PreferredArmenian News - NEWS.am presents the daily digest of top news as of 25.02.22:
Kyiv’s mayor said they are starting to defend the country. According to him, some sabotage groups have already entered the country.
The military actions started in Ukraine on Friday night.
The situation remains highly tense in Ukraine now.
Since Friday morning, the alarm signals have been on in Kyiv and residents have been called to hide in shelters. Subway stations have been built as shelters for residents to hide from attacks.
On Friday night, multi-kilometre traffic jams formed at a major checkpoint at the entrance to Moldova.
Kyiv’s busy streets were empty of cars and people. Shops were closed. At ATMs, residents lined up to get cash. Gas stations, facing long lines of cars, ran empty. Volodymyr Zelenskyy noted that a special Russian military operation has killed 137 Ukrainian citizens.
“Ten of them were military officers. 316 citizens were injured," he added.
The Russian defense ministry spokesman also presented the military losses ‘inflicted on the Ukrainian side’. Accordingly, 5 combat planes, a helicopter, and 5 drones have been shot down so far. In addition, 18 armored vehicles were destroyed.
Russia also said it had blockaded Kyiv from the western side.
On Thursday, it was reported that Russian An-26 aircraft crashed in the Voronezh region, leaving all on board dead.
Putin, in turn, noted that “Russia is ready to negotiate with Ukraine at a high level.”
His remarks came during talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
During the talks, the Chinese side also said it supports the settlement of relations between Russia and Ukraine through talks.
Russian president Vladimir Putin talked with his Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko, who said his country can host talks and guarantee the security of the delegations.
Putin has already held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi giving exhaustive explanations about the reasons and circumstances of the decision of Russia to conduct a special military operation in Ukraine.
- Since the situation in Ukraine escalated, the UK said they are ready to provide the Ukrainian president with the shelter.
According to PM Boris Johnson, the UK is ready to provide asylum to both Volodymyr Zelenskyy and members of his government if they need a safe place.
In turn, the US is calling on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to go to Lviv for his safety, ABC TV channel reported.
NBC correspondent Richard Engel tweeted that the US authorities discussed with the government of Ukraine the possible departure of Zelenskyy if the situation escalated.
- Major international leaders and organizations, including the US, the EU and NATO, have already issued statements noting that they are not going to send troops to Ukraine.
NATO has no troops on the territory of Ukraine and has no plans to deploy them into the country, said Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.
US President Joe Biden, in turn, noted that US forces will not fight in Ukraine.
“Our forces are not going to Europe to fight in Ukraine, but to defend our NATO allies and reassure those allies,” he added.
Amid the situation created, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that NATO failed to show proper resolve in the situation with Ukraine and that the West's attitude towards it was far from friendly.
“The West, EU countries and NATO have failed to show determination towards Ukraine. They are all giving advice. The West's attitude towards Ukraine cannot be considered either friendship or solidarity," the president told reporters in Istanbul on Friday.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his country is forced to "heroically" defend its independence and "territorial integrity" because world leaders refused to help them.
He again urged EU member states citizens to help Ukraine fight.
“If you have military experience in Europe and do not want to look at the indecisiveness of politicians, you can already arrive in our state and defend Europe with us,” the Ukrainian leader noted.
Meanwhile, Russian Chechnya’s region leader Ramzan Kadyrov said about 70,000 of their security officials are ready to voluntarily go to and fight in Ukraine.
He noted ‘volunteers are ready to go to any special operation in any territory to secure Russia’.
- Countries around the world are imposing fresh sanctions against Russia.
The EU, the US, the UK, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Taiwan all hit Moscow with new injunctions on Friday.
On Thursday, the US and UK also revealed more measures against Russia as both nations' leaders condemned the actions of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
US freezes assets of four Russian banks, including VTB, for $1 trillion.
Canada, in turn, imposed sanctions against members of the Security Council of Russia, including Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Finance Minister Anton Siluanov.
UK PM Boris Johnson said that sanctions have been imposed on Aeroflot's operations in the UK. He also said the UK was freezing VTB's assets.
However, the Federal Air Transport Agency of Russia sent a notice to the British aviation authorities on the need to comply with the provisions of the air service agreement, warning that after the sanctions on Aeroflot, Moscow could apply mirror measures.
In the meantime, Georgian PM Irakli Garibashvili said they are not going to participate in economic sanctions against Russia as this will only further harm their country and people
- Armenians form the fourth largest community in Ukraine. Most of them live in Kyiv, Kharkiv and other major cities where the situation is tense.
The Armenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said they had no verified information about Armenian citizens killed in the conflict yet.
According to MFA spokesperson Vahan Hunanyan, the work in that regard continues.
Human Rights Defender of Armenia Kristine Grigoryan is also in constant contact with the Armenian Embassy in Kyiv and periodically receives information about the problems faced by the Armenian community of Ukraine and the Armenian citizens.
A report was disseminated Thursday that military tank crewman Davit Aghajanyan, an ethnic Armenian, was killed in Kharkiv, Ukraine, by the Russian side.
- Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, who is on a working visit in Kazakhstan, met with the country's President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev.
During the talks, Tokayev highlighted developing relations between the countries as allies in the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and the Eurasian Economic Union.
However, PM Pashinyan said that “unfortunately, Armenia was in a situation when we thought that the CSTO mechanism should work, but that did not happen.”
Later, the PM took part in the sitting of the Eurasian Intergovernmental Council and attached importance to expansion of the EEU industrial cooperation in civil aviation and e-commerce.
The total number of COVID-19 cases reached 418,792 in the country. Also 21 more deaths were registered, making the respective total 8,413 cases.
The number of people who have recovered so far is 399,241, and the number of people currently being treated is 10,535.
Almost 2,000,000 COVID-19 vaccination doses have been given in Armenia, while over 870,000 people are fully vaccinated.
