Today, African leaders were in Ukraine on a peace mission when at least two explosions shook the capital city of Kyiv and air raid sirens wailed.
There have been explosions in the city’s central Podil neighborhood, and Mayor Vitali Klitschko has warned that more missiles are on their way to the capital.
A Reuters reporter in the capital city saw the smoke from two incoming missiles.
It was unclear if Russian or Ukrainian air defenses had launched the missiles.
African leaders arrived in Kyiv in a column of automobiles and were filmed by a Reuters cameraman entering a hotel to take cover from the air strike.
Before meeting with Volodymr Zelensky later today, the leaders, including Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa and Macky Sall of Senegal, visited a mass cemetery in Bucha, not far from Kyiv.
According to a draught framework document obtained by Reuters, the African peace mission may offer a number of “confidence-building measures” during preliminary mediation talks.
On Friday, when an African group visited Ukraine on a peace mission, witnesses told Reuters and the mayor of Kyiv that they heard explosions in the city center.
In the city of Bucha, the heads of state of Zambia (Hakainde Hichilema), Senegal (Macky Sall), the Union of Comoros (Azali Assoumani), South Africa (Cyril Ramaphosa), and Egypt (Mustafa Madbuly) visited a mass grave.
There have been explosions in the city’s central Podil neighborhood, and Mayor Vitali Klitschko has warned that more missiles are on their way to the capital. Smoke from two rockets was seen by a Reuters reporter in Kyiv.
It was unclear if Russian or Ukrainian air defenses had launched the missiles.
After a year, the “special military operation” launched by Russia against Ukraine has resulted in millions of innocent Ukrainians being uprooted from their homes and lives.
Putin started the conflict with the absurd assertion that Russia’s neighbor needed to be “demilitarised and de-Nazified,” giving Russia an excuse to begin an invasion of a sovereign state led by the Jewish Volodymyr Zelensky.
Ukraine has defied the odds by defending itself against Russian onslaughts with the backing of Western military aid, and it has fought back bravely against Mr. Putin’s misguided attempt to reclaim territory lost to Moscow with the fall of the Soviet Union.
According to Interfax, on Friday, Valentina Matviyenko, speaker of Russia’s upper chamber of parliament, warned that it is “impossible” to prolong the Black Sea grain agreement under the present conditions.
Speaking on the sidelines of an economic summit in St. Petersburg, Matiyenko said, “The limits of our patience… have been exhausted,” reiterating the sentiments of President Vladimir Putin and other top Russian officials from earlier in the week.
She did add, though, that it was vital to not make the food situation in developing nations any worse.
Grain and other items may now be sent out of Ukrainian ports without fear of attack according to the Black Sea agreement.
In a long-awaited counteroffensive against the invading Russian soldiers, Ukraine has celebrated its first territorial victories.
Photos and videos purportedly showing Ukrainian troops raising the blue and yellow flag in the eastern Donetsk villages of Storozheve, Blahodatne, Neskuchne, and Makarivka from Sunday and Monday suggest that these neighborhoods have been retaken from the occupying forces of the enemy.
Deputy Ukrainian Defence Minister Hanna Maliar hailed the 35th Separate Brigade of Marines on Instagram for freeing the town of Storozheve.
According to her latest report, Ukrainian forces had recaptured the villages of Lobkove, Levadne, and Novodarivk in Zaporizhzhia and moved at least 500 meters closer to the port city of Berdyansk, 250 meters near Bakhmut, and 200 meters on the Toretsk front in eastern Ukraine.
