Ukraine: ‘Three months without light,’ Odessa residents asked to leave – The World

Repairing the electrical system destroyed by the drones launched last night by the Russian military over Odessa and the region could take up to two or three months: “If you have the opportunity to temporarily leave the city and the regions left without electricity, it is worth doing”: is the message to the population launched by the Odessa Region Power Systems Administration after the call of the state electricity operator Dtek warned of long periods to restore power. This was reported by Ukrainian media. “Odessa and almost the entire region are still without electricity,” Ditek said in a statement.

The situation in the Odessa region is very difficult. After the Russian attack with Iranian drones, the city and other places in the region went dark: more than 1.5 million people in the region are without electricity. Commenting on the situation in Odessa after last night’s kamikaze drone attack, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening video message that only critical infrastructure is being connected, as far as electricity can be provided.

The situation in the Kherson region is still difficult, with Russian bombing yesterday on several settlements near the contact line. This was reported by the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, citing ukranska pravda. According to the authorities, the Russians also opened fire on the Berislav hospital, causing severe damage to the building. According to regional government departments, yesterday the Russians bombed the territory of 9 Ukrainian regions, a number of residents were injured, and houses and other buildings were destroyed. In addition to Kherson, the affected regions are Sumy, Zaporizhia, Dnepropetrovsk, Kharkiv, Lugansk, Donetsk, Mykolaiv and Odessa.

The Holy See can play an important role In mediation between Ukraine and Russia, but “this moment has not been resolved.” So there are no conditions, in Ukraine that is still under bombardment, to open a peace table, and in any case anyone who wants to help in this process, including the Vatican, “cannot be neutral”, cannot put the two states on the same ground . Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba speaks without peering into the bush as he receives in his office a group of international journalists after a mission organized by the Ukrainian Embassy to the Holy See.

He adds: “The concept of brotherhood cannot be insisted on. We are not brothers. This is the story of Cain and Abel.”. But the pope’s last words, and above all his sentiments on December 8, “reached straight into the heart of Ukrainians.

Relations between Kyiv and the Holy See continue. The files in which the Holy See works are diverse, from wheat to prisoners. But anyone who wants to help Ukraine “cannot be neutral.”

“On October 2, the Pope asked Putin to stop the war and Zelensky to be open to proposals,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba recalled Sunday’s private message from Angelos. “This going both ways didn’t help. It’s good that you remember Putin, but if you ask Zelensky to be open to peace proposals, you say that Zelensky is not open to peace and he needs someone to tell him. this is not true. Ukraine wants peace.

The Kiev government views positively a possible role for the Holy See in future peace negotiations, but “the sad fact is that It is not yet time for mediation The reason is President Putin. If you want peace, don’t send missiles every week to destroy our infrastructure, don’t keep sending soldiers to take over our cities, and don’t annex lands that belong to others.”

withdraw recognition in Oslo, Russian Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, President of the NGO Memorialshe has He criticized President Vladimir Putin’s “crazy and criminal” war. in Ukraine. He said that “resistance to Russia under Putin is called fascism,” a distortion that has become “the ideological justification for the insane and criminal war of aggression against Ukraine.” Jan Raczynski In his Nobel acceptance speech. and the Ukrainian Nobel Peace Prize laureate He declared that peace in his country could not be achieved by “laying down arms” against Vladimir Putin’s Russia. “The Ukrainian people want peace more than anyone else in the world,” Oleksandra Matveychuk, head of the Center for Civil Liberties, said at the ceremony. “But peace in a country under attack cannot be achieved by laying down arms. It will not be peace, but occupation.”

Meanwhile, Kiev reported on the ground that it had shot down ten Russian kamikaze drones at night in the Kherson, Mykolaiv and Odessa regions, and that yesterday it repelled attacks near 13 settlements. Russian bombs struck yesterday evening in the east of the country, injuring 4 civilians: “The Russians fired on Nikopol and Marhanets. The city of Nikopol is the most affected,” according to the regional military administration.

And while Moscow accuses the West of wanting to open a second front against Russia in the Caucasus, NATO Secretary Jens Stoltenberg fears that the fighting in Ukraine could turn into a war between Russia and NATO: “It is a war that could become a major, all-out war between NATO and Russia. And we are working every day to avoid it.”