Ukraine: Zelensky visits the Kherson region, partially occupied by Russia

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visited the partially Russian-occupied Kherson region in southern Ukraine on Thursday, the day after a trip to the eastern front. He went in particular to Posad-Pokrovské, according to images from the presidency, a locality which suffered significant destruction and was occupied by troops from Moscow, until the retreat of the Russian army in the fall. 2022.

Volodymyr Zelensky also visited a power station damaged during the wave of strikes against Ukrainian energy facilities throughout the winter. According to the Telegram account of the presidency, this trip focused on reconstruction in the Kherson region and the head of state chaired a meeting there on the subject. Russia occupied a large part of the Kherson region, including its eponymous capital, from the start of its invasion in February 2022.

Zelensky’s visit to Bakhmout

Before that, President Volodymyr Zelensky visited on Wednesday near Bakhmout, epicenter of the front and symbol of Ukrainian resistance in the east of the country, where he promised a military victory over “terrorist” Russia, the day after a call for peace launched without convincing from Moscow by the Chinese head of state Xi Jinping. The declarations of the Ukrainian president, who came to reinforce his troops as close as possible to the fighting near Bakhmout, then in Kharkiv, a large city in the northeast, followed new deadly strikes by the Russian army.

These claimed the lives of at least eight civilians in the Kiev region, and hit a residential building in Zaporizhia head-on, killing at least one person and injuring dozens. “We will definitely respond (…) to all attacks on our cities,” Volodymyr Zelensky said in a video message. “Here in the Donbass, in the Kharkiv region, wherever the Russian Evil has come, it seems obvious that this terrorist state cannot be stopped other than by our victory,” he added. “Russia will lose this war,” said the Ukrainian president.

Previously, Volodymyr Zelensky had posted a video on Telegram of his trip near Bakhmout, a city threatened with encirclement by Russian forces. We see him in a black sweater in a concrete hangar, with heavily armed soldiers to whom he gives medals. His trip – the second to this part of the front where he had already been in December – came just hours after Chinese President Xi Jinping left Moscow, following a summit the day before with Vladimir Putin. .

Displaying an alliance with the West, the limits of which he has scarcely defined with his Russian counterpart, the Chinese president has put on the table a plan for settling the conflict, which the Russian side has affirmed that it agrees to consider but that the West – United States in the lead – suspected of only being able to consolidate Russian territorial gains.

Ukraine intends to “very soon take advantage” of Russian fatigue in Bakhmout

Ukraine said on Thursday it expects “very soon to take advantage” of Russian fatigue in Bakhmout, the epicenter of fighting in the east of the country for several months and where Russian forces, with the paramilitary group Wagner in the front line, have suffered attacks. significant losses.

“The aggressor does not despair of taking Bakhmout at all costs, despite the losses in men and equipment,” Ukrainian ground forces commander Oleksandre Syrsky said on Telegram. “Very soon we will take advantage of this opportunity, as we did in the past near Kiev, Kharkiv, Balaklya and Kupyansk,” he said, citing previous Ukrainian military victories.

Zelensky’s call for peace for Ramadan

Volodymyr Zelensky sent a message to Internet users on the first day of Ramadan, on Twitter. “May the power of prayer in this holy month of Ramadan help us to cleanse Ukraine of evil Russian atheists, of those who truly believe in nothing, and that is why they are capable of such terror. May the next Ramadan will begin in peace as well as in all Ukrainian land liberated from Russia,” Volodymyr Zelensky said in a video posted on Tuesday evening.

May the power of prayer in this holy month of Ramadan help us cleanse Ukraine of Russian godless evil, of those who truly believe in nothing, and that is why they are capable of such terror. Let the next Ramadan begin in peace and on the entire Ukrainian land free from Russia. pic.twitter.com/ukzhncJ3Tg

— Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) March 22, 2023

Blinken calls Russian-Chinese rapprochement a ‘marriage of convenience’

The Russian-Chinese rapprochement resembles “a marriage of convenience” rather than “conviction”, said Wednesday the head of American diplomacy, Antony Blinken, according to whom Beijing has not yet delivered lethal weapons to Moscow in full war in Ukraine. “Partly because they have a very different view of the world from ours, they entered into a marriage of convenience. I’m not sure it was of conviction,” said the secretary of state who was heard by the commission. of Foreign Affairs of the United States Senate.

“Russia is clearly the junior partner in this relationship,” he added. Chinese President Xi Jinping visited for a two-day trip to Russia focused on strengthening ties with his counterpart Vladimir Putin. “I’m not sure that Russia or Putin want world order, rather world disorder,” he said.

China has not yet delivered lethal weapons to Russia, assures the Americans

China has not yet “crossed the line” of delivering lethal weapons to Russia in the midst of the war in Ukraine, US Foreign Minister Antony Blinken said on Wednesday. “To date, we have not seen them cross that line,” the US secretary of state said in response to a question during a Senate committee hearing in Washington.

For several weeks, American diplomacy has exerted intense diplomatic pressure on China to prevent it from delivering important military equipment to Moscow, mired in the conflict in Ukraine. In mid-February, Washington announced that China was considering such an option, and there were reports of small shipments being sent by Chinese companies to Moscow.