9,000 civilians killed since Russian invasion

GBNEWS24DESK//

Over 9,000 civilians, including 453 children, have been killed in Ukraine since Russia’s invasion last February, a senior Ukrainian presidential aide said yesterday.

“We have registered 80,000 crimes committed by Russian invaders and over 9,000 civilians have been killed, including 453 children,” Andriy Yermak, head of the Ukrainian presidential staff, said at the World Economic Forum in the Swiss resort of Davos.

“We will not forgive a single (act of) torture or life taken. Each criminal will be held accountable,” he said, reiterating that Ukraine wants a special international tribunal to try Russian political leaders and reparations for the destruction caused by Russia’s invasion.

The Office of the UN high commissioner for human rights said on Monday that more than 7,000 civilians had been killed in Ukraine since Russia invaded.

In eastern Ukraine, 25 people were still missing after a Russian missile strike on a block of apartments that killed at least 41 people in the city of Dnipro.

Saturday’s strike was one of the deadliest attacks since Russia invaded Ukraine nearly a year ago. The Kremlin denies that Russian troops were responsible.

Ukraine came a step closer yesterday to winning the fleet of Western battle tanks it hopes could turn the course of the war, after Germany said tanks would be the first item on the agenda of a new defence minister.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his Monday night video address that the attack on Dnipro and Russia’s attempts to gain the initiative in the war underscored the need for the West “to speed up decision-making” in supplying weapons, reports Reuters.

German-made Leopard battle tanks – the workhorse of armies across Europe – are widely seen as the only plausible choice to supply Ukraine with the large-scale tank force it needs.

Ukraine’s army General Staff said yesterday that Russia had launched more than 70 rocket attacks in the past 24 hours.

It said Russian forces shelled more than 15 settlements near the city of Bakhmut in the eastern Donetsk region, including the salt-mining town of Soledar, where Russia and Ukraine have waged fierce trench warfare for weeks.