By DAVID KEYTON, JOHN LEICESTER and EFREM LUKATSKY
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The European Union’s govt arm advisable placing Ukraine on a path to membership Friday, a symbolic enhance for a rustic keeping off a Russian onslaught that’s killing civilians, flattening cities and threatening its very survival.
In one other present of Western assist, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson met with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv to supply continued help and navy coaching.
The European allies’ newest embrace of Ukraine marked one other setback for Russian President Vladimir Putin, who launched his warfare almost 4 months in the past, hoping to tug his ex-Soviet neighbor away from the West and again into Russia’s sphere of affect.
At Russia’s showpiece financial discussion board in St. Petersburg on Friday, Putin stated Moscow “has nothing against” Ukraine becoming a member of the EU, as a result of it “isn’t a military organization, a political organization like NATO.” He additionally reprised his common protection of the warfare, alleging it was essential to guard individuals in components of jap Ukraine managed by Moscow-backed rebels and to make sure Russia’s personal safety.
Johnson’s journey to Kyiv adopted one Thursday by the leaders of Germany, France, Italy and Romania, who pledged to assist Ukraine with out asking it to make any territorial concessions to Russia.
“We are with you to give you the strategic endurance that you will need,” Johnson stated on his second go to to the nation because the Feb. 24 begin of the warfare. Although he didn’t element the help, he stated Britain would lead a program that might prepare as much as 10,000 Ukrainian troopers each 120 days in an unspecified location exterior the nation.
The coaching program might “change the equation of this war,” he stated. Ukraine has been taking heavy casualties in preventing within the east.
“I completely understand why you and your people can make no compromise with Putin because if Ukraine is suffering, if the Ukrainian troops are suffering, then I have to tell you that all the evidence is that Putin’s troops are under acute pressure themselves and they are taking heavy casualties,” he stated. “Their expenditure of munitions, of shells and other weaponry, is colossal.”
Since his April go to, “the Ukrainian grit, determination and resilience is stronger than ever, and I know that unbreakable resolve will long outlive the vain ambitions of President Putin,” he stated.
Johnson stated the U.Okay. will work to accentuate the sanctions on Russia. He praised the resilience of Ukrainians and the way “life is coming back to the streets” of Kyiv, however famous that “only a couple of hours away, a barbaric assault continues. Towns and villages are being reduced to rubble.”
Zelenskyy gave Johnson a tour of a monastery the place they lit candles and the British chief acquired an icon. They positioned flowers at an outside memorial wall displaying images of troopers who fell in preventing in 2014, considered an exhibit of broken, rusting Russian weapons, and greeted cheering crowds.
“We have a common view of the movement toward Ukraine’s victory. I’m grateful for the powerful support!” Zelenskyy stated on Telegram.
The risk of membership within the EU, created to safeguard peace on the continent and function a mannequin for the rule of regulation and prosperity, fulfills a want of Zelenskyy and his Western-looking residents.
The European Commission’s advice that Ukraine grow to be a candidate for membership might be mentioned by leaders of the 27-nation bloc subsequent week in Brussels. The warfare has elevated strain on EU governments to fast-track Ukraine’s candidacy, however the course of is predicted to take years, and EU members stay divided over how shortly and totally to welcome new members.
Political and navy assist from Western international locations has been key to Ukraine’s shocking success towards bigger and better-equipped Russian forces. Zelenskyy has additionally clamored for extra rapid assist within the type of extra and higher weapons to show the tide within the industrial east, often called the Donbas area.
In St. Petersburg, Putin decried the sanctions imposed on Russia by the U.S. and its allies as “insane and, I would say, reckless.”
“The calculation was understandable: to impudently, with a swoop, crush the Russian economy by destroying business chains, forcing the withdrawal of Western companies from the Russian market, freezing domestic assets, hitting industry, finance, and the people’s standard of living. It didn’t work,” he stated.
Russia has pressed its offensive within the east, leaving determined residents frightened about their future.
“We are old people, we do not have a place to go. Where will I go?” requested Vira Miedientseva, an aged resident grappling with the aftermath of an assault Thursday in Lysychansk, simply throughout the river from Sievierodonetsk, the place a key battle is raging.
In different developments Friday:
— Zelenskyy introduced that Russia has freed Yuliia Paievska, a celebrated Ukrainian medic who used a physique digital camera to file her work in Mariupol whereas the port metropolis was beneath Russian siege. Paievska, identified in Ukraine as Taira, bought the clips to an Associated Press crew on March 15, the day earlier than she was captured by Russian troops. Zelenskyy stated Paievska is “already home.” He stated Ukraine will proceed working to free all these held by the Russians.
— The Ukrainian navy claimed it destroyed a Russian boat carrying air protection techniques to a strategic island within the Black Sea. The navy stated on social media that the Vasily Bekh was used to move ammunition, weapons and personnel to Snake Island, which is significant for safeguarding sea lanes out of the important thing port of Odesa.
— A bunch of volunteers known as the “IT Army of Ukraine” stated it carried out a cyberattack that delayed Putin’s St. Petersburg speech. The group was convened by Ukraine after the invasion to launch cyberattacks towards Russian targets. It stated it carried out a distributed denial-of-service assault, which leverages networks of zombie computer systems to flood web sites with junk site visitors, rendering them unreachable.
— The warfare’s disruption to exports of grain and different crops from Ukraine that feed the world has captured world consideration and despatched bread costs hovering the world over. But the manufacturing of different, extra area of interest foodstuffs has additionally been impacted, together with for a Ukrainian snail farmer.
— The organizer of the Eurovision Song Contest stated it can begin talks with the BBC on probably holding subsequent 12 months’s occasion within the U.Okay. after concluding it may possibly’t be held in Ukraine. The Ukrainian band Kalush Orchestra received the 2022 contest, buoying Ukrainian spirits. The occasion is historically staged by the earlier 12 months’s winner.
Russian forces have switched their focus to the Donbas after a collection of setbacks early within the warfare, together with the failure to grab Ukraine’s capital. The Ukrainian navy stated Moscow’s troops saved up relentless assaults on Sloviansk and Sievierodonetsk, the main target of current preventing. The navy claimed Ukrainian forces pushed Russian fighters out of the village of Bohorodychne, north of Sloviansk.
Russia and its allies say they’ve taken about half of Donetsk and almost all of Luhansk — the 2 areas that make up the Donbas. Sievierodonetsk and surrounding villages are within the final pocket of Luhansk area nonetheless in Ukrainian fingers.
“The Russians are pouring fire on the city,” stated Luhansk Gov. Serhiy Haidai. “It’s getting harder and harder for us to fight in Sievierodonetsk, because the Russians outnumber us in artillery and manpower, and it’s very difficult for us to resist this barrage of fire.”
The fixed shelling made it not possible for 568 individuals, together with 38 kids, sheltering within the Azot chemical plant within the metropolis to flee, he stated. Russian forces have destroyed all three bridges main from the town, however Haidai stated it nonetheless had not been totally blocked off.
Moscow’s envoy for Russia-backed separatists who management a lot of the territory round Sievierodonetsk stated an evacuation from the Azot plant nonetheless might happen. Rodion Miroshnik of the self-proclaimed Luhansk’s People’s Republic stated on social media that Russian troops and separatists are “ready to consider options for opening a humanitarian corridor for the exit of civilians, but subject to strict adherence to the cease-fire.”
Earlier this week, Miroshnik accused Kyiv of attempting to disrupt civilian evacuations from Azot, a declare vigorously denied by Ukrainian officers.
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Lukatsky reported from Lysychansk, Ukraine.
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Follow the AP’s protection of the warfare at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
Source: www.bostonherald.com”