Today at 12: 15 a.m. EDT|Updated today at 3: 18 p.m. EDT
ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine — The first group of evacuees from Mariupol’s embattled Azovstal steel plant reached this Ukrainian-controlled city Tuesday afternoon local time, after weeks of failed efforts. Mariupol mayor says that more evacuations are being made from the troubled port city. A smaller group was previously evacuated from the Russian-held territory.
Officials said 101 civilians remain trapped at the plant — and separately, the Red Cross said it remains concerned about the people still stuck in ‘hell.’
Britain has promised to send armored vehicles to help Ukraine with civilian evacuations.
In Lviv, missile strikes damaged the electrical infrastructure and causing power outages in some areas, local leaders said. Water supply could also be affected. Lviv, less than 50 miles from the Polish border, is considered relatively safe and has become a base of operations for foreign diplomats, aid organizations and journalists. The Russian attack on other areas of Ukraine has not affected Lviv.
Here’s what else to know
- French President Emmanuel Macron told Russian President Vladimir Putin that he is ready to help counter a Russian blockade on Ukrainian food exports; Ukraine is a major exporter of grain, and the war has raised concerns about ripple effects on global food supplies.
- U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin left open the possibility that parts of the Ukrainian military might be hoarding U.S.-made weapons, adding that it is difficult for the Pentagon to assess because the U.S. military has no forces in Ukraine.
- Pope Francis, in an interview with Italian media, said Hungarian leader Viktor Orban told him that “everything will be over on May 9.” The Washington Post reported last month, however, that Russian President Vladimir Putin may use Russia’s Victory Day to accelerate the war effort.
- Moscow is preparing to annex vast new swaths of Ukrainian territory — the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, along with the southern city of Kherson — in the coming days, U.S. intelligence indicates.
- The Washington Post has lifted its paywall for readers in Russia and Ukraine. Telegram users can subscribe to our channel.
Missile strikes reported in relatively peaceful Lviv
LVIV — Several missile strikes rocked the western city of Lviv late Tuesday, damaging the electrical infrastructure and causing power outages in some areas, local leaders said.
Air raid sirens and loud blasts could be heard across the city, Lviv, one of Ukraine’s largest. Soon after, the sound of police and ambulance sirens was heard. In posts to social media, a thick black smoke cloud could be seen above the city.
The strikes damaged at least three electrical substations, regional governor Maksym Kozytskyi said in a message on Telegram. In a post, Mayor Andriy Sadovyi stated that while the strikes may also have disrupted water supplies but that they were working to repair it. Officials urged people to find shelter.
Lviv, less than 50 miles from the Polish border, is considered a relatively safe city and has become a base of operations for foreign diplomats, aid organizations and journalists. It has largely been spared the Russian attacks that have pummeled other parts of the country but suffered its first wartime deaths last month, when missile strikes on a military warehouse and commercial service station killed at least seven and injured 11.
On Monday, the top U.S. diplomat for Ukraine, Kristina Kvien, announced the resumption of some embassy activity on a day trip to Lviv — her first visit to Ukraine since the war began Feb. 24.
In an interview a day before the apparent strikes, Sadovyi said he had made contingency plans before the war to protect the city’s water supply in the event electricity was cut. Sadovyi stated that Lviv with its cobblestone-paved streets was spared due to its status as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
“If it’s bombarded, it’ll be a completely different level of crime,” Sadovyi said.
Red Cross official worries about Mariupol civilians still stuck in ‘hell’
A Red Cross official said Tuesday that he was relieved the organization had been able to facilitate the evacuation of a group of civilians from Mariupol’s besieged Azovstal steel plant but “extremely concerned” about those who remain trapped.
“We would have hoped that much more people would be able to join the convoy and to get out of hell,” Pascal Hundt, the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross’s delegation in Ukraine, said during a video call with reporters. “That’s why we have a bit of a mixed feeling today.”
The evacuation, coordinated with the United Nations, took weeks to negotiate and was limited to civilians. Speaking from Kyiv, Hundt described it as an “extremely delicate and complex operation.” He said that 50 buses had left the plant but that not all were full.
About a dozen people in the convoy were sick or injured, Hundt said, none critically. He noted that his group had heard “heartbreaking” testimony from those who escaped and that “the invisible suffering is much bigger than what we can see.”
Hundt said that an unknown number of civilians were left behind and that some chose not to leave. Although he didn’t know the reason, he suggested that they may have been afraid of fighting on.
Asked how hopeful he was that such an operation would take place, Hundt responded, “We will continue to push, even if the hope is close to zero.”
Britain to send armored vehicles to Ukraine for civilian evacuations
LONDON — The British government announced Tuesday that it will donate a fleet of 13 armored vehicles to Ukraine to support the evacuation of civilians from war-torn areas, and to facilitate the movement of Ukrainian officials and key workers to repair and rebuild the country’s infrastructure.
The vehicles will start to arrive in eastern Ukraine “in the coming days,” along with a logistics team tasked with dispatching them as quickly as possible, Britain’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office said in a statement.
The donation of heavy weapons comes as British Prime Minister Boris Johnson became the first head of state to address Ukraine’s parliament since Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion, telling lawmakers Tuesday, “Ukraine will win, Ukraine will be free.”
Johnson’s speech was met with “standing ovations” in Ukraine’s parliament, according to Ukrainian lawmaker Lesia Vasylenko, who tweeted that she had “never seen this many standing ovations for a single speech.”
Pentagon chief: Ukraine putting howitzers ‘to very good use’
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told a group of senators Tuesday that Ukrainian troops are putting the howitzers and drones supplied by Western allies — including the United States — “to very good use,” saying that “they are employing those systems now.”
The United States announced last month that it would begin sending howitzers as part of the military assistance being rushed to Ukraine, valued cumulatively in the billions of dollars. Austin and Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, testified Tuesday that “several hundred” Ukrainian fighters had been pulled out of their country to be trained to use such systems- as the 155 mm howitzers and had since returned to the front.
Both said that the commitment of Ukraine to training by NATO and its demonstration of leadership — from the head of state to commanders of smaller ground units — had given Kyiv an edge in the fight against Moscow, even as Russian troops try to correct mistakes that hobbled their assault from Ukraine’s north earlier in the invasion.
“Some things they won’t be able to correct,” Austin said of the Russian troops, noting that the United States had “learned a lot about their leadership at the lower levels and their level of training” — and suggesting that they were far from impressive.
Russian President Vladimir Putin might be able to mobilize more people in the weeks and months ahead, Austin added, “but to adequately train those people to be more effective than what we’ve seen on the battlefield thus far — that’s questionable.”
Pentagon chief leaves open possibility of weapons hoarding in Ukrainian military
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin left open the possibility Tuesday that some hoarding of U.S.-made weapons is occurring within the Ukrainian military, adding that it is difficult for the Pentagon to assess because the U.S. military has no forces in Ukraine.
The comments came in response to a question from Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) during a hearing of the Senate Armed Services defense subcommittee. She wanted to know what Austin was doing to make sure that the weapons that are being supplied to Ukraine’s military reach their front-line units.
Austin said that the issue is important to him and Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and that they raise it with senior Ukrainian officials on a weekly basis.
“We don’t have people on the ground to be able to provide accurate feedback on how this equipment is moving and whether or not it is getting to where it’s needed most, but the report that we get back from the senior leadership routinely is that it is getting to where it needs to go,” Austin said. But, I will not stop. I’ll continue to engage and make sure that we emphasize that it’s important that all the stuff we’re giving them gets to the right place so that they can be successful.”
The Pentagon has been flying U.S.-made arms into Eastern Europe for transfer to the Ukrainian military, with the Ukrainians taking ownership of them outside Ukraine and then transporting them for use in the war.
Macron raises evacuations, food exports in 1st call with Putin in a month
PARIS — In their first call in over a month, French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday told Russian President Vladimir Putin that he is ready to help counter a Russian blockade on Ukrainian food exports, the Elysee presidential palace said in a statement.
Ukraine is a major exporter of grain, and the war has raised concerns about ripple effects on global food supplies. The statement stated that Macron was ready to work with international organisations in order to lift Russia’s blockade on Ukrainian food exports through the Black Sea.
The French leader also urged Putin to allow the continuation of evacuations from Mariupol’s embattled Azovstal steel plant.
Macron told Putin that the evacuees from the Azovstal plant should be able to choose their destination independently “in accordance with international humanitarian law,” the Elysee Palace said.
The conversation, which lasted more than two hours, was the first call between the two leaders since signs of massacre emerged from the Ukrainian city of Bucha and since Macron was reelected president on April 24.
Macron has been one of the few Western leaders to have stayed in contact with Putin, in what the Elysee Palace has described as an effort to monitor signs of Russian readiness to engage in more-substantial negotiations.
But Macron also has been a key proponent of European sanctions on Russia, and France has delivered weapons and other supplies to Ukraine. His contacts with Volodymyr Zelensky Return to menu69German Chancellor 30German Chancellor
Germany’s Scholz warns Russia could invade other countries
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz warned Tuesday that there is no guarantee Russia would not invade another country following its assault on Ukraine.
Speaking alongside his Swedish and Finnish counterparts in a news conference in northern Germany, Scholz said it had become accepted in Europe in recent decades that borders “would no longer be moved by force and that the sovereignty of states must be respected.” Russia upset that status quo, and, therefore, no one can assume that President Vladimir Putin would not do so “by force on another occasion,” the German leader said.
“That is why we decided at the same time that we would expand our defense efforts,” he added, citing Germany’s increased funding of its military and a decision to dedicate 2 percent of its GDP to defense spending. He also spoke out in support of Sweden and Finland joining the NATO military alliance.
“It is clear to us that if these two countries decide that they want to be part of the NATO alliance, they can count on our support,” he said.
Scholz reiterated this week that he would not visit Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, because of a perceived snub by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky toward German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier over Berlin’s relations with Moscow. Ukraine’s ambassador to Germany, Andriy Melnyk, also made headlines when he accused Scholz of acting like “an offended liverwurst,” according to German media reports, referring to a type of sausage.
Germany has pledged to send armored antiaircraft vehicles to Ukraine, upending its tradition of not dispatching such weapons to conflict zones. The plans to build a Nord Stream 2 natural-gas pipeline connecting Russia and Germany have been halted.
Bryan Pietsch contributed to this report.
Shelling imperils Luhansk evacuations as fighting rages, governor says
The governor of Luhansk in eastern Ukraine said Tuesday morning that plans to evacuate residents would continue but were “complicated by shelling,” as Ukrainian troops fight to prevent Russian forces from advancing.
A dozen attacks were foiled in the Donbas region over the past 24 hours, according to Serhiy Haidai, head of the Luhansk regional administration, and an update from the Ukrainian Defense Ministry. The claims were not confirmed by the Washington Post.
Russian shelling left the “residential area of the region in ruins,” Haidai wrote on Telegram, adding that the water supply was disrupted and nearly 100,000 people were without electricity. He said 10 houses burned down in an urban settlement between the Luhansk and Donetsk provinces, which make up the eastern Donbas region where pro-Moscow separatists who control disputed territories are fighting to expand their grip.
The governor also said buildings in the city of Severodonetsk came under fire. In recent weeks, he has urged people near front-line areas to flee as fighting rages since Russian forces shifted their offensive to the eastern region of Ukraine closer to the Russian border. Haidai said Tuesday that 49 new evacuees had managed to leave, while many others were unwilling to do so.
Annabelle Chapman contributed to this report.
Video: Mariupol woman sits unflinching while shells explode
The explosion sounds close, but Mariupol resident Tatyana Bushlanova, 64, barely acknowledges the danger. After shedding tears, she continues to answer interviewer’s questions.
She cries every morning, Bushlanova says. Although fear of shelling is still a concern, it’s now despair that has overtaken.
“I don’t know where to go at all. Bushlanova said that everything was destroyed and broken. She said that her house has no roof and windows.
Evacuations in Mariupol are underway. Mayor Vadym Boychenko estimated Tuesday that 100,000 people remain in the devastated southern port city, adding: “Others have managed to leave that hell.”
First evacuees from Azovstal plant in Mariupol reach safety
ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine — The first evacuees from Mariupol’s besieged and bombarded Azovstal steel works reached safety Tuesday in a southeastern Ukrainian city, their buses flanked by ambulances and U.N. vehicles.
The initial evacuation of 101 civilians from the steel plant to Zaporizhzhia had taken weeks to negotiate. Even once plans were finalized, the departure of their buses had stalled repeatedly as fighting raged outside.
U.N. Officials left Friday to Azovstal for the evacuation.
By the time the evacuees’ convoy finally arrived in Zaporizhzhia, those onboard looked shattered with exhaustion. Others waved to the crowd from the windows. Some looked confused, pulling their loved ones closer to them while they waited silently.
As an elderly woman stepped down from a bus, her face froze a moment, and then she started to sob.
A victory in Mariupol would be Russia’s most significant in this war to date. The port city is critical to Russian hopes of forming an unbroken land corridor from the eastern Donbas region bordering Russia to the Crimean Peninsula, which Russia annexed in 2014.
As the evacuation buses were on the road, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk insisted to a crowd in Zaporizhzhia that Mariupol would not fall to full Russian control.
“Mariupol is Ukraine,” she said. “It was Ukraine, it is Ukraine, it will be Ukraine.”
But a member of the crowd berated her, shouting that the Ukrainian government has not done enough to evacuate civilians. Many are prevented from fleeing Mariupol or the surrounding areas.
Officials and aid workers have camped out for days at the Zaporizhzhia reception center to which families from across the region have been evacuated.
Doctors are also at the ready. According to medics, the shock of the trip is wearing off and elderly residents from Mariupol, and other Russian-occupied cities, have suffered strokes and seizures.
On Tuesday, the doctors were laying out stretchers. The doctors were warned that they should expect brain injury victims, including those with broken bones and burns. A medic looked down at the medication piles around her and said “We’re trying our best to prepare.” But nothing has been confirmed. We’re waiting to see how they are.”
Russia appears to avoid default after bond payments sent
The Russian government appeared narrowly to have avoided a default that risked paralyzing its economy by unexpectedly tapping into a reserve of dollars to make a $650 million payment to international lenders.
The Treasury Department unit that processes international payments received the money last week, Bloomberg News and CNBC reported, and three unnamed investors told Bloomberg that their banks had received the money.
The U.S. sanctions that mostly cut Russia off from global financial markets include an exemption for payments by the Kremlin on its sovereign debt. But that loophole is set to expire on May 25, and it is unclear whether the Treasury will extend it, leaving open the possibility that the Biden administration could force Russia into default by the end of the month.
The payments were made even as much of Russia’s overseas assets and foreign currencies were frozen or seized in response to its invasion of Ukraine in February. The Kremlin failed to make on-time payments in April on some of its international debt, triggering 30-day grace periods for the payments.
Since then, it has tried to make payments in rubles rather than dollars or euros, even though that is prohibited in most of the loan terms, and global credit agencies said payments in rubles would constitute default.
But experts say the payments processed Tuesday show that Russia has a large enough reserve of dollars — plus a steady incoming stream of foreign currency from sales of oil and natural gas — to finance its obligations.
Inside Russia, a default would be likely to create tremendous economic hardship for ordinary people. Lack of capital can lead to huge unemployment with government agencies and major employers being unable to find the funds necessary to pay salaries. Russian banks would be cut off from the international financial system, causing consumer credit to evaporate.
A Russian default also could shake the economies of developing-market countries — which are favored by some lenders for their high-yield upside — so profoundly that investors could ditch them in favor of safer bets, experts say. This would cause Western economies to flood with capital from China, India and Brazil, causing even more inflation.
Evacuations from Mariupol city are ‘underway,’ mayor says
Residents in the devastated southern port city of Mariupol are being evacuated Tuesday, Mayor Vadym Boychenko told a news conference.
However, he refused to provide details of the evacuations or specify how many individuals had left until the mission was completed. It is believed that the United Nations and International Committee of the Red Cross supported the evacuation efforts.
“We’d like to see people reaching the government-controlled parts of Ukraine, and then we’ll provide comments,” Boychenko told reporters.
He said that “many people” remain in Mariupol, estimating their number at around 100,000. Others have “managed” to escape that hell, he said.
Boychenko also did not comment on evacuations from Mariupol’s besieged Azovstal steel plant, where Ukrainian fighters are holed up after rejecting Russian demands to surrender. About 200 civilians, including 20 children, also remain at the plant, a Ukrainian official told The Washington Post late Monday.
“I can only thank our heroes who have been fighting for 69 days there,” Boychenko said of people at the plant. They are also subject to daily Russian bombardment, he said. The Russian Defense Ministry also accused the Azov rebels from Ukraine of using the silence at the steel plant to return fire positions. In response, Russian forces used artillery as well as aircraft to attack the Russian defense ministry.
Some civilians at the steel plant began evacuating over the weekend. According to Mykhailo Vershinin (head of Donetsk region patrol police), a convoy of buses had been supposed to depart Monday from Mariupol to Zaporizhzhia. However, the attempt was unsuccessful. The bus is due to arrive Tuesday.
Mary Ilyushina contributed to this report.
Russia continues fight with Israel over ‘neo-Nazi regime’ of Ukraine
Russia escalated a verbal brawl with Israel on Tuesday in a blistering statement that scolded Israeli officials for supporting “a neo-Nazi regime” in Ukraine, accused Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky of nurturing antisemitism, and cited isolated examples of cooperation between Jewish collaborators and Nazis during the Holocaust.
“The historical tragedy lies in the fact that … during the Second World War some Jews were forced to participate in crimes, while Zelensky, who speculates on his roots, does this consciously and voluntarily,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in an 800-plus-word release on Telegram.
Moscow issued the broadside a day after Israeli officials lambasted Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov for saying that “Hitler also had Jewish blood” in a television interview, in response to a question about how he squared Zelensky’s Jewish identify with Russia’s claims to be “denazifying” Ukraine with a military invasion.
Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, roundly condemned the comments on Monday. Foreign Minister Yair Lepid stated that he had summoned Russia’s ambassador to apologize for his comments. Lapid stated that Jews did not commit suicide in the Holocaust. “The lowest level of racism against Jews is to accuse Jews themselves of antisemitism.”
The meeting between Russian Ambassador Anatoly Viktorov and Israeli diplomats took place Monday in Jerusalem, according to an Israeli official. According to an Israeli official, both sides had agreed not to go into detail in public.
And then Russia issued an online screed on Tuesday. Lavrov claimed that Ukraine could be ruled and governed solely by Jews. It also belittled Lapid’s comments as “anti-historical.”
The statement criticized Israel for not condemning the desecration of Russian war memorials in Ukraine, which it framed as an insult to “the real righteous people of the world — the soldiers of the Red Army who stopped the Holocaust and saved the Jewish world.”
The Israeli Foreign Ministry declined to comment on Russia’s latest statement.
Boris Johnson to Ukraine’s parliament: ‘This is Ukraine’s finest hour’
LONDON — British Prime Minister Boris Johnson told Ukrainian lawmakers via videolink Tuesday that this was their “finest hour,” as he became the first head of government to address the Ukrainian parliament since the Russian invasion.
In a remote speech that echoed the oratory of British wartime leader Winston Churchill, Johnson told the legislature, called the Verkhovna Rada, that “Ukraine will win, Ukraine will be free.”
“This is Ukraine’s finest hour, that will be remembered and recounted for generations to come,” he said. “You have exploded the myth of [Vladimir] Putin’s invincibility, and you have written one of the most glorious chapters in military history and in the life of your country.”
During his address, Johnson unveiled around $375 million in new military aid, including heavy drones to lift supplies to Ukrainian forces, electronic warfare equipment and thousands of night vision devices.
Britain will also send armored vehicles to help evacuate civilians from front-line areas, Johnson said. They were requested by Ukraine.
Johnson’s critics questioned the timing of the speech, just two days before Britons cast their ballots in local elections, which are seen at least partially as a referendum on Johnson following multiple domestic scandals.
The British government has been criticized for welcoming just 27,000 Ukrainian refugees — a fraction of the 5.3 million the United Nations says have left Ukraine as of April 27. The United Kingdom does not have visa restrictions on Ukrainians fleeing conflict, unlike many European countries.
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