Embassy of Ukraine in the USA
WAR BULLETIN
March 29, 10.00 EST
WAR ROOM
General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine
The total combat losses of the enemy from 24.02 to 29.03 were approximately:
personnel - about 17200,
tanks ‒ 597,
APV ‒ 1710,
artillery systems – 303,
MLRS - 96,
Anti-aircraft warfare systems - 54,
aircraft – 127,
helicopters – 129,
vehicles - 1178
boats / cutters - 7,
fuel tanks - 73,
UAV operational-tactical level - 71.
special equipment - 21.
mobile SRBM system - 4.
The thirty fourth day of the resistance of the Ukrainian people to the Russian military invasion has already started.
The Ukrainian Defence Forces Group continues to conduct a defense operation in the Eastern, Southeastern and Northeastern directions. The Armed Forces of Ukraine successfully hold back the enemy in all the directions, and in some areas our troops carry out successful counterattacks.
The Russian enemy continues to insidiously launch missile and bomb strikes, trying to completely destroy the infrastructure and residential areas of Ukrainian cities. It concentrates on fuel storage, in order to complicate logistics and create conditions for a humanitarian crisis.
In violation of the requirements of International Humanitarian Law in some temporarily occupied settlements of Kyiv, Zaporizhzhia, Chernihiv, Kherson and Kharkiv oblasts, the Russian occupiers continue to terrorize the local population. They are shelling residential buildings; rob, abduct and hostage civilians, engage in looting.
The Joint Forces of Ukraine repulsed 7 enemy attacks in the Donetsk and Luhansk directions during the day. Our soldiers destroyed 12 tanks, 10 infantry fighting vehicles and 3 units of motor vehicles. The enemy suffered casualties.
Defenders of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine for the previous day hit 17 air targets - 8 planes, 3 helicopters, 4 UAVs of various types and 2 cruise missiles. Air Force aircraft fired missile and bomb strikes at places of accumulation of the Russian enemy equipment and manpower.
The Russian enemy did not meet the goal of the offensive operation. The withdrawal of certain units of the armed forces from the territory of Kyiv and Chernihiv oblasts is noted. At the same time, there is a high risk of the Russian occupiers attacking military and civilian infrastructure.
There is a problem of strengthening and rotating the existing enemy group. Thus, only in the Pacific Fleet of the Armed Forces, recruitment units, due to the refusal of personnel to participate in the so-called "special operation", are not able to staff even one battalion-tactical group.
In the Volyn direction, the group of the armed forces of the republic of Belarus provides cover for its state border, conducts demonstration actions. In the Polissya direction, the enemy is limited to artillery shelling, regrouping of existing units and their partial withdrawal to the territory of Belarus.
In the Sivershchyna direction, the occupiers continue to blockade Chernihiv, trying to gradually destroy military and civilian facilities. The enemy did not take active action in the direction of Brovary.
In the Slobozhansky direction, the Russian occupiers continue to use aircraft and artillery in the settlements of Kharkiv and Barvinkove, trying to capture the city of Izyum. Fighting continues in the area of the settlements of Kamyanka, Sukha Kamyanka, Tykhotske. The Russian enemy increased the existing group by involving separate units from the 1st Tank Army of the Russian federation. The 200th separate motorized infantry brigade of the enemy lost two battalion-tactical groups and personally the brigade commander, Colonel Denis KurilIt in the battles near Kharkiv. The losses only of one 200th brigade amounted to more than 1,500 servicemen.
In the Donetsk direction, the enemy increased its firepower and intensified assault operations in most areas. He struck air strikes in the settlements of Voevodivka, Rubizhne, Lysychansk, Kreminna, Zolote-4, Popasna, Toretsk, and Novhorod. It focuses its main efforts on taking control of Popasna and Mariupol. The russian enemy is not successful.
In the city of Berdyansk, the occupiers are trying to restore the port infrastructure.
In the South Buh direction, the enemy, under cover of artillery fire, takes measures to restore combat capability, replenish ammunition and fuel.
The Defence Forces Group continues to conduct a defence operation in the Eastern, Southeastern and Northeastern directions, restrains the enemy in all directions, in some directions - displaces the enemy.
Ukrainian Parliamentary Commissioner for Human Rights
Russians are taking hostages of civilians en masse in the occupied territories.
Another abduction of local authorities in the Kherson region - the invaders took hostage a deputy of the Genichesk City Council O.Konovalov. The man was taken to a Russian-occupied school building. His further fate is unknown.
The occupiers captured the head of the Mylivka village territorial community Oleh Yakhnienko.
Zaporizhzhya regional journalist Iryna Dubchenko was arrested by Russian forces in the town of Rozivka, where she was caring for her frail grandmother. The woman was taken to Donetsk for "investigative actions".
Dubchenko is accused of supporting and hiding the Ukrainian military.
In Sumy region, the occupiers are abducting residents along with cars. The Russian military takes them to other areas and arranges interrogations.
The taking of civilian hostages is a direct violation of Articles 3 and 34 of the Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, Article 9 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
As of 10 a.m. on March 29, 2022, according to the Unified Register of Pre-Trial Investigations, as well as other sources that need confirmation, 144 children (+1 per day) have died and 220 children (+4 per day) have been injured since the Russian invasion of Ukraine began.
It is impossible to establish the actual number of dead and wounded children due to the fact that the occupying forces are actively fighting in Ukrainian cities.
A 3-year-old child died in the Luhansk region from mine injuries.
As a result of the shelling of a village in the Zaporizhzhia region, the occupiers wounded three civilians, including a child.
In the Luhansk region, an obstetrician covered a mother and a newborn child with his body while receiving a childbirth under enemy fire, which saved their lives. The doctor received multiple injuries.
In the Donetsk region, the occupiers continue the blockade of Mariupol. In the city, the invaders are active in hostilities and do not provide emergency medical care to children. Data on dead and injured children in the city of Mariupol are currently being established.
The bombing and shelling damaged 773 educational institutions, 75 of which were completely destroyed.
The actions of the Russian Federation violate the right to life of children, guaranteed by Article 6 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and prove that Russia is a terrorist state and its political and military leadership criminals.
I call on international human rights organizations to take all possible measures to increase pressure on the Russian Federation to end military aggression against Ukraine.
Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine
In one of the settlements of the Rivne region the fire broke out at the enterprise for storage of fuel as a result of Russia’s rocket strike.
There is no oil spill outside the embankment. Rescuers from the State Emergency Service are working at the scene. There are no victims.
As a result of shelling in a five-storey building in Severodonetsk, a fire broke out in one of the apartments on the 4th floor, subsequently the 4th and 5th floors of the building were destroyed. Rescuers from the Luhansk State Emergency Service rescued 4 people from the rubble.
The shelling destroyed a five-story apartment building. Arriving at the scene, the SES of Luhansk region rescued 9 citizens. Disassembling the debris, rescuers found 2 people bodies.
As a result of the shelling in the city of Lysychansk, apartments and garages caught fire. Rescuers of Luhansk region are extinguishing the fire.
https://www.facebook.com/mvs.gov.ua
POLICY
President of Ukraine
Address by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to Ukrainians.
Today we have good news. Our defenders are advancing in the Kyiv region, regaining control over Ukrainian territory. Irpin was liberated and the occupiers are pushed away. Pushed away from Kyiv.
However, it is too early to talk about security in this part of our region. The fighting continues.
Russian troops control the north of Kyiv, have the resources and manpower. They are trying to restore the destroyed units. The level of their losses, even at 90%, do not convince them that this will happen to everyone.
Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv regions, Donbas, southern Ukraine - the situation everywhere remains tense.
As of today, 143 children are known to have died. Mariupol remains blocked. Russian troops did not allow any humanitarian corridor to be organized today, they did not allow "silence". Therefore, the situation must now be perceived in a balanced, wise way. We still need time and weapons. We can't set expectations too high. Just so as not to burn out.
I spoke with the leaders of the partner countries. Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Johnson, Prime Minister of Canada Trudeau, Chancellor of Germany Scholz, Prime Minister of Italy Draghi and President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev.
We agreed with Britain to further support our defense and strengthen sanctions against the Russian Federation. Canada also supports a tougher response from the world to the catastrophe created by Russian troops in Ukrainian cities.
In a conversation with German Chancellor Scholz, I also paid considerable attention to the need to increase sanction pressure on Russia.
I thanked the President of Azerbaijan for the humanitarian support provided to Ukraine, informed about the state of affairs in the territories where Russian troops entered.
Italy has agreed to become one of the guarantors of Ukraine's security in the relevant new system of guarantees that we are elaborating.
Ukraine cannot and will not agree with the passive sanctions position of some entities towards Russia. There should be no "suspended" sanctions packages.
We went through this story last year when we said that strong preventive sanctions against Russia were needed to prevent an invasion. The preventive package was not made. A full-scale war has begun. There are now many hints and warnings that sanctions will be tightened, such as an embargo on Russian oil supplies to Europe, if Russia uses chemical weapons. There are simply no words.
We, living people, have to wait for chemical weapons … Doesn't everything that the Russian military is doing and has already done deserve an oil embargo? Don't phosphorus bombs deserve that? Do the shelled chemical production or nuclear power plant deserve that?
It is important for us that the sanctions packages are effective and substantial enough, given what is already being done against Ukraine by the Russian Federation.
Starting this week, we are creating a group of experts at the President's Office - Ukrainian and international, who will constantly analyze the sanctions against Russia - what they really influence.
Our goal is for the sanctions to work as intended. And so that there is no possibility to circumvent them. This must be a goal for the whole democratic world, without exception.
During the week I will speak in the parliaments of the partner countries: Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Greece, Australia. It is important that these are speeches not only in front of politicians, but also in front of societies.
I will emphasize everywhere that no one has the right to use the lives of Ukrainians to save any income in Russia or income common with Russia. Ukrainians should not die just because someone cannot find enough courage to hand over the necessary weapons to Ukraine.
Fear always makes you an accomplice. If someone is afraid of Russia, if he or she is afraid to make the necessary decisions that are important to us, in particular for us to get planes, tanks, necessary artillery, shells, it makes these people responsible for the catastrophe created by Russian troops in our cities, too.
Full address: https://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/mi-povinni-borotisya-nam-ne-mozhna-vipalyuvati-emociyi-shob-73913
Speech by President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Folketing
Mr. Speaker!
Mrs. Prime Minister!
Members of the Government and the Folketing!
Danish people!
40 missiles.
Every day, Russian troops use so many different but equally deadly missiles against our state, against Ukraine.
This is the average number per day. 40. More than 1,370 missiles have been used in just over a month of Russia's full-scale invasion of our land.
This morning the Russian missiles hit one of our southern cities - Mykolaiv. The city of shipbuilders.
Absolutely peaceful city, which dreamed of only one thing - to regain the glory of the center of shipbuilding in the Black Sea region.
As a result of this strike, the building of the regional administration was destroyed. It is known that seven people were killed and 22 were wounded. Debris removal continues.
The Mykolaiv region residents didn't have any military dreams. They posed no threat to Russia.
But they, like all other Ukrainians, believe me, have become a target for Russian troops. For missiles, bombs, rocket artillery, mortars.
The total number of means of destruction that Russian troops have already used against our people on our land is simply impossible to count.
But we can say that the intensity and brutality of the hostilities against us have reached a level even higher than during World War II. The most devastating war for Europe.
A month of hostilities - and we already have not one or two, but a whole black list of cities that were completely destroyed by Russian bombing.
In dozens of other cities, towns and small villages, residential areas were partially burned, infrastructure was destroyed and enterprises where people worked were blown up. Living, ordinary people.
773 educational institutions - universities, schools, kindergartens - were destroyed. 773. Imagine! And dozens of hospitals, churches, even memorials to Holocaust victims have become targets...
The goal of Russian troops in this war is to completely destroy any basis for the normal life of the Ukrainian people. The occupiers are deliberately making sure that nothing is left of Ukraine. Only ruins. Only refugees.
More than 10 million Ukrainians have already fled their homes due to the hostilities. Almost 4 million Ukrainians have left our country, most of them women and children.
The stories of these people are full of horror.
There are still many burned and shot cars on the roadsides in the areas where the Russian military came. Hundreds and hundreds of such cars, what’s left of them. The occupiers were killing civilians even when they were just trying to escape!
Along with our immigrants in Europe and the western regions of Ukraine, there are children who were simply picked up on the road near the corpses of their parents.
Up to 100,000 people remain in our city of Mariupol, which has been blocked by Russian troops for more than three weeks. While there was snow people melted it to get water. All this time we can't deliver humanitarian goods to the city - they are simply blocked. Water, food, medicine. Everything is blocked by the Russian military.
More than 90 percent of all buildings in Mariupol were completely destroyed by shelling and bombs. But Russian aircraft strike without stopping. They purposefully blow up even shelters, although they know for sure that peaceful people are hiding there - women, children, old people.
What Russian troops are doing to Mariupol is a crime against humanity that is being committed live in front of the eyes of the entire planet.
Why is this even possible? Why can't the world stop this flow of Russia's war crimes ongoing since February 24 this year?
The answer is very simple and cynical.
People who make decisions in Russia hope that they will get away with it. Sanctions? They think they can be bypassed. An embargo on Russian oil? They see that this is still nothing more than just talking about this important topic. And concern, constant concern. An international tribunal? They know that it takes years to bring specific perpetrators to justice.
That is why we appeal to you and to the entire democratic community of the world: sanctions against Russia must be strengthened! Constantly. We need to give up Russian oil, we need to block trade with the Russian Federation, we need to close ports for Russian ships. And this must be the solidarity policy of the European Union, of all the member states. Everyone.
It is you, in Denmark, in the country where the basic principles of the European Union, the Copenhagen criteria, come from, who can feel most of all how important it is for all-European solidarity to work for pressure on Russia.
Because this pressure is for Russia to seek peace. This is pressure to give the necessary protection to all the basic values on which life in Europe is built and which are now completely trampled by Russia in Ukraine.
What can be said about the protection of human rights or freedom on the European continent, if there is no such crime against people and humanity in general not committed by the occupiers?
They deport our people to Russia by force, rape women, underage girls, and engage in looting.
They have already taken more than two thousand children to Russia, and we do not know where they are, we do not even have a complete list of these children. Do they have families? How will they then find their loved ones?
It would be simply impossible for a normal person to imagine the level of evil that was brought to our land!
That is why I call on you to raise the issue of solidarity in the defense of freedom, in the defense of humanity at the level of the European Union.
There can be no Russian branches in Europe that split the EU from within, that are trying to help Russia make as much money as possible even now.
Everyone knows very well who in the European Union opposes humanity and common sense. Who does nothing at all to help establish peace in Ukraine. This must stop, and Europe must stop listening to any excuses from official Budapest.
I am grateful to Denmark for its principled position. Thank you to everyone.
I am grateful to your people who help Ukraine and help Ukrainians. To your companies that have decided to leave the Russian market. Maersk, Jysk, Lego, Vestas, DSV, Arla Foods, Carlsberg and many other companies who have made this important decision.
But I ask you not to stop, to be leaders in Europe in promoting the decisions we really need.
Long before this war, it was clear that humanity should reduce the use of fossil fuels. The era of coal and oil has caused huge damage to the environment, to our planet as a whole. Green technologies and green energy have become a logical and just answer to this challenge.
European policy is already aimed at reducing the consumption of environmentally hazardous resources. But Russia's aggression against Ukraine and against everything that life in Europe is built on is an argument to accelerate green transformation on the continent. Europe must give up Russian oil, give up as soon as possible!
Because it is the crazy income from energy resources that allows the Russian leadership to be bold. Violate generally accepted rules. Promote hatred against other nations, against us and destroy the lives of neighboring countries.
If you had to find the complete opposite of what is called the "Law of Jante" in your country, it would be the "Law of Russian Oil".
I am confident that together - only together with all Europeans, with all responsible states on the planet - we will be able to overcome this catastrophe.
We will be able to return to peace.
We will be able to live together in a European family.
I hope this will happen very soon. But it depends on how consistent and principled we remain at this time.
At a time when the war continues.
However, we have no right now to think only of war. We know there will be peace. We know that we will be able to return to a normal, peaceful life.
That is why I want to invite you to join our initiative to rebuild Ukraine after the war, after our victory.
We invite your companies, your specialists, your state.
Knowing your potential, your creative economic power, I offer your country to take patronage over one of our beautiful regions - after the war. Of course, after the war.
Mykolaiv, the city of shipbuilders, can become such a city, such a region, which will unite you and us even more. Which Denmark can help rebuild.
Ladies and Gentlemen!
Danish people!
Now is the dark time in Ukraine.
Thousands of candles are placed in our churches in memory of the people whose lives were taken by this war.
I know that for you the warm light of candles is a synonym of home comfort, ordinary good human life.
Life, which today has become an unattainable dream for many in Ukraine. The Russian invasion continues.
But I believe, I know, that we can return to peace.
And I ask you to light a candle at home tonight in memory of all Ukrainians whose lives were taken by Russian aggression.
Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Ukraine
The operational situation on the diplomatic front as of 10:00, March 29
Ukrainian diplomacy continues Russia's complete isolation, particularly in the energy sector, which is actively fueling Russia's military machine. The energy ministers of the Group of Seven have made a responsible decision, rejecting Russia's demands to pay gas bills in rubles.
Dmytro Kuleba: “I welcome the statement of the Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action Robert Gabek regarding the decision of the Group of Seven to reject Russia's demands to pay for Russian gas in rubles. Blackmail of the Russian Federation is unacceptable. I am grateful to France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the European Union.”
️ Deputinization of the world
Northern Macedonia is deporting 5 Russian diplomats for violating the Vienna Convention. They must leave the country within five days
Riga's tallest buildings, the Z-Towers, changed their name to Zunda Towers in response to a negative association with the letter Z, which the Russian military uses in symbolic terms of its invasion of Ukraine
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has announced the closure of its offices in Moscow and Minsk due to Russia's military invasion of Ukraine
️ Isolation of the Russian Federation
Sri Lanka's national airline SriLankan Airlines Limited will suspend flights to Russia from March 28
The European Commission appealed to Affiliated Countries to immediately abolish any existing schemes for gaining citizenship for investment and to provide strict checks are in place to address the risks associated with residence permit schemes, as well as to revise previously issued "golden passports"
International rating agency Fitch Ratings will no longer publish data on Russia's sovereign rating
The government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland has decided to suspend state-funded research and innovation cooperation with Russian universities and companies that are strategically important to the Russian government
The United Arab Emirates Investment Fund Mubadala Investment Company suspends investments in Russia
️ Humanitarian aid
Since the start of the war, the American charity company United Help Ukraine has collected more than $ 10 million in donations from Americans, which will be spent on humanitarian and medical aid to Ukraine
Material and technical assistance worth a total of 163,000 euros arrived in Ukraine from Slovenia
Thanks to the efforts of the public organization Razom for Ukraine, $ 20 million was raised in the United States from 60,000 privates