Manama - Yasser Ibrahim - Moscow threatened on Sunday 6 March 2022 the countries surrounding Ukraine to allow the Ukrainian Air Force to use its airports with the aim of launching attacks on Russian forces, saying that this step means that these capitals have entered the circle of conflict. The Interfax News Agency quoted a spokesman for the Russian Defense Ministry, Igor Konashenkov, as saying on Sunday that "the use of airports for these countries for Ukrainian military aircraft, and their later use against the Russian armed forces, may be seen as these countries in an armed conflict." Earlier on Sunday, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that his campaign was proceeding according to the prescribed plan and will not end before Kyiv stopped the fighting at a time when she failed for the second consecutive day, efforts to evacuate the city of Mariolol in southern Ukraine, which was bombed. Putin made these statements during a telephone conversation with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who called for a ceasefire in this conflict, which the United Nations says has caused the fastest growing refugee crisis in Europe since World War II.
Contacts with Moscow
While the Kremlin said in a statement that Putin informed Erdogan that he was ready for dialogue with Ukraine and foreign partners, but any attempt to prolong the negotiations will fail. Turkey said Erdogan called for a ceasefire to calm human concerns. Kyiv renewed her appeal to the West, tightening sanctions beyond the current efforts that affected the Russian economy, and also requested more weapons. While US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, speaking during a visit to Moldova, adjacent to Ukraine, said that Washington is studying "with effective" how it can send planes to Poland if Warsaw decides to supply Ukraine with its warplanes. For its part, Russian media said that Putin had conversations that lasted for nearly two hours on Sunday with French President Emmanuel Macron, but he has not yet convinced Moscow to cancel the campaign that entered its eleventh day, in a repetition of the other international efforts aimed at defuse the crisis. Moscow describes the campaign it launched on February 24 as a "special military operation", and says it does not intend to occupy Ukraine, which has ever been part of the Soviet Union, but is now heading towards the West and seeks to obtain membership of NATO and the European Union.
A crisis in Mariolpol
While the authorities in Mariopol said that they will try again to evacuate some of the 400,000 residents after the Ukrainian coastal city was bombed for days, which made them trapped without heating, electricity or water. However, the ceasefire plan collapsed, as happened on Saturday, and the two parties exchanged accusations of responsibility for that. "They are destroying us," Vadim Bochinko told Reuters in a video call, while describing the plight of the city with a population of 400,000. He added: "They do not even give us the opportunity to count the number of wounded and dead, because the bombing does not stop." Russia, which denies attacking civilian areas, has sent military forces and equipment to Ukraine. A huge Russian military convoy on the northern Kyiv road has made limited progress during the past days, although the Russian Ministry of Defense deployed today's footage showing the movement of some military vehicles. In the capital Kyiv, the Ukrainian soldiers strengthened their defenses by digging trenches, closing roads and communicating with civil defense units, while Russian forces were bombing nearby areas. "The sites are in preparation. We prepared them and we are waiting for their interview here ... Victory will be our ally," said a soldier in a photographer published by the Ukrainian Armed Forces. While Ukrainian President Folodimir Zellinski said that the Russian missiles destroyed a civilian airport in Venitsia, the capital of the region of the same name and located in the western part of the center of Ukraine on Sunday. He added that Russia is preparing to bomb another city in the south, which is Odysse. For its part, the World Health Organization said that several attacks targeted Ukrainian health care facilities during the conflict. The general manager of the organization, Tedros Adhanum Gibrissus, said in a message on Twitter that the attacks had killed and wounded, but he did not give details. He added: "The attacks on health care facilities or their employees are a violation of medical neutrality and international humanitarian law." This comes at a time when the Ukrainians' flow to Poland, Romania, Slovakia and other countries continued. Filippo Grande, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, said the number of refugees fleeing from Ukraine exceeded 1.5 million today. UNHCR estimated that the number of refugees may jump to four million by July. While the British Military Intelligence said on Sunday that the Russian forces are targeting the populated areas in Ukraine, but the severity of the resistance slows the Russian progress. "Russia has previously used similar methods in Chechnya in 1999 and Syria in 2016 when it was employed by both air and ground ammunition" in its attacks. While Russia has repeatedly denied targeting Ukrainian civilian regions.
(Reuters)