WAR IN UKRAINE: April 23, 2022 — Michael Bociurkiw

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS: Day 58

At around 2pm local time air raid sirens could be heard in almost all regions of Ukraine. National TV also reported the sounds of explosions in Odesa and later that a military facility and two residential buildings were hit. The missiles were reportedly fired from inside Russia near the Caspian Sea, Ukrainska Pravda reported. The targeting of the one residential complex resulted in 6 dead - including one child and at least 18 injured. It marks a dangerous turn in the war as civilian infrastructure in the crucial port city was left mostly untouched.
Today is the Saturday between Good Friday and Easter Sunday on the Julian calendar.
More civilians could leave the devastated southern city of Mariupol, via a planned humanitarian corridor - though these have failed in the past. There are reportedly 100,000 people left in the strategic port city – Ukraine's deputy PM has said the UN may need to help for evacuation to succeed. Avideo appearing to show women and children trapped in a bunker in a steelworks - the last redoubt of Ukrainian defenders in Mariupol - has been published - BBC
The UN chief is set to meet the Russian and Ukrainian presidents separately in the coming days, reports CNN. The UN chief’s mission comes at great risk as the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross discovered after traveling to Moscow. Separately, Turkey's President is expecting to hold phone calls with his Russian and Ukrainian counterparts over the weekend with the hope of meeting them both in Istanbul to end the war.
Ukrainian officials have warned of unspecified provocations by Russian forces over the Easter holiday, which is observed by many Ukrainians according to the Julian calendar, and have urged citizens in some regions to mark the holiday at home. However the Lviv oblast administration, in an unexpected move which appears to clash with church and Lviv city administrators, has scrapped the curfew for tonight - ostensibly to allow the faithful to attend the traditional all night church services.
The head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Epiphanius of Kyiv, said on Ukrainian television Saturday that in case of danger the church is compelled to ensure the safety of the faithful and therefore changes to traditional Easter church services are permitted. The church leader said several army chaplains have been killed since the war began and some taken prisoner. He said all church faithful are permitted to take up arms in order to protect their homeland.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Friday warned residents in regions to the south and west of Donetsk against providing personal information to Russian soldiers. "I urge the residents of the southern regions of Ukraine - Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions - to be very careful about what information you provide to the invaders," he said in an address. "If they ask you to fill out some questionnaires…you should know this is not to help you."
A Russian commander said Friday that Moscow wants to take “full control” of eastern and southern Ukraine, in part so it could have a path to neighboring Moldova — raising fears that the nearly two-month war could spill outside of Ukrainian borders, reports the Washington Post. Separately, Moldova’s Foreign Ministry summoned Oleg Vasnetov, the Russian Ambassador to Moldova, to express concern over a Russian general’s earlier statement that Russia wanted to take control of southern Ukraine to gain access to the pro-Russia breakaway region of Transnistria. The ministry called the general’s statements “unfounded.”
Canada said on Friday it has provided heavy artillery to Ukrainian security forces, following up on a pledge by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau earlier this week to send more artillery weaponry to Ukraine in the face of a Russian assault on its East, reports Reuters. Canada has now delivered a number of M777 howitzers and associated ammunition to Ukrainian forces, and is finalizing contracts for commercial pattern armoured vehicles that it will send to Ukraine as soon as possible, the defense ministry said.
Damage to at least 242 items of cultural heritage have been documented in Ukraine, according to the country’s Ministry of Culture and Information Policy. They include: the island of Khortytsia, where the Museum of the History of the Zaporozhian Cossacks is located; the building of the Makariv Public Library of the early 20th century in Kyiv; and in the Kharkiv region, the ancient Teachers' House of 1925.

Belarusian photographer Pavel Krychko created a portrait of Putin from 1,500 screenshots and photos of 57 days of the war in Ukraine. "Horror, pain, suffering, death, inhumanity, evil - all of it is in this image. I don't understand how people can support this," he says.