White House officials have confirmed that the United States will send M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, also known as HIMARS, to war-torn Ukraine. The medium-range rocket systems have long topped the lists of weapons requests by Kyiv as fighting against Russian forces has concentrated in the eastern regions of the country. The US officials confirmed the systems would be part of a new $700m security assistance package to Ukraine that will also include helicopters, Javelin anti-tank weapon systems, tactical vehicles, spare parts and more. On Wednesday, the Kremlin sharply criticised the US decision to supply the rocket systems and munitions to Ukraine, and accused Washington of adding “fuel to […]
Russia’s progress in Mariupol has sparked concerns it could widen its offensive to target more of southern Ukraine. Ukrainian army says it is fighting back against Russian troops suffering low moral. But Inside Mykolaiv, residents live in fear of renewed Russian assault. Al Jazeera’s Hoda Abdel-Hamid reports from the Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv. – Subscribe to our channel: http://aje.io/AJSubscribe – Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AJEnglish – Find us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aljazeera – Check our website: https://www.aljazeera.com/ #UkraineWar #Mykolaiv #RussiaUkraineWar
While Russia is preparing a show of force to celebrate the anniversary of its World War II victory, the reality of its battle in Ukraine seems much bleaker. Ukraine’s military says more than 25,000 Russian soldiers have been killed since the invasion on February 24, while Moscow’s Defence Ministry says less than 1,300 soldiers have been killed. Al Jazeera was given rare access to the bodies left behind as Russia retreated from the Kyiv region. Al Jazeera’s Hoda Abdel-Hamid reports from Kyiv on the human cost of the war. – Subscribe to our channel: http://aje.io/AJSubscribe – Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AJEnglish – Find us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aljazeera – Check our […]
President Vladimir Putin has said Russia’s military action in Ukraine was “unavoidable” and pledged that its goals in the conflict will be achieved. His comments on Tuesday came after he flew into Russia’s far east Amur region where he met Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko. The visit marked Putin’s first known trip outside Moscow since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, sending tens of thousands of troops into the neighbouring country. Putin and Lukashenko visited the Vostochny Cosmodrome to mark Russia’s annual Cosmonautics Day, commemorating the first crewed space flight made in 1961 by the Russian Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin. Al Jazeera’s Dorsa Jabbari reports from Moscow. – Subscribe to our […]
A warning, this report contains images that viewers may find disturbing. Ukrainian forces have buried hundreds of people in a mass grave in a commuter town outside Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, after retaking control of the area from Russian troops, according to an official. “In Bucha, we have already buried 280 people in mass graves,” Mayor Anatoly Fedoruk told the AFP news agency by phone on Saturday. He said the heavily destroyed town’s streets are littered with corpses. Bucha has seen fierce fighting during the past few weeks and had been under Russian occupation for about a month until it was retaken this week. Al Jazeera’s Zein Basravi reports from the […]
Ukraine’s Azov battalion has been the main force defending the city of Mariupol. The group has a reputation for fighting fiercely, but it has also said to hold far-right views. In 2016 the United Nations accused it of violating international humanitarian law. In 2019, 40 US congress members unsuccessfully tried to designate the Azov as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation. Russian President Vladimir Putin referenced the presence of such units within the Ukrainian military as one of the reasons for launching his so-called “special military operation – to de-militarise and de-Nazify Ukraine”. The unit has denied it adheres to Nazi ideology as a whole, but Nazi symbols such as the swastika […]
Russia’s month-long war on Ukraine has killed thousands of people, displaced millions of refugees and devastated cities, but its armed forces remain largely frustrated by fierce Ukrainian resistance, with no end in sight to the conflict. On February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine – the biggest offensive in Europe since World War II – and implied the possibility of nuclear escalation if the West intervened. Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy has called for global protests against the Russian invasion, saying that Moscow is trying to defeat the freedom of “all the people in the world” and show that only crude force matters. Al Jazeera’s Rob […]
Russian forces have intensified their bombardment of the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol as street fighting has raged on Tuesday, a day after Mariupol authorities rejected Moscow’s ultimatum to surrender, Ukrainian officials said. Russian shelling is turning the southern city into the “ashes of a dead land”, the city council said on Tuesday. Russia’s RIA news agency said Russian forces and units of Russian-backed separatists had taken about half of the city, citing a separatist leader. Al Jazeera’s Zein Basravi reports from the western city of Lviv, Ukraine – Subscribe to our channel: http://aje.io/AJSubscribe – Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AJEnglish – Find us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aljazeera – Check our website: […]
At least 500 people have been killed in the city of Kharkiv since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine on February 24, the regional emergency service has said. Ukraine’s second-largest city, located in the country’s northeast, has been subjected to relentless bombardment by Russian forces for weeks. Kharkiv has suffered constant shelling by Russian forces. Although they have not been able to take control of the city, the bombing has caused catastrophic damage. Al Jazeera’s Assed Baig reports from Kharkiv in Ukraine. – Subscribe to our channel: http://aje.io/AJSubscribe – Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AJEnglish – Find us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aljazeera – Check our website: https://www.aljazeera.com/ #UkraineWar #Kharkhiv #RussiaUkraineWar
Russian forces have pushed deeper into Ukraine’s besieged and battered port city of Mariupol where heavy fighting shut down a major steel plant and local authorities pleaded for more help. The fall of Mariupol, the scene of some of the war’s worst suffering, would mark a crucial battlefield advance for the Russians, who are largely bogged down outside key cities more than three weeks into the biggest land invasion in Europe since World War II. “Children, elderly people are dying. The city is destroyed and it is wiped off the face of the earth,” Mariupol police officer Michail Vershnin said on Saturday from a rubble-strewn street in a video addressed […]
