Ukraine

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A top Vatican envoy and his entourage came under fire as they were distributing humanitarian supplies in Ukraine, the Vatican news service said on Sunday, but reported no injuries.

The incident took place near the city of Zaporizhzhia on Saturday and forced Vatican Almoner Cardinal Konrad Krajewski and others to take cover.

“For the first time in my life, I didn’t know where to run. Because it is not enough to run, you have to know where to go,” said the Polish-born cardinal, whose position makes charitable contributions in the name of the pope.

KOZACHA LOPAN, Ukraine (AP) — In a dank basement behind the local supermarket, metal bars cordon off a corner of the room to form a large cell. Dirty sleeping bags and duvets show three sleeping spots on top of sheets of Styrofoam for insulation from the damp earth floor. In the corner, two black buckets served as toilets.

A few meters (yards) outside the barred cell, three dilapidated chairs stand around a table, cigarette butts and empty husks of pumpkin seeds littering the floor around them.

KYIV, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Friday he would only back the idea of reopening Russian ammonia exports through Ukraine if Moscow handed back prisoners of war (POWs), an idea the Kremlin quickly rejected.

In an interview, Zelenskiy told Reuters he had proposed the arrangement to the United Nations, which has suggested resuming Russian ammonia across Ukraine to ease a global shortage of fertiliser. 

KYIV, Sept 16 (Reuters) - President Volodymyr Zelenskiy accused Russia on Friday of committing war crimes in Ukraine's northeast and said it was too early to say the tide of the war was turning despite rapid territorial gains by his forces this month.

The Ukrainian leader also told Reuters in an interview that the outcome of the war with Russia, now in its seventh month, hinged on the swift delivery of foreign weapons to his country.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — An honor guard fired a three-gun salute toward cloudy skies as friends and comrades-in-arms gathered in Kyiv to bid farewell to a Russian woman who was killed while fighting on Ukraine’s side in the war with her native country.

Olga Simonova, 34, was remembered for her courage and kindness at a funeral in the Ukrainian capital on Friday.

Simonova’s coffin was draped in the blue-and-yellow Ukrainian flag, with a cuddly toy lion on top. Her nom de guerre was “Simba,” like the main character in the Disney cartoon “The Lion King.”

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin mounted on the battlefield and in the halls of global power as Ukrainian troops pushed their counteroffensive Saturday to advance farther into Ukraine’s partly recaptured northeast.

At a high-level summit in Uzbekistan, Putin vowed to press his attack on Ukraine despite recent military setbacks but also faced concerns by India and China over the drawn-out conflict.

IZIUM, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian authorities were expected to begin recovering bodies Friday from a mass burial site in a forest recaptured from Russian forces, a delicate task that President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said would help show the world “what the Russian occupation has led to.”

The site, containing hundreds of graves, was discovered close to Izium after a rapid counteroffensive by Ukrainian forces retook the northeastern city and much of the Kharkiv region, breaking what had largely become a stalemate in the nearly seven-month war.

15 Sep 2022; MEMO: The Ukrainian military claimed on Tuesday that it shot down an Iranian-made Shahed-136 drone allegedly used by Russia's armed forces near Kupiansk in the north-eastern region of Kharkiv which was recently recaptured by Ukraine amid Moscow's on-going military operation in the country. It is the first time that Kyiv has claimed to have downed an Iranian drone.

IZIUM, Ukraine (AP) — Hand on heart, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy watched his country’s flag rise Wednesday above the recaptured city of Izium, making a rare foray outside the capital that highlights Moscow’s embarrassing retreat from a Ukrainian counteroffensive.

Russian forces left the war-scarred city last week as Kyiv’s soldiers pressed a stunning advance that has reclaimed large swaths of territory in Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy are each courting major allies on Thursday, seeking to prop up their efforts in a war whose fortunes have tilted toward Ukraine in recent days.

In Uzbekistan’s ancient Samarkand, Putin was hoping to break through his international isolation and further cement his ties with Chinese President Xi Jinping in a geopolitical alliance increasingly seen as potent counterweight to the Western powers.