The Fort Worth Press - Russia shells Ukraine's Odessa as US pledges fresh arms for Kyiv

USD -
AED 3.67298
AFN 67.384996
ALL 90.930513
AMD 386.175669
ANG 1.798582
AOA 911.49704
ARS 987.764796
AUD 1.520288
AWG 1.8
AZN 1.696955
BAM 1.807328
BBD 2.014989
BDT 119.253338
BGN 1.80481
BHD 0.376977
BIF 2900.548912
BMD 1
BND 1.322749
BOB 6.895532
BRL 5.762597
BSD 0.99793
BTN 83.886707
BWP 13.395803
BYN 3.265906
BYR 19600
BZD 2.01157
CAD 1.39255
CDF 2910.000154
CHF 0.86748
CLF 0.034741
CLP 958.597109
CNY 7.1227
CNH 7.119295
COP 4362.01
CRC 512.311083
CUC 1
CUP 26.5
CVE 101.894377
CZK 23.446801
DJF 177.71268
DKK 6.89063
DOP 60.103407
DZD 133.516994
EGP 48.737904
ERN 15
ETB 119.252592
EUR 0.923535
FJD 2.280598
FKP 0.765169
GBP 0.770975
GEL 2.730049
GGP 0.765169
GHS 16.216791
GIP 0.765169
GMD 69.510995
GNF 8607.019424
GTQ 7.714273
GYD 208.788061
HKD 7.771398
HNL 25.174192
HRK 6.88903
HTG 131.517179
HUF 376.946015
IDR 15658.85
ILS 3.712875
IMP 0.765169
INR 84.0917
IQD 1307.316983
IRR 42104.999989
ISK 137.15044
JEP 0.765169
JMD 157.879417
JOD 0.709304
JPY 153.00603
KES 128.999956
KGS 85.801853
KHR 4056.776388
KMF 455.449632
KPW 899.999774
KRW 1379.264996
KWD 0.30657
KYD 0.831685
KZT 489.206572
LAK 21877.743381
LBP 89415.792635
LKR 293.064732
LRD 191.612838
LSL 17.675809
LTL 2.95274
LVL 0.60489
LYD 4.817306
MAD 9.845031
MDL 17.88838
MGA 4613.124116
MKD 56.926531
MMK 3247.960992
MNT 3398.000028
MOP 7.985954
MRU 39.458485
MUR 46.110014
MVR 15.360218
MWK 1730.476006
MXN 20.14388
MYR 4.37901
MZN 63.909949
NAD 17.675809
NGN 1641.570371
NIO 36.723529
NOK 10.958145
NPR 134.220156
NZD 1.670945
OMR 0.384997
PAB 0.997921
PEN 3.756261
PGK 3.99671
PHP 58.228038
PKR 277.18023
PLN 4.009161
PYG 7944.443418
QAR 3.638497
RON 4.59426
RSD 108.085005
RUB 97.018184
RWF 1357.199292
SAR 3.755738
SBD 8.333542
SCR 13.606272
SDG 601.491881
SEK 10.670155
SGD 1.323685
SHP 0.765169
SLE 22.700818
SLL 20969.496802
SOS 570.343435
SRD 34.328008
STD 20697.981008
SVC 8.731772
SYP 2512.530268
SZL 17.680625
THB 33.770499
TJS 10.628101
TMT 3.5
TND 3.091161
TOP 2.342098
TRY 34.291785
TTD 6.763388
TWD 31.984997
TZS 2720.000316
UAH 41.276464
UGX 3657.533614
UYU 41.528439
UZS 12758.859677
VEF 3622552.534434
VES 42.245336
VND 25295
VUV 118.722039
WST 2.801184
XAF 606.158083
XAG 0.029645
XAU 0.000367
XCD 2.70255
XDR 0.750095
XOF 606.166485
XPF 110.206533
YER 250.325026
ZAR 17.68735
ZMK 9001.201112
ZMW 26.570499
ZWL 321.999592
  • CMSC

    -0.0200

    24.55

    -0.08%

  • BCE

    -0.1250

    32.335

    -0.39%

  • CMSD

    0.0150

    24.855

    +0.06%

  • SCS

    0.0550

    12.265

    +0.45%

  • BCC

    4.7950

    136.435

    +3.51%

  • RBGPF

    -2.0000

    61

    -3.28%

  • RIO

    -0.4800

    66.1

    -0.73%

  • RYCEF

    0.0400

    7.25

    +0.55%

  • NGG

    -0.1000

    65.02

    -0.15%

  • JRI

    0.0260

    13.006

    +0.2%

  • GSK

    -1.1450

    37.025

    -3.09%

  • VOD

    0.1200

    9.4

    +1.28%

  • RELX

    -0.8100

    47.1

    -1.72%

  • BP

    0.0800

    29.44

    +0.27%

  • BTI

    -0.0300

    34.43

    -0.09%

  • AZN

    -2.0700

    73.15

    -2.83%

Russia shells Ukraine's Odessa as US pledges fresh arms for Kyiv
Russia shells Ukraine's Odessa as US pledges fresh arms for Kyiv / Photo: © AFP

Russia shells Ukraine's Odessa as US pledges fresh arms for Kyiv

Russian forces intensified their fight in Ukraine's east and fired missiles over the port city of Odessa, as President Joe Biden signed a law speeding up arms deliveries to Kyiv.

Text size:

The southern city was hit by a series of missiles Monday, destroying buildings, setting ablaze a shopping centre and killing one person, its city council said, just hours after a visit by European Council President Charles Michel.

As Russia stepped up its fight to seize Ukraine's east, US President Joe Biden resurrected a World War II measure to aid Kyiv, opening the spigots on artillery, anti-aircraft missiles, anti-tank weapons and other powerful Western materiel.

The United States has sent some $4 billion in military aid to Ukraine already but "caving to aggression is even more costly," Biden said as he signed the act, passed with unusual bipartisan support.

Missiles earlier rumbled through Moscow's Red Square as Russia's President Vladimir Putin sought to channel national pride on the anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany into support for a war that has killed thousands and sent millions into exile.

On the ground in Ukraine, the governor of Lugansk reported "very serious battles" in the frontline areas of Bilogorivka and Rubizhne.

An AFP team reported seeing columns of trucks filled with soldiers and heavy equipment move down the main road leading away from the city of Severodonetsk -- one of its last eastern strongholds against Russia -- suggesting Ukraine was pulling back from some parts of the front.

In the devastated southern port of Mariupol, pro-Russian separatists feted Victory Day, with leader Denis Pushilin and residents carried a giant black and orange ribbon of Saint George -- a symbol of WWII celebrations in Russia -- through a city that has seen some of the heaviest fighting since the invasion on February 24.

Full control of Mariupol would allow Moscow to create a land bridge between the Crimean peninsula, which it annexed in 2014, and eastern regions run by pro-Russian separatists.

Some have speculated that Putin was seeking to achieve that goal in time for Victory Day, but a small contingent of depleted Ukrainian forces continued their defence of a final bastion at the Azovstal steelworks.

- 'I bow to Putin' -

In his speech in Moscow, the Russian leader blamed the West and Ukraine for the two-and-a-half-month conflict, telling the parade that his country faced an "absolutely unacceptable threat" and warning against the "horror of a global war".

"You are fighting for the Motherland, for its future, so that no one forgets the lessons of the Second World War," he said.

The celebration in Red Square also featured some 11,000 troops and more than 130 military vehicles, although a planned military flypast was cancelled.

"Putin conducts politics so well, well done to him. He makes sure that our boys don't die, that there is as little blood as possible. I bow down to him," added Taisiya Chepurina, 81, whose husband fought in the Battle of Stalingrad in 1943.

But Ukrainians and Western powers accused Putin of exploiting the anniversary, with protesters in Warsaw tossing blood-red paint on the Russian ambassador, chanting "fascists!" and hoisting a Ukrainian flag, as he visited a cemetery.

Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky also invoked the ghosts of World War II, chiding Russia for claiming sole credit for winning.

"We will not allow anyone to annex this victory. We will not allow it to be appropriated," he said in a video speech shortly before Putin spoke.

In Kyiv the commemoration day was largely shunned as life slowly returned to normal, weeks after fierce fighting raged in its suburbs.

- Camps in the east? -

Still facing the brunt of the fighting are Ukraine's civilians, with the country reeling from a Russian attack on a school over the weekend that killed 60 people.

And the Pentagon said Monday it has seen indications that those caught up in Russia's invasion are being forcibly removed from their homeland.

"I can't speak to how many camps or what they look like," Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told reporters when asked about statements from Kyiv that some 1.2 million Ukrainians were being sent across the border and placed in camps.

"But we do have indications that Ukrainians are being taken against their will into Russia," Kirby said. He called these actions "unconscionable" and "not the behaviour of a responsible power."

The deportation of Ukrainians from their own nation -- often to isolated or economically depressed regions of Russia, according to Kyiv -- is another indication that Putin "simply won't accept and respect Ukrainian sovereignty," he added.

- Progress towards embargo -

In another step forward in building pressure on Russia, EU chief Ursula von der Leyen said she made "progress" on a proposed Russian oil embargo during talks with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

The populist Orban is one of Putin's closest friends in Europe and had held up the bloc's attempt to phase out Russian oil -- one of the most painful measures yet taken by the West -- as he pointed to economic consequences in landlocked Hungary.

But France's President Emmanuel Macron poured cold water on Ukraine's oft-repeated desire for fast-track European Union membership, saying it would take "decades".

Macron, however, suggested building a broader political bloc that could also include Britain.

Ukrainian soldier Glib Stryzhko, 25, was gravely wounded and captured in Mariupol in April but finally released after a secret phone call to his mother.

"After we were loaded onto the bus waiting for us, the driver said: 'Guys, you can breathe. You are home now,'" Stryzhko told AFP from his hospital bed in Zaporizhzhia.

burs-oho/mtp

H.Carroll--TFWP