By Al jazeera and BBC
Russian troops have seized control of Kherson, in Ukraine’s south as bombings rage on the seventh day of the invasion.
Several other cities, including the capital, Kyiv, northeastern Kharkiv and Mariupol, in the southeast, continue to be under siege.
Mariupol’s city council says Russian forces are constantly and deliberately shelling critical civilian infrastructure there but Russians have called this propaganda instead accusing Ukranians as using civilians as human shields.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Ukraine’s defence lines are holding yet the United Nations says more than one million people have fled Ukraine amid intense assault.
For months, President Vladimir Putin denied he would invade his neighbour, but then he tore up a peace deal and unleashed what Germany calls “Putin’s war”, pouring forces into Ukraine’s north, east and south.
As the number of dead climbs, Russia’s leader stands accused of shattering peace in Europe. What happens next could jeopardise the continent’s entire security structure.
Why have Russian troops attacked?
In a pre-dawn TV address on 24 February, President Putin declared Russia could not feel “safe, develop and exist” because of what he claimed was a constant threat from modern Ukraine.
Immediately, airports and military headquarters were attacked, then tanks and troops rolled in from Russia, Russian-annexed Crimea and its ally Belarus. Now, warplanes have bombed major cities, and Russian forces have seized control of the key southern port city Kherson.
Russia refuses to use the terms war or even invasion; many of its leader’s justifications for it were false or irrational.
He claimed his goal was to protect people subjected to bullying and genocide and aim for the “demilitarisation and de-Nazification” of Ukraine. There has been no genocide in Ukraine: it is a vibrant democracy, led by a president who is Jewish.
“How could I be a Nazi?” said Volodymyr Zelensky, who likened Russia’s onslaught to Nazi Germany’s invasion in World War Two. Ukraine’s chief rabbi and the Auschwitz Memorial have also rejected Russia’s slur.
President Putin has frequently accused Ukraine of being taken over by extremists, ever since its pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych, was ousted in 2014 after months of protests against his rule.
Russia then retaliated by seizing the southern region of Crimea and triggering a rebellion in the east, backing separatists who have fought Ukrainian forces in a war that has claimed 14,000 lives.
Late in 2021, Russia began deploying big numbers of troops close to Ukraine’s borders, while repeatedly denying it was going to attack. Then Mr Putin scrapped a 2015 peace deal for the east and recognised areas under rebel control as independent.
Russia has long resisted Ukraine’s move towards the European Union and the West’s defensive military alliance, Nato. Announcing Russia’s invasion, he accused Nato of threatening “our historic future as a nation”.
Do you want to share a story, comment or opinion regarding this story or others, Email us at newsdayuganda@gmail.com Tel/WhatsApp........0726054858
Discussion about this post