- and has targeted journalists and others with what critics call spurious "sedition" charges.

Media reports say more than 100 alleged criminals -- most of them Muslims or Dalits -- have been victims of extra-judicial police killings, a charge Adityanath denies.

And his government is widely seen as having bungled its response to Covid-19, including by concealing the real death toll.

But he won his own seat in Gorakhpur with more than 66 percent of the vote.

Michael Kugelman of the Wilson Center tweeted that Adityanath "may be the biggest winner" from the polls.

"The BJP's performance in UP will likely strengthen his case within the party brass to be viewed as the eventual successor to Narendra Modi," he added.

Congress's humiliation in Punjab further erodes the claim of the Gandhi dynasty's once-mighty party to be the only national alternative to the BJP.

The victor in Punjab, the AAP, already runs the capital New Delhi and hopes to supplant Congress as the second-biggest party in other upcoming state elections.

"This revolution first happened in Delhi, now it has happened in Punjab and next it will happen in the rest of the country," AAP head and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said.

abh-bb-stu/slb/lb/st

SEE LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for HINDUISM IS FASCISM 

Balkan Orthodox faithful anguished by 'ungodly' Ukraine war

He condemned "the human Antichrist who pretends to believe in God and in patriotism"

rAid for Ukrainian refugees in the parish house attached to a church in Bucharest where Romanian Orthodox priest Georgian Paunoiu officiates

 (AFP/Mihai Barbu)

Mihaela RODINA with Vessela SERGUEVA in Sofia
Thu, March 10, 2022

Romanian Orthodox priest Georgian Paunoiu is tormented by Russia's invasion of Ukraine and how followers of the same religion became embroiled in such a bloody conflict.

He is not alone in his anguish.

Both in Romania and neighbouring Bulgaria, religious leaders from the two countries' churches have expressed sympathy for Ukraine and condemned the invasion of one Orthodox country by another.

Rolling up the sleeves of his cassock, Paunoiu offers "prayers but above all good deeds" to bring a "sliver of comfort and hope" to Ukrainians.

"The images of small children fleeing, tired and hungry, holding their mothers' hands, are just heartbreaking," 45-year-old Paunoiu -- himself a father of three -- tells AFP.

- 'Our hearts are trembling' -

In the parish house attached to Bucharest's St Ecaterina Church where Pauniou officiates, aid for refugees is piled all the way up to the bathroom -- blankets, food, medicine and even a wheelchair.

A first convoy from the church carrying aid to the Ukrainian border left on Wednesday to help some of the tens of thousands of refugees crossing into Romania daily.

"Our hearts are trembling," says Paunoiu, who says he has been cheered by the willingness of his flock to donate.

Aurelian Reit, priest of the St Trinity parish in the central city of Brasov, had a similar reaction when he made an appeal for donations.

There was an "unexpected flood" of worshippers bringing mattresses, duvets, tents and sanitary products.

"We filled 132 crates, and some are already on the way," Reit told AFP.

"As long as the war continues, this outpouring of solidarity will continue," he says, adding that 63 Ukrainian children have been welcomed at the community centre attached to his church.

- 'Human Antichrist' -

In Bulgaria, Patriarch Neophyte has urged the faithful to "pray for an immediate end to the war".

"Let us open our hearts to our brothers who are suffering and let us help them!" he said at a prayer marking the beginning of Lent, openly taking the Ukrainian side despite his church's perceived closeness to Russia.

In a March 3 address, Metropolitan Nikolay of Plovdiv openly criticised the "war which has pitted Orthodox Christians against each other".

"Russia has attacked Ukraine. It is so ungodly!" he thundered.

"This is not a war for our faith, but a war fed by pride, which is wounding the Orthodox church."

Hundreds of Ukrainian refugees will be hosted in Bulgaria's monasteries.

Romania's Patriarch Daniel similarly voiced his "grave concern" at the invasion launched "by Russia against a sovereign, independent state".

The spokesman for the patriarch's office, Vasile Banescu, went further, denouncing the "cynical complicity of the opulent Patriarch" Kirill, head of Russia's Orthodox Church, with a "murderous" government.

He condemned "the human Antichrist who pretends to believe in God and in patriotism," in a thinly veiled reference to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Kirill has called Moscow's opponents in Ukraine "evil forces" bent on breaking the historic bonds between the two countries.

But in the small room where he sorts the donations for refugees, Paunoiu rejects the idea that true Christians could have started this war.

He reaches for a particularly apt quotation of Jesus: "Blessed are the peacemakers."

vs-mr/anb/jsk/raz

Russian families fall out over clashing views of war in Ukraine

Russian police detain an anti-war protester in Moscow. 

PHOTO: EPA-EFE

PUBLISHED
MAR 9, 2022, 

GDANSK (REUTERS) - When Russian actor Jean-Michel Scherbak wrote on social media that he was ashamed his country had started a war in Ukraine, his mother, a longtime supporter of Russian President Vladimir Putin, blocked him online.

"She texted me on Facebook saying that I was a traitor and that I had made my choice," Scherbak, 30, an actor and head of a production studio's press relations, told Reuters by telephone.

He declined to say which European country he was speaking from, but said he was outside Russia.

The falling out between mother and son over the war in Ukraine is one of many to divide Russian families and friends since the fighting broke out on Feb 24.

Ukraine and its allies call Russia's actions a brutal invasion that has killed hundreds of civilians. Apartment blocks have been reduced to rubble, towns have been evacuated and nearly two million Ukrainians have fled the country. Kyiv has accused Moscow of war crimes.

Putin says Russia launched a special operation to destroy its neighbour's military capabilities and remove what it regards as dangerous nationalists in Kyiv. Russia denies it has targeted civilians.

Russian and international media have covered the conflict very differently. Most Russians get their news about Ukraine from pro-Kremlin outlets, which present a radically different interpretation of what is happening to others.

The Russian state polling agency VTsIOM said Putin's approval rating had risen 6 percentage points to 70 per cent in the week to Feb 27. FOM, which provides research for the Kremlin, said his rating had risen 7 percentage points to 71 per cent in the same period.

But thousands of Russians have also turned out to demonstrate against the war. According to the OVD-Info protest monitoring group, police have detained more than 13,000 people at anti-war protests in Russia since Feb 24.

Russia declared OVD-Info a "foreign agent" in September, in a move that critics say is designed to stifle dissent.

Scherbak, who shares social media posts and videos showing events in Ukraine, said it was not the first time his mother had tried to influence his political opinions.

"She was always trying to convince me, to talk sense into me because she is a mother, she is clever and I am stupid," he said.
'Small victories'

In discussions with her mother, Daria, a 25-year-old from the Russian city of Yekaterinburg who declined to give her full name, said she avoided the touchy subject of war and other issues where they "don't exactly see eye to eye."

"I have made it clear to myself that she is in the worst position emotionally right now and she needs help and support,"Daria said.

At the same time, she tries to offer different points of view. Her mother was shocked, she said, by videos of protesters being arrested by police in riot gear. Daria rejoices in what she calls "small victories".

Alex, a 28-year-old game tester who lives with his wife in Gdansk, Poland, said his parents who are in Russia told him to delete his social media posts about the war in Ukraine, warning it could be dangerous for him to share his views.

Russia's parliament on Friday passed a law imposing a jail term of up to 15 years for spreading intentionally "fake" news about the military, stepping up the information war over the conflict in Ukraine.

Alex's parents called him every day since the conflict began, and each call would lead to arguments and shouting between him and his mother.

His father, some of whose relatives are fighting on opposing sides in Ukraine, remained more neutral.

To save their relationship, Alex stopped posting the news.

His wife changed the privacy settings of her own account and continued to share articles about the Ukraine conflict.

MORE ON THIS TOPIC
Ukraine thaw could slow Russian advance in mud

Ukraine says 6-year-old child died alone from dehydration in besieged Mariupol

Follow The Straits Times' live coverage on the Ukraine crisis here.

'We are enemies': Ukraine, Russia tensions at Saudi arms fair

Saudi men walk in front of Ukraine's stand, at the World Defence Show in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. 

PHOTO: REUTERS

PUBLISHED
MAR 11, 2022

RIYADH (AFP) - Far from the war raging thousands of miles away, Russia-Ukraine tensions were on full display at a Saudi arms fair, where staff from each country eyed each other suspiciously over their latest weaponry.

Russian military hardware at the World Defence Show in Riyadh this week far outstripped the display at the Ukrainian pavilion, where staff bristled with anger about the attack on their country.

Maxim Potemkov, sales director of one of the exhibiting Ukrainian companies, said there was a wall of silence between the two sides.

He could hardly even bring himself to walk past the Russians, he said.

"We don't communicate of course. There is nothing to discuss," Potemkov, whose family was forced to flee Ukraine, told AFP.

"I only passed once (in front of the Russian pavilion) to see how many of them were there... There are feelings of anger within us because we are now enemies."

The number of staff at the Ukrainian pavilion was severely diminished by the war, which broke out two weeks ago when Russian President Vladimir Putin sent troops and warplanes over the border.

A planned delegation of 50 was reduced to just two officials and two volunteers, all based in Riyadh.

But even though the Ukrainian display consisted of just two armoured vehicles, it was visited by a string of Western officials, including a delegation from the US embassy.

US charge d'affaires Martina Strong stopped by to express "solidarity with the brave Ukrainian people who are defending their country in the face of brutal Russian aggression", the US mission tweeted.

'This is my duty'

Over in the Russian pavilion, which included machine guns, anti-aircraft weapons and air-defence systems, sales staff were tight-lipped.

"We are prohibited from making media statements because of the political situation," an employee told AFP.

One Russian visitor agreed to an interview but changed his mind when he was challenged by a pavilion representative who asked to see his identity badge and business card.

Russian staff are seen at their country's stand, during Saudi Arabia’s first World Defence Show. PHOTO: AFP

A model poses with Russian made automatic assault rifles at the World Defence Show in Saudi Arabia. 

PHOTO: REUTERS

Oleg Perutzkari, 43, a staff member at the Ukrainian pavilion who has evacuated his family to Saudi Arabia, said he feared losing his temper if he went to speak to the Russians.

"I don't want to approach the Russian pavilion, I just don't want (to)," he said, adding that Ukrainians were already fully aware of Russia's weaponry.

"We see the reality in our country, in our land and what equipment they have," Perutzkari said.

The Ukrainian armoured cars were not for display only. After the defence show closed on Wednesday, they were due to be shipped back to the war-torn country.

Perutzkari said he also planned to collect military equipment from the other exhibitors to be sent along for the war effort.

"I am looking for any equipment, any helmet or jacket, that I can find and send to my country... This is my duty," he said.

 

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New Photos Appear To Show Breakup Of 40-Mile Russian Convoy In Ominous Sign

New satellite photos appear to show that a massive convoy outside the Ukrainian capital has split up and fanned out.

EVGENIY MALOLETKA
03/11/2022 

MARIUPOL, Ukraine (AP) — New satellite photos appeared to show that a massive convoy outside the Ukrainian capital has split up and fanned out into towns and forests near Kyiv, with artillery pieces raised into firing position in a potentially ominous movement of the Russian military.

The photos emerged amid more international efforts to isolate and sanction Russia, particularly after a deadly airstrike on a maternity hospital in the port city of Mariupol that Western and Ukrainian officials decried as a war crime. The U.S. and other nations were poised Friday to announce the revocation of Russia’s “most favored nation” trade status, which would allow tariffs to be imposed on Russian imports.

Unbowed by the sanctions, Russia kept up its bombardment of Mariupol while Kyiv braced for an onslaught, its mayor boasting that the capital had become practically a fortress protected by armed civilians.

Satellite imagery from Maxar Technologies showed that 40-mile (64-kilometer) convoy of vehicles, tanks and artillery has broken up and been redeployed, the company said. Armored units were seen in towns near the Antonov Airport north of the city. Some of the vehicles have moved into forests, Maxar reported, with towed howitzers nearby in position to open fire.

The convoy had massed outside the city early last week, but its advance appeared to stall as reports of food and fuel shortages circulated. U.S. officials said Ukrainian troops also targeted the convoy with anti-tank missiles.

Still, the immediacy of the threat to Kyiv was unclear. A U.S. defense official speaking on condition of anonymity said Russian forces moving toward Kyiv had advanced about 5 kilometers (about 3 miles) in the past 24 hours, with some elements as close as 15 kilometers (about 9 miles) from the city.

The official gave no indication that the convoy had dispersed or otherwise repositioned in a significant way, saying some vehicles were seen moving off the road into the tree line in recent days.

This satellite image provided by Maxar Technologies shows a closeup view of fires in an industrial area and nearby fields in southern Chernihiv, Ukraine, during the Russian invasion, Thursday, March 10, 2022.

(Satellite image ©2022 Maxar Technologies via AP)
VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS

In Mariupol, a southern seaport of 430,000, the situation was increasingly dire as civilians trapped inside the city scrounged for food and fuel. More than 1,300 people have died in the 10-day siege of the frigid city, said Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk.

Residents have no heat or phone service, and many have no electricity. Nighttime temperatures are regularly below freezing, and daytime ones normally hover just above it. Bodies are being buried in mass graves. The streets are littered with burned-out cars, broken glass and splintered trees.

“They have a clear order to hold Mariupol hostage, to mock it, to constantly bomb and shell it,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address to the nation. He said the Russians began a tank attack right where there was supposed to be a humanitarian corridor.

On Thursday, firefighters tried to free a boy trapped in the rubble. One grasped the boy’s hand. His eyes blinked, but he was otherwise still. It was not clear if he survived. Nearby, at a mangled truck, a woman wrapped in a blue blanket shuddered at the sound of an explosion.

Grocery stores and pharmacies were emptied days ago by people breaking in to get supplies, according to a local official with the Red Cross, Sacha Volkov. A black market is operating for vegetables, meat is unavailable, and people are stealing gasoline from cars, Volkov said.

A Ukrainian serviceman takes a photograph of a damaged church after shelling in a residential district in Mariupol, Ukraine, Thursday, March 10, 2022.

 (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)

Places protected from bombings are hard to find, with basements reserved for women and children, he said. Residents, Volkov said, are turning on one another: “People started to attack each other for food.”

An exhausted-looking Aleksander Ivanov pulled a cart loaded with bags down an empty street flanked by damaged buildings.

“I don’t have a home anymore. That’s why I’m moving,” he said. “It doesn’t exist anymore. It was hit, by a mortar.”

Repeated attempts to send in food and medicine and evacuate civilians have been thwarted by Russian shelling, Ukrainian authorities said.

“They want to destroy the people of Mariupol. They want to make them starve,” Vereshchuk said. “It’s a war crime.”

The number of refugees fleeing the country topped 2.3 million, and some 100,000 people have been evacuated during the past two days from seven cities under Russian blockade in the north and center of the country, including the Kyiv suburbs, Zelenskyy said.

Zelenskyy told Russian leaders that the invasion will backfire on them as their economy is strangled. Western sanctions have already dealt a severe blow, causing the ruble to plunge, foreign businesses to flee and prices to rise sharply.

“You will definitely be prosecuted for complicity in war crimes,” Zelenskyy said in a video address, warning that “you will be hated by Russian citizens.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin dismissed such talk, saying the country has endured sanctions before.

″We will overcome them,” he said at a televised meeting of government officials. He did, however, acknowledge the sanctions create “certain challenges.”

In addition to those who have fled the country, millions have been driven from their homes inside Ukraine. Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said about 2 million people, half the population of the metropolitan area, have left the capital.

“Every street, every house … is being fortified,” he said. “Even people who in their lives never intended to change their clothes, now they are in uniform with machine guns in their hands.”

On Thursday, a 14-year-old girl named Katya was recovering at the Brovary Central District Hospital on the outskirts of Kyiv after her family was ambushed as they tried to flee the area. She was shot in the hand when their car was raked with gunfire from a roadside forest, said her mother, who identified herself only as Nina.

The girl’s father, who drove frantically from the ambush on blown-out tires, underwent surgery. His wife said he had been shot in the head and had two fingers blown off.

Western officials said Russian forces have made little progress on the ground in recent days and are seeing heavier losses and stiffer Ukrainian resistance than Moscow apparently anticipated. But Putin’s forces have used air power and artillery to pummel Ukraine’s cities.

Early in the day, the Mariupol city council posted a video showing a convoy it said was bringing in food and medicine. But as night fell, it was unclear if those buses had reached the city.

A child was among three people killed in the hospital airstrike Wednesday. Seventeen people were also wounded, including women waiting to give birth, doctors, and children buried in the rubble. Images of the attack, with pregnant women covered in dust and blood, dominated news reports in many countries.

French President Emmanuel Macron called the attack “a shameful and immoral act of war.” Britain’s Armed Forces minister, James Heappey, said that whether the hospital was hit by indiscriminate fire or deliberately targeted, “it is a war crime.”

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, on a visit to Ukraine’s neighbor Poland, backed calls for an international war-crimes investigation into the invasion, saying, “The eyes of the world are on this war and what Russia has done in terms of this aggression and these atrocities.”
___

Associated Press journalists Yuras Karmanau in Lviv, Ukraine, and Felipe Dana and Andrew Drake in Kyiv, Ukraine, contributed along with other reporters around the world.
___

Follow the AP’s coverage of the Ukraine crisis at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Russian strikes hit western Ukraine far from main offensive

EVGENIY MALOLETKA, Associated Press
March 10, 2022

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This satellite image provided by Maxar Technologies shows a closeup view of fires in an industrial area and nearby fields in southern Chernihiv, Ukraine, during the Russian invasion, Thursday, March 10, 2022. 

(Satellite image ©2022 Maxar Technologies via AP) 

MARIUPOL, Ukraine (AP) — Local authorities say Russian strikes hit near airports in the western Ukrainian cities of Ivano-Frankiivsk and Lutsk, far from Russia’s main attack targets elsewhere in Ukraine.

The mayor of Ivano-Frankiivsk, Ruslan Martsinkiv, ordered residents in the neighboring areas to head to shelters after an air raid alert. The mayor of Lutsk also announced an airstrike near the airport.

The strikes were far to the west from the main Russian offensive and could indicate a new direction of the war.

New satellite photos appeared to show a massive convoy outside the Ukrainian capital has fanned out into towns and forests near Kyiv, with artillery pieces raised into firing position in a potentially ominous movement of the Russian military.

The photos emerged amid more international efforts to isolate and sanction Russia, particularly after a deadly airstrike on a maternity hospital in the port city of Mariupol that Western and Ukrainian officials decried as a war crime.

The U.S. and other nations were poised Friday to announce the revocation of Russia’s “most favored nation” trade status, which would allow higher tariffs to be imposed on some Russian imports.

Unbowed by the sanctions, Russia kept up its bombardment of the besieged southern seaport of Mariupol while Kyiv braced for an onslaught, its mayor boasting that the capital had become practically a fortress protected by armed civilians.

Three Russian airstrikes hit the eastern industrial city of Dnipro on Friday, killing at least one person, according to Interior Ministry adviser Anton Heraschenko. Meanwhile, Russian forces were pushing toward Kyiv from the northwest and east but were repulsed from Chernihiv as Ukrainian fighters regained control of Baklanova Muraviika, the general staff of Ukraine's armed forces said in a statement.

The convoy seen in satellite imagery from Maxar Technologies showed the 40-mile (64-kilometer) line of vehicles, tanks and artillery had been redeployed, the company said. Armored units were seen in towns near the Antonov Airport north of the city. Some vehicles moved into forests, Maxar reported, with towed howitzers nearby in position to open fire.

The Russian column massed outside the city early last week, but its advance appeared to stall as reports of food and fuel shortages circulated. U.S. officials said Ukrainian troops also targeted the convoy with anti-tank missiles.

Still, the immediacy of the threat to Kyiv was unclear. A U.S. defense official speaking on condition of anonymity said Russian forces moving toward Kyiv had advanced about 5 kilometers (about 3 miles) in the past 24 hours, with some elements as close as 15 kilometers (about 9 miles) from the city.

The official did not indicate if the convoy had dispersed or otherwise repositioned in a significant way, saying some vehicles were seen moving off the road into the tree line in recent days.

In Mariupol, a city of 430,000, the situation was increasingly dire as civilians trapped inside the city scrounged for food and fuel. More than 1,300 people have died in the 10-day siege of the frigid city, said Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk.

Residents have no heat or phone service, and many have no electricity. Nighttime temperatures are regularly below freezing, and daytime ones normally hover just above it. Bodies are being buried in mass graves. The streets are littered with burned-out cars, broken glass and splintered trees.

“They have a clear order to hold Mariupol hostage, to mock it, to constantly bomb and shell it,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address to the nation. He said the Russians began a tank attack right where there was supposed to be a humanitarian corridor.

On Thursday, firefighters tried to free a boy trapped in the rubble. One grasped the boy's hand. His eyes blinked, but he was otherwise still. It was not clear if he survived. Nearby, at a mangled truck, a woman wrapped in a blue blanket shuddered at the sound of an explosion.

Grocery stores and pharmacies were emptied days ago by people breaking in to get supplies, according to a local official with the Red Cross, Sacha Volkov. A black market is operating for vegetables, meat is unavailable, and people are stealing gasoline from cars, Volkov said.

Places protected from bombings are hard to find, with basements reserved for women and children, he said. Residents, Volkov said, are turning on one another: “People started to attack each other for food.”

An exhausted-looking Aleksander Ivanov pulled a cart loaded with bags down an empty street flanked by damaged buildings.

“I don’t have a home anymore. That’s why I’m moving,” he said. “It doesn’t exist anymore. It was hit, by a mortar.”

Repeated attempts to send in food and medicine and evacuate civilians have been thwarted by Russian shelling, Ukrainian authorities said.

“They want to destroy the people of Mariupol. They want to make them starve,” Vereshchuk said. “It’s a war crime.”

The number of refugees fleeing the country topped 2.3 million, and some 100,000 people have been evacuated during the past two days from seven cities under Russian blockade in the north and center of the country, including the Kyiv suburbs, Zelenskyy said.

Zelenskyy told Russian leaders that the invasion will backfire on them as their economy is strangled. Western sanctions have already dealt a severe blow, causing the ruble to plunge, foreign businesses to flee and prices to rise sharply.

“You will definitely be prosecuted for complicity in war crimes,” Zelenskyy said in a video address, warning that "you will be hated by Russian citizens.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin dismissed such talk, saying the country has endured sanctions before.

″We will overcome them," he said at a televised meeting of government officials. He did, however, acknowledge the sanctions create “certain challenges.”

In addition to those who have fled the country, millions have been driven from their homes inside Ukraine. Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said about 2 million people, half the population of the metropolitan area, have left the capital.

“Every street, every house … is being fortified," he said. "Even people who in their lives never intended to change their clothes, now they are in uniform with machine guns in their hands.”

On Thursday, a 14-year-old girl named Katya was recovering at the Brovary Central District Hospital on the outskirts of Kyiv after her family was ambushed as they tried to flee the area. She was shot in the hand when their car was raked with gunfire from a roadside forest, said her mother, who identified herself only as Nina.

The girl’s father, who drove frantically from the ambush on blown-out tires, underwent surgery. His wife said he had been shot in the head and had two fingers blown off.

Western officials said Russian forces have made little progress on the ground in recent days and are seeing heavier losses and stiffer Ukrainian resistance than Moscow apparently anticipated. But Putin’s forces have used air power and artillery to pummel Ukraine's cities.

Early in the day, the Mariupol city council posted a video showing a convoy it said was bringing in food and medicine. But as night fell, it was unclear if those buses had reached the city.

A child was among three people killed in the hospital airstrike Wednesday. Seventeen people were also wounded, including women waiting to give birth, doctors, and children buried in the rubble. Images of the attack, with pregnant women covered in dust and blood, dominated news reports in many countries.

French President Emmanuel Macron called the attack “a shameful and immoral act of war.” Britain’s Armed Forces minister, James Heappey, said that whether the hospital was hit by indiscriminate fire or deliberately targeted, “it is a war crime.”

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, on a visit to Ukraine's neighbor Poland, backed calls for an international war-crimes investigation into the invasion, saying, “The eyes of the world are on this war and what Russia has done in terms of this aggression and these atrocities.”

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Associated Press journalists Yuras Karmanau in Lviv, Ukraine, and Felipe Dana and Andrew Drake in Kyiv, Ukraine, contributed along with other reporters around the world.

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Follow the AP’s coverage of the Ukraine crisis at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Battleground Ukraine: Day 15 of Russia's invasion


Russia invades Ukraine (AFP/Kenan AUGEARD) (Kenan AUGEARD)

Tue, March 8, 2022, 

On the 15th day of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Russian forces were encircling at least four major cities Thursday and inched closer towards the city limits of Kyiv.

The capital remains under Ukrainian control but is increasingly at risk of being surrounded, with many observers believing Russia is still aiming to capture the city.

Here is a summary of the situation on the ground, based on statements from both sides, Western defence and intelligence sources and international organisations.

- The east -

Kharkiv remains in Ukrainian hands despite increasingly intense Russian bombardment, according to Western sources, and the city is likely now surrounded.

Russian forces are also pressing an offensive through the separatist Donetsk and Lugansk regions that are backed by Russia and seeking to join up with Russian forces who entered from the north.

The city of Sumy in northeast Ukraine is now encircled by Russian troops but thousands have been able to leave through a humanitarian corridor.

- Kyiv and the north -

Kyiv remains under Ukrainian control despite heavy bombardments, though Western observers point to a Russian column of hundreds of vehicles outside the city.

An AFP team saw Russian armoured vehicles rolling up to the northeastern edge of Kyiv, edging closer in their attempts to encircle the Ukrainian capital.

But the British defence ministry said the column was suffering "continued losses" at the hands of Ukrainian forces.

Ukrainian forces also retain control of the northern town of Chernihiv, which has seen heavy civilian casualties in recent days and appears to be encircled.

- The south -

Russia has besieged the strategic city of Mariupol, and attempts to evacuate an estimated 200,000 civilians from the city have so far failed.

The children's and maternity hospital in Mariupol was attacked on Wednesday in what Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described as a Russian "war crime".

The major port city of Odessa remains under Ukrainian control and has so far been spared fighting. But the US Defence Department said Russian ground forces appeared primed to attack the city, possibly in coordination with an amphibious assault.

Russian forces last week took the southern city of Kherson, just north of Crimea, and there is now heavy fighting for control of the city of Mykolayiv to the northwest. Some sources believe Russia could bypass Mykolayiv and head direct for Odessa.

- The west and centre -

The west of Ukraine remains largely spared from the fighting. The main city of Lviv has become a hub for foreign diplomatic missions and journalists as well as Ukrainians seeking safety or wanting to leave the country.

- Casualties -

The United Nations said Thursday that it had recorded 549 civilian deaths in Ukraine, including 41 children, though the actual toll could be far higher.

Ukraine and Western sources claim that the Russian death toll is far higher than Moscow has so far admitted to.

Ukraine says more than 12,000 Russian soldiers have been killed, though US estimates put the number of Russians killed at 2,000 to 4,000.

Russia's only official toll, announced last week, said 498 Russian troops had been killed in Ukraine.

- Refugees -

Around 2.3 million refugees have fled Ukraine since the invasion began, more than half going to Poland, according to the UN refugee agency.

bur-sjw/har

11 years later, fate of Fukushima reactor cleanup uncertain

Eleven years after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant was ravaged by a meltdown following a massive earthquake and tsunami, most of the radioactive debris blasted by hydrogen explosions has been cleared and torn buildings fixed

By MARI YAMAGUCHI Associated Press

10 March 2022

The Associated Press

Tanks storing treated radioactive water after it was used to cool the melted fuel are seen...

OKUMA, Japan -- Eleven years after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant was ravaged by a meltdown following a massive earthquake and tsunami, the plant now looks like a sprawling construction site. Most of the radioactive debris blasted by the hydrogen explosions has been cleared and the torn buildings have been fixed.

During a recent visit by journalists from The Associated Press to see firsthand the cleanup of one of the world’s worst nuclear meltdowns, helmeted men wore regular work clothes and surgical masks, instead of previously required hazmat coveralls and full-face masks, as they dug near a recently reinforced oceanside seawall.

Workers were preparing for the planned construction of an Olympic pool-sized shaft for use in a highly controversial plan set to begin in the spring of 2023 to gradually get rid of treated radioactive water — now exceeding 1.3 million tons stored in 1,000 tanks — so officials can make room for other facilities needed for the plant's decommissioning.

Despite the progress, massive amounts of radioactive melted fuel remain inside of the reactors. There's worry about the fuel because so much about its condition is still unknown, even to officials in charge of the cleanup.

Nearly 900 tons of melted nuclear fuel remain inside the three damaged reactors, and its removal is an unprecedented challenge involving 10 times the amount of damaged fuel removed in the Three Mile Island cleanup following its 1979 partial core melt.

The government has set a decommissioning roadmap aiming for completion in 29 years.

The challenge of removing melted fuel from the reactors is so daunting that some experts now say that setting a completion target is impossible, especially as officials still don't have any idea about where to store the waste.

Nuclear Regulation Authority Chairman Toyoshi Fuketa said recently that extra time would be needed to determine where and how the highly radioactive waste removed from the reactors should be stored.

Japan has no final storage plans even for the highly radioactive waste that comes out of normal reactors. Twenty-four of the country's 60 reactors are designated for decommissioning, mostly because of the high cost needed to meet safety standards set up in the wake of the Fukushima disaster.

On March 11, 2011, a magnitude 9.0 earthquake caused a tsunami 17 meters (56 feet) high that slammed into the coastal plant, destroying its power supply and cooling systems, causing reactors No. 1, 2 and 3 to melt and spewing massive amounts of radiation. Three other reactors were offline and survived, though a fourth building suffered hydrogen explosions.

The spreading radiation caused some 160,000 residents to evacuate. Parts of the surrounding neighborhood are still uninhabitable.

The melted cores in Units 1, 2 and 3 largely fell to the bottom of their primary containment vessels, together with control rods and other equipment, some possibly penetrating or mixing with the concrete foundation, making the cleanup extremely difficult.

Probes of the melted fuel must rely on remote-controlled robots carrying equipment such as cameras and dosimeters — which measure radiation — because radiation levels in those areas are still fatally high for humans.

In February, a remote-operated submersible robot entered the Unit 1 primary containment vessel, its first internal probe since a failed 2017 attempt. It captured limited images of what are believed to be mounds of melted fuel rising from the concrete floor.

Probes have moved ahead at Unit 2, where TEPCO plans to send in an extendable robotic arm later this year to collect melted fuel samples.

TEPCO Chief Decommissioning Officer Akira Ono said in a recent online interview that robotic probes at Unit 1 and 2 this year are a major “step forward” in the decades-long cleanup.

“It's like we have finally come to the starting line," Ono said. “Before, we didn’t even know which way we were supposed to go."

Ono said the Unit 2 melted fuel test removal will start from a granule or two, all of which will be sent for lab analysis, meaning a storage facility won't be necessary until larger amounts are hauled out. Even a tiny amount would provide valuable data for research and development of fuel and debris removal technology for all three reactors, he said.

Hideyuki Ban, the co-founder of the Citizens’ Nuclear Information Center who previously served on government nuclear safety panels, proposes the underground burial of solidified treated water for stable long-term storage, while entombing the three reactors for several decades — like Chernobyl — and waiting for radioactivity to decrease for better safety and access for workers instead of rushing the cleanup.

Since the disaster, contaminated cooling water has constantly escaped from the damaged primary containment vessels into the reactor building basements, where it mixes with groundwater and rainwater that seep in.

The water is pumped up and treated, partly recycled as cooling water, with the remainder stored in 1,000 huge tanks crowding the plant. The tanks will be full at 1.37 million tons by next spring, TEPCO says.

The government has announced plans to release the water after treatment and dilution to well below the legally releasable levels through a planned undersea tunnel at a site about 1 kilometer offshore. The plan has faced fierce opposition from local residents, especially fishermen concerned about further damage to the area’s reputation.

TEPCO and government officials say tritium, which is not harmful in small amounts, is inseparable from the water, but all other 63 radioactive isotopes selected for treatment can be reduced to safe levels, tested and further diluted by seawater before release.

Scientists say the health impact from consuming tritium through the food chain could be greater than drinking it in water, and further studies are needed.

At one of the water treatment facilities where radiation levels are much higher, a team of workers in full protective gear handled a container filled with highly radioactive slurry. It had been filtered from the contaminated water that's been continuously leaking from the damaged reactors and pumped up from their basements since the disaster. Large amounts of slurry and solid radioactive waste also accumulate in the plant.

Radiation levels have fallen significantly after decontamination since the disaster, and full protection gear is only needed in limited areas, including in and around the reactor buildings.

On a recent visit, AP journalists used cotton gloves, goggles, a head cover and surgical masks to tour low-radiation areas.

Additional protection, including hazmat coveralls and double rubber gloves, was required when the journalists entered the Unit 5 primary containment vessel and stood on the grating of the pedestal, a structure beneath the defueled core, where officials explained the concept of using robotic probes in No. 1 and 2 reactors.

TEPCO has emptied spent fuel from the No. 3 and No. 4 reactor pools, but removal at the No. 1 and 2 reactors has been delayed several years because of high radiation and contaminated debris, posing concerns of a spent fuel meltdown in case another major quake caused water loss and overheating.

Futaba Mayor Shiro Izawa says the Fukushima Daiichi plant must be safely and fully decommissioned “to make our hometown a safe and livable place again." Izawa said he wants the government to “wipe out the (region’s) negative image” by tackling the safe cleanup, which is a prerequisite for the town's reconstruction.