In a show of force as President Vladimir Putin bid farewell to his visiting “dear friend” and Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, Russia blasted an apartment block in Ukraine with missiles on Wednesday and swarmed cities with drone attacks overnight.
Firefighters battled a blaze in two adjacent residential buildings in Zaporizhzhia, where officials said a twin missile strike killed at least one person and injured 33 others.
“Right now, ordinary people and children are being fired at in residential areas,” President Volodymyr Zelenskiy tweeted, with security camera footage showing one building exploding.
“This cannot be ‘just another day’ in Ukraine or elsewhere in the world. To defeat Russian terror and save lives, the world needs more unity and determination.”
Glass, debris, and wrecked cars littered the scene’s playground and car park. Emergency personnel carried the injured or escorted those who could walk.
An elderly woman with scratches on her face sat alone on a bench, wiping her tears and praying.
“When I stepped outside, there was devastation, smoke, people screaming, and debris. Then came the firefighters and rescuers “Ivan Nalyvaiko, 24, explained.
After a drone struck two college dormitories in Rzhyshchiv, a riverside town south of the capital, at least six people were killed, 18 were injured, and three went missing. Reuters observed a five-story building with a section of the top floor collapsed.
Throughout the night, sirens wailed across the capital and across large swaths of northern Ukraine, and the military claimed to have shot down 16 of 21 Iranian-made Shahed suicide drones.
In an apparent reference to the Chinese president’s visit to Moscow, Zelenskiy tweeted: “Every time someone tries to hear the word ‘peace’ in Moscow, another order for such criminal strikes is given there.”
On Wednesday, Zelenskiy paid a visit to troops near the front lines. His office released a video of him awarding medals to soldiers, which it said was shot near Bakhmut, the eastern city where Ukrainian forces are defending in what has become Europe’s bloodiest infantry battle since World War II.
Putin’s hosting of Xi in Moscow this week was his most grand diplomatic gesture since launching the war a year ago and becoming a pariah in the West. The two men addressed each other as “dear friends,” promised economic cooperation, denounced the West, and described their relationship as the best it had ever been.
According to a statement released by China, they “shared the view that this relationship has gone far beyond the bilateral scope and acquired critical importance for the global landscape and the future of humanity.”
“Now there are changes that haven’t happened in 100 years,” Xi said as he left, adding, “When we are together, we drive these changes.”
“I agree,” Putin said, to which Xi replied, “Please take care of yourself, dear friend.”
However, the public remarks were noticeably devoid of specifics, and during the visit, Xi said almost nothing about the Ukraine war other than that China’s position was “impartial.”
WAR CRIME CHARGES
The White House urged Beijing to put pressure on Russia to leave Ukraine. Washington also criticized the trip’s timing, which came just days after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Putin on war crimes charges, which Beijing, like Moscow, has rejected.
China has positioned itself as a neutral peacemaker, proposing a plan for Ukraine last month that the West largely dismissed as ambiguous at best and a ploy to buy time for Putin to regroup his forces at worst.
Ukraine claims that there will be no peace unless Russia withdraws from occupied territory. Moscow claims that Kyiv must recognize territorial “reality” after claiming to have annexed nearly a fifth of Ukraine.
Following Ukraine’s recapture of territory in the second half of 2022, Moscow launched a massive winter offensive with hundreds of thousands of newly called-up reservists and convicts recruited as mercenaries from prison.
Despite the bloodiest fighting of the war, described by both sides as a meat grinder, the front line has barely moved in four months.
Russia’s only significant gains have been around Bakhmut, but Kyiv has decided not to withdraw there in recent weeks, claiming that its defenders were inflicting enough losses on the Russian attackers to justify holding out.
In an intelligence update, Britain’s Ministry of Defence stated that, while the Ukrainian garrison in Bakhmut could still be surrounded, Russia’s assault on the city could be winding down.
According to the Wednesday update, a recent Ukrainian counterattack west of Bakhmut was likely to relieve pressure on Ukraine’s supply route.
Russia has accused Britain of putting Ukraine at risk of “nuclear collision” by providing depleted uranium ammunition.
“There is no threat to Russia; this is purely about assisting Ukraine in its defense,” Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said.
Britain confirmed on Monday that it was supplying Ukraine with such shells, which are used by many militaries to penetrate armor due to the high density of the metal.
Depleted uranium is a byproduct of the production of enriched uranium, which is used in nuclear reactors and weapons. It is less radioactive than naturally occurring uranium, but campaigners are concerned about long-term health risks near impact sites, where dust can enter people’s lungs and vital organs.
