* Russia threatened to bypass a U.N.-brokered grain deal unless obstacles to its agricultural exports were removed, while talks in Turkey agreed removing barriers was needed to extend the agreement beyond next month.
He had initially vowed to stay put in Kyiv despite the constant blaring of air raid sirens and attacks on residential buildings, but decided to leave after hearing reports of Russian soldiers ‘raping’ Ukrainian women.
Tens of thousands of flag-waving Russians packed out Moscow’s Luzhniki World Cup stadium on Friday as the despot attempted to drum up support for his stalled invasion of Ukraine, peddled debunked claims about why the war started and shilled a false narrative of Russia’s battlefield ‘success’.
Meanwhile, Pope Francis appeared to ask Russians to seek the truth about their country’s invasion of Ukraine in his Easter message to the world on Sunday and appealed for dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians following recent violence.
Married At First Sight’s Davina Rankin returns to Instagram… Is everything OK? Married At First Sight ‘villain’ Davina… Married At First Sight’s Dean Wells claims ‘there is no… He’s finally found Mrs Right! Married At First Sight’s Dean…
In his speech, Putin quoted the Bible’s book of John, praising his troops in Ukraine. ‘The words from the sacred scripture come to my mind: “There is no greater love than if someone laid down his life for his friends,”‘ he said.
“Now the fifth rescue mission is nearing its completion. It was special regarding the number of children we managed to return and also because of its complexity,” said Mykola Kuleba, the founder of the Save Ukraine humanitarian organisation that helped arrange the rescue mission.
* Ukraine’s First Deputy Foreign Minister Emine Dzhaparova is due to visit India on Monday and will seek humanitarian aid and equipment to repair energy infrastructure damaged during Russia’s invasion, the Hindu newspaper reported on Saturday.
And Dean Wells was grabbing attention for another reason on Saturday, as he surrounded himself with twerking ladies at a party held by tobacco tycoon Travers ‘Candyman’ Beynon at the Candyshop mansion in Queensland.
In the wake of the invasion, the Kremlin has cracked down harder on dissent and the flow of information, arresting thousands of antiwar protesters, banning sites such as Facebook and Twitter, and handing out tough prison sentences for what it says is false reporting on the war, which Moscow refers to as a ‘special military operation.’
Vladimir Putin gave a a tub-thumping address yesterday to tens of thousands of Russians gathered at Moscow’s world cup stadium, celebrating his invasion of Ukraine in 2014 and drumming up support for his new war
Kateryna Rashevska, a lawyer from a Ukrainian NGO called Regional Centre for Human Rights, told the briefing they were collecting evidence to build a case that Russian officials deliberately prevented return of the Ukrainian children.
Putin, who called the rally to mark the anniversary of the last time he attacked Ukraine to annex the Crimea region, spoke of sharing a ‘common destiny’ with Crimeans, of ‘de-Nazifying’ the region in 2014, and of the ‘bravery’ of soldiers currently fighting in Ukraine.
The three said they had been separated from their parents who were pressured by Russian authorities to send their children to Russian summer camps for what was billed as two weeks, from occupied parts of Kherson and Kharkiv regions.
In his Easter message, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said today: ‘Easter Sunday gives us a chance to reflect on the considerable contribution Christian communities make to our national life – offering support and a sense of belonging to so many across the country.
Several Telegram channels critical of the Kremlin reported that students and employees of state institutions in a number of regions were ordered by their superiors to attend rallies and concerts marking the Crimea anniversary.
Moscow has not concealed a programme under which it has taken thousands of Ukrainian children from occupied areas, but presents this it as a humanitarian campaign to protect orphans and children abandoned in the conflict zone.
UKRAINE/BELARUS BORDER, April 8 (Reuters) – More than 30 children were reunited with their families in Ukraine this weekend after a long operation to bring them back home from Russia or Russian-occupied Crimea, where they had been taken from areas occupied by Russian forces during the war.
* Russian forces have likely seized the center of the fiercely contested city of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine and are threatening a key supply route for Ukrainian forces to the west, British intelligence said.
Princess Anne, Prince Edward and the Duchess of Edinburgh are all expected to attend will attend the service at St George’s Chapel, while the Princess of Wales has also reportedly organised an Easter egg hunt for the royal children.
Meanwhile, whoever set up a live stream of the event on YouTube did not turn the comment section off, meaning thousands of negative comments towards the event – written in Russian – flooded the page, as did blue and yellow heart emojis – the colours of Ukraine’s flag.