Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed that the first batch of U.S.-made M1 Abrams tanks is “already in Ukraine.” The tanks will “reinforce our actions against the occupiers. And it will be a significant reinforcement,” he said Monday in his nightly address.
President Biden committed in January to sending 31 of the advanced battle tanks. U.S. military officials have said that the deliveries would be gradual but that they expected them all to arrive in coming weeks.
Here’s the latest on the war and its ripple effects across the globe.
Fewer than half of the expected M1 Abrams tanks have arrived so far, a senior Ukrainian military official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military preparations.
Some Ukrainian citizens have been tortured to death under Russian occupation, a U.N. panel announced Monday. “In some cases, torture was inflicted with such brutality that it caused the death of the victims,” Erik Mose, chairman of the Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine, told the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva as his team presented its latest findings. Mose, a Norwegian judge with experience in international human rights, also said that Russian soldiers “raped and committed sexual violence against women of ages ranging from 19 to 83 years” in Kherson, with family members often kept next door to hear the abuses. Russia did not respond to the commission’s requests for communication, Mose added.
A town near the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson was shelled overnight, regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin said early Tuesday. At least four people were injured.
Russian forces shot down two Ukrainian drones in the Kursk region late Monday, the Russian Defense Ministry said, in what it described as Kyiv’s attempt to carry out a “terrorist attack.” The drones were shot down about 11 p.m. local time, it said.
Zelensky said Ukraine would retaliate against Russian attacks following a strike Monday on Odessa that left at least two people dead. Ukraine will retaliate for “every strike against our cities and villages, against every Ukrainian community. For Odessa, for Beryslav and Kherson, for Donetsk, Kharkiv and Sumy regions,” he said in his nightly address.
The Canadian speaker of the House of Commons apologized after praising a 98-year-old Ukrainian man who had served in a notorious Nazi military unit during World War II. Speaker Anthony Rota introduced Yaroslav Hunka following Zelensky’s address to Parliament on Friday, calling him a “Ukrainian hero, a Canadian hero.” Jewish groups condemned the honor. Zelensky has relatives who were killed in the Holocaust.
Russia’s Ministry of Internal Affairs added the president of the International Criminal Court to its wanted list on Monday. The ministry did not publicly specify the charges against Piotr Hofmanski, the Polish lawyer who was elected the court’s president in 2021. The ICC previously issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin, accusing him of unlawful deportation of children from Ukraine.
Russia attacks Odessa port, in latest assault on Ukrainian grain: A Russian attack on Odessa was the latest assault on Ukraine’s vital agriculture sector as Moscow seeks to exploit divisions between Kyiv and its European neighbors over grain exports, Alex Horton and Kamila Hrabchuk report. The strike killed at least two people, destroyed granaries and damaged port facilities.
Russian disruptions to Ukraine’s use of the Black Sea as a highway for exporting food have forced Kyiv to explore overland routes, but Ukraine has faced resistance from some of its closest neighbors. Officials in Poland, Hungary and Slovakia fear that cheap Ukrainian grain would flood their markets, drive down prices and hurt local farmers.
