O VOO DO CORVO

Dan Bilefsky

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/03/08/world/ukraine-russia-war

 

Here are the latest developments in the war in Ukraine.

Nearly two weeks into a grinding war that has denied Russia the quick victory it anticipated, the first enduring humanitarian corridor took hold in Ukraine on Tuesday as refugees across the country scrambled to flee, and President Biden raised the economic stakes for Moscow by banning the importation of Russian oil and natural gas into the United States.

 

Mr.  Biden announced the latest sanctions against Russia on Tuesday morning, an escalation of economic penalties that could also have consequences at home and internationally.

 

The move shuts off the flow of Russian fuel into the United States and could raise gas prices, which have hit a national average of  $4.17 per gallon, and further rattle global energy markets. In a coordinated move, Britain announced that it would phase out imports of Russian oil by the end of the year. The United States receives less than 10 percent of its energy resources from Russia.

 

In a speech streamed to a packed meeting of the British Parliament on Tuesday, President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine underlined his country’s challenges, making a comparison to Britain’s situation in World War II. “We do not want to lose what we have, what is ours, just in the same way as you didn’t want to lose your country,” he said. “The question for us is to be or not to be,” he added, invoking Shakespeare’s “Hamlet.”  The answer, he said, is “yes, to be.”

 

Here are the latest developments:

 

• After days of failed evacuation efforts because of Russian attacks, at least one humanitarian corridor lasted open long enough to allow hundreds of civilians to escape from the war-battered city of Sumy, east of Kyiv, the capital. People left in a convoy of buses led by the Red Cross, despite shooting near the evacuation route.
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• Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians remain trapped in the besieged southern city of Mariupol. Millions of others are in cities and towns under assault by Russian forces across the country.  So far, according to the United Nations, two million people have fled in what the U.N. has called the fastest-growing refugee crisis in decades.
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• Mr. Zelensky, taunting President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and showing confidence in the Ukrainian defense of Kyiv, released a video that opened with cellphone footage showing his exact location. “I’m staying in Kyiv. In my office,” he said. “I’m not hiding. And I’m not afraid of anyone.”
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• The Ukrainian military claimed to have shot down three Russian fighter jets and a cruise missile early Tuesday, an assertion that appeared to be backed up by several loud explosions over Kyiv. If confirmed, it would be a sign that Ukraine’s air defense systems and air force are still functioning nearly two weeks into the war.
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• In Russia, Mr. Putin signed a package of measures aimed at crippling Western sanctions  and mitigating the pain inflicted by the retreat of international businesses from the country — an unmistakable signal that the ever-tightening economic vise squeezing Mr. Putin is forcing Moscow to take swift domestic countermeasures. The new actions, announced around the time Mr. Biden banned importation of Russian oil, include bolstered pensions and easing regulations for small- and medium-sized businesses.
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• The European Commission, the European Union’s executive arm, outlined ambitious proposals to “make Europe independent from Russian fossil fuels well before 2030.”