A month after the start of the Russian invasion, the conflict is bogged down. While Westerners fear a chemical attack, NATO has warned Moscow. On Saturday, Joe Biden had very harsh words towards Vladimir Putin calling him a “butcher”. Follow the latest information live.
11:03 p.m.
Regime change in Russia is not “NATO’s goal” despite the invasion of Ukraine, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Sunday. Regime change in Russia “is not the goal of NATO, nor that of the American president”, declared the chancellor on the German public channel ARD.
“I had the opportunity to speak with him at length at the White House and we also discussed these issues,” he added.
9:54 p.m.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Sunday that several Russian businessmen had offered to donate money to help Ukraine, including to support its army.
During a videoconference interview with several Russian media, Mr. Zelensky said he had received “signals” from several Russian businessmen, including billionaire Roman Abramovich, a close associate of Vladimir Putin targeted by Union sanctions. European and UK.
8:23 p.m.
The question of Ukraine’s “neutrality”, one of the central points of negotiations with Russia to end the conflict, is “studied in depth”, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky assured Sunday in an interview with the media. Russians.
“This point of the negotiations (…) is under discussion, it is studied in depth,” he said in this online interview, broadcast on the Telegram channel of the Ukrainian presidential administration.
6:16 p.m.
kyiv fears a worsening situation in Mariupol and eastern Ukraine, following Moscow’s announcement on Friday of a “concentration of its efforts on the liberation of Donbass”, a presidential adviser said on Sunday. Ukrainian.
This Russian announcement could lead to “a worsening” of the situation around Mariupol, a strategic port in the south-east of the country besieged since the end of February, and in the whole of the Donbass mining basin, said Oleksiï Arestovych, in a video message posted on the presidency’s Telegram account.
5:52 p.m.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian on Sunday called for continued dialogue with Russian President Vladimir Putin until he realizes the ‘price to pay’ for his invasion of Israel. Ukraine and that he wants to negotiate.
5:32 p.m.
Russian and Ukrainian delegations will meet in Turkey from Monday for a new round of face-to-face negotiations, David Arakhamia, one of the Ukrainian negotiators, announced on Sunday.
“During discussions today by videoconference, it was decided to hold the next face-to-face round in Turkey from March 28 to 30,” he said on his Facebook page.
A face-to-face Russian-Ukrainian negotiation session had already taken place on March 10 in Turkey, in Antalya, between the foreign ministers, without leading to concrete progress.
5:01 p.m.
More than 10 days after the bombardment of the Mariupol theater, the fate of the hundreds of civilians who had taken refuge there is still unknown: faulty communications and the absence of local authorities make the mission almost impossible, explained to the AFP an elected municipal of this port of the south-east of Ukraine besieged by the Russian forces.
4:22 p.m.
Russia may want to establish a Korean-style separation in Ukraine, an official with the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense said on Sunday.
“After failing to take kyiv and overthrow the Ukrainian government, (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is changing operational orientation”, focusing on “the south and the east” of the country, estimated on Facebook Kyrylo Boudanov, head of military intelligence.
“There are reasons to believe that he could impose a dividing line between the occupied and unoccupied regions of our country, an attempt to create South and North Koreas in Ukraine,” he added.
3:08 p.m.
Nearly half of Ukrainians between the ages of 18 and 55 say they are ready to participate directly in the fighting against the Russian invasion, according to a poll compiled by European researchers despite the constraints of the war. For men, this share rises to around 70%, while it is around 30% for women, according to this opinion poll, the results of which were published by the Oslo Peace Research Institute (Prio). with the support of local pollster Info Sapiens.
The latter interviewed more than 1,000 Ukrainians considered old enough to resist with the aim of establishing a representative sample, despite the difficulties of establishing a survey in the midst of the war.
2:45 p.m.
The Ukrainian Foreign Minister called on Sunday for a boycott of Auchan stores, after the French group announced that it wanted to maintain its activities in Russia, arguing in particular for the need to support the purchasing power of Russians. “Apparently the job losses in Russia are greater than the deaths in Ukraine,” Dmytro Kouleba wrote on Twitter.
“If Auchan ignores the 139 Ukrainian children murdered during this month of Russian invasion, let’s ignore Auchan and all its products,” he added, calling for a “boycott” of Auchan, Leroy-Merlin and Decathlon stores, all owned by the Mulliez Family Association.
2:35 p.m.
The Polish public channel TVP announced that it would broadcast a program on Sunday to raise funds for the benefit of Ukrainians in the face of the Russian invasion, in English and in more than 20 countries. The program called “Save Ukraine #StopWar” (Save Ukraine, Stop the war) aims to raise “funds for the victims of the Russian invasion in Ukraine”, explained in a press release TVP World, the antenna English-speaking Polish channel.
It is “a project aimed at reaching millions of people around the world to help Ukrainians live through the war and win it”, the organizers stressed. It will be broadcast from 3:30 p.m. GMT for a duration of two hours, the statement said.
12:57
Pope Francis on Sunday denounced in particularly strong terms since the entry of Russian troops into Ukraine “the martyrdom” and “aggression” of the country by Moscow.
“More than a month has passed since the start of the invasion of Ukraine, since the start of this cruel and senseless war,” the sovereign pontiff said after the Angelus prayer in the square. Saint Peter in the Vatican, evoking “a barbaric and sacrilegious act” against a “martyred Ukraine”.
11:15 a.m.
Housing Minister Emmanuelle Wargon said this on Sunday on France Info. “Of these 30,000, some stay in France, and some cross the country, more towards Spain and Portugal. Today, we welcome in housing and accommodation around 15,000 people,” said the minister.
10:45 a.m.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has formally denied having facilitated forced evacuations of Ukrainian civilians to Russia. “The ICRC never helps to organize or carry out forced evacuations.
This applies wherever we work. We would never support an operation that goes against the will of the people or our principles,” the ICRC said in a statement released on Saturday evening, which does not specify what gave rise to this very firm denial.
The Committee appears to be responding to accusations by Roman Rukomeda, a Ukrainian political analyst who spoke to online media Euractiv on Saturday.
09:12
Questioned by the JDD, General Jérôme Pellistrandi mentioned the difficulties of the Russian army on the Ukrainian ground.
“The Russian army is faced with the failure of its initial strategy. She failed to assert her superiority on the pitch, when she had the certainty of a healthy walk. And it gets bogged down because of the thaw, which slows down operations significantly, ”he explains to the weekly.
07:40
The CEO of Auchan Retail International Yves Claude defended on Sunday the maintenance of the group’s activities in Russia, a “not easy” choice after the appeal of the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, because “leaving would be imaginable on the economic level but not from the point of view. from a human point of view”.
Questioned by Mr. Zelensky before the French Parliament on Wednesday on his activity in Russia, where he has been present for twenty years and employs 30,000 people, Auchan has decided to remain in the country even if he foresees losses there for 2022 , explains Mr. Claude in an interview with the Journal du Dimanche.
07:01
The Russian army has taken control of the town of Slavoutitch, where the staff of the Chernobyl power plant reside, briefly arresting the mayor and sparking pro-Ukrainian demonstrations, Ukrainian authorities said on Saturday.
“I have been released, everything is fine, as far as it is possible under the occupation,” Yuri Fomichev, mayor of Slavoutitch, told AFP by phone, whose arrest by the Russians had been announced. in the morning by the Kyiv regional administration.
After being released, he spoke at an anti-Russian demonstration, which he said gathered some 5,000 people, and assured that Russian troops would soon leave the city. He then told AFP that they would withdraw on Sunday.