Once a day, NU.nl gives you an overview of the situation in Ukraine. This time: Ukrainian authorities in Mariupol have so far found at least 16,000 civilian bodies in mass graves near the southern port city. Meanwhile, the European Union continues to bicker over an oil boycott.
The mass graves are said to have been arranged in such a way that the bodies are only separated from each other by an iron plate. The Russians want to give the impression that these are individual graves, the city council of Mariupol claims.
Thousands more bodies are said to lie under the rubble of destroyed buildings. Local crematoria and cemeteries have been said to have been full of war dead for ages.
City authorities fear the death toll will exceed 22,000, Ukrainians quote media burgemeester Vadym Boychenko.
Russian troops enter Severodonetsk
Russian forces have penetrated the crucial eastern Ukrainian city of Severodonetsk for the first time. It is the largest city in the Donets Basin that Ukraine still controls.
Fierce fighting has been going on around the city for days. Governor Serhiy Gaidai reported that Russian troops are now on their way to the center of the city through the suburbs.
“We have disappointing news: the enemy has invaded the city,” Gaidai said in a televised speech. He emphasized that the nearby city of Lysychansk is still completely in Ukrainian hands.
One million people in eastern Ukraine’s Luhansk region are without water, Gaidai said Monday. According to him, there is also no more gas in the city of Severodonetsk. He believes that the fighting means that there is no way to ensure that civilians can get water and gas.
The Netherlands no longer gets gas from Gazprom
The Russian state gas company Gazprom will stop supplying gas to the Dutch company GasTerra on Tuesday. The gas trader, which is owned by Shell, Esso Nederland and the Dutch State, among others, refuses to pay its bills in rubles. GasTerra does not foresee any problems, because the trader has already purchased gas elsewhere.
Russia announced at the end of March that payments for gas must now be made in rubles. The country did so in response to Western sanctions imposed after Russia invaded Ukraine in late February.
US does not supply missile systems that can hit targets in Russia
The United States will not provide Ukraine with long-range missiles that can reach targets deep in Russia. President Joe Biden ruled out that on Monday despite repeated requests from the Kyiv government for such weapons.
US media said in recent days that Washington was preparing delivery of the so-called Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS). Such multiple rocket launchers can hit targets up to 300 kilometers away, but the Americans consider the risk of being directly involved in the war too great as a result.
EU continues to bicker over oil boycott
After weeks of bickering over a possible boycott on Russian oil imports, it appears that a special EU summit will not lead to an agreement either. On arrival at the summit, EU leaders were pessimistic about a so-called embargo, designed to hit Russians in the wallet.
Negotiations have been going on at European level for weeks to end imports of Russian oil. But whether it’s EU leaders or ambassadors behind the scenes, they can’t figure it out. The sleeper has been the same for ages: Hungary. The country is highly dependent on Russian oil.
The proposal was also criticized from unexpected quarters. Prime Minister Mark Rutte emphasized on arrival at the summit that the Netherlands also has interests. He wants to prevent that ports will no longer be able to obtain Russian oil, while other countries still use Russian pipeline oil.
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