Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba discussed with German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock the issues of toughening sanctions against the Russian Federation and strengthening the defense capability of Ukraine, and also thanked the German side for refusing to a demand of the Russian Federation to pay for energy in Russian currency.
“I spoke with Annalena Baerbock and thanked Germany for refusing to pay for Russian natural gas exports in rubles. Emphasized the need to impose new stiff sanctions on Russia. Informed on the frontline developments. The need to further strengthen Ukraine’s defense capabilities is urgent,” Kuleba wrote on Twitter on Saturday.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba had a conversation with Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Burita.
“Ukraine and Morocco maintain friendly bilateral relations, and we look forward to their further strengthening in all areas, including food security, trade expansion and cooperation within international organizations,” Kuleba wrote on Twitter.
As reported, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday, March 31, signed a decree by which he recalled the Ukrainian ambassador to Morocco.
“There are those who work together with everyone for the defense of the state. In order for Ukraine to win back its future. We appreciate the work of each such person. And there are those who waste time just to remain in office. Today I signed a decree to recall such a person, to recall such an ambassador from Morocco,” the president said.
The Russian side at the talks with Ukraine agreed that the referendum is the only way out in the process of recognizing the country’s neutral status, David Arakhamia, head of the Ukrainian delegation at the talks, said during a telethon on Ukrainian television on Saturday.
“The Russian side agreed that this would be the only way out of this situation,” he said.
Answering the question what will happen if the transition to a neutral status is not supported by the people of Ukraine, Arakhamia said that “the treaty will then not have legal force, and we will either return to a state of war, perhaps, or return to new negotiations.”
Ukraine has stopped power unit No. 1 of the Khmelnytsky NPP, which remained in operation after power unit No. 2 was taken out for repair, as a result of which only seven of the 15 existing power units are operating in the power system, the International Nuclear Energy Agency (IAEA) reported, citing the Ukrainian nuclear regulator SNRIU.
According to the IAEA’s daily report on Ukraine on its website late on Saturday evening, the agency explained the shutdown of the remaining power unit by taking it out for scheduled repairs.
“Seven reactors are operating in the country, including two at the Russian-controlled Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, three at the Rivne Nuclear Power Plant and two at the Yuzhno-Ukrainian Nuclear Power Plant. Other reactors have been shut down for regular maintenance, including both units of the Khmelnytsky Nuclear Power Plant,” the statement said.
As reported, since February 18, KhNPP power unit No. 2 was shut down for scheduled preventive maintenance, lasting approximately 92 days.
According to the IAEA, power unit No. 2 of the Rivne NPP was recently put into repair, after which 8 out of 15 power units remained in operation.
Earlier, NNEGC Energoatom reported that three ZNPP power units were put into reserve after the station was occupied by Russian invaders, only one is under repair.
Khmelnytsky NPP consisting of two power units (VVER-1000) with a total capacity of 2000 MW is located in Netishyn (Khmelnytsky region).
In total, there are 15 power units in Ukraine equipped with water-cooled power reactors with a total installed electrical capacity of 13.835 GW.
Presidents of Ukraine and Russia Vladimir Zelensky and Vladimir Putin “with a high degree of probability” will meet in Turkey, head of the Ukrainian delegation at the talks David Arakhamia said during a telethon on Ukrainian television on Saturday.
According to him, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “called both us and Vladimir Putin yesterday, and he seemed to confirm for his part that they were ready to organize a meeting in the near future.”
“Neither the date nor the place is known, but we believe that the place with a high degree of probability will be Istanbul or Ankara,” Arakhamia said.
Losses among civilians since February 24, when Russia started the war against Ukraine, until April 1, 2022, amounted to 3342 civilians (in the report a day earlier – 3257), including 1325 dead (1276), reports the office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in Saturday. “OHCHR believes that the actual figures are much higher as information is delayed from some areas of intense fighting and many reports are still awaiting confirmation,” the document says. According to him, this applies, for example, to Mariupol and Volnovakha (Donetsk region), Izyum (Kharkiv region), Popasna (Luhansk region), Irpin (Kyiv region), where there are reports of numerous civilian casualties. They are subject to further verification and are not included in the above statistics. “The majority of civilian deaths or injuries were caused by the use of explosive devices with a wide area of effect, including shelling from heavy artillery and multiple launch rocket systems, as well as rocket and air strikes,” the report says. According to confirmed UN data, 268 men, 189 women, 36 boys and 20 girls died, while the gender of 64 children and 748 adults has not yet been determined. Among the 2017 injured, 39 girls and 35 boys, as well as 94 children, whose gender has not yet been determined. Compared to the previous day, five children were killed and eight more were injured, according to the UN. OHCHR indicates that in Donetsk and Luhansk regions, as of midnight on April 2, there were 381 (358) dead and 793 (772) injured in government-controlled territory, and 67 (67) dead and 246 (246) injured in territory controlled by self-proclaimed “republics”. In other regions of Ukraine under government control (in Kyiv, as well as in Zhytomyr, Zaporozhye, Kiev, Sumy, Odessa, Mykolaiv, Kharkiv, Kherson, Dnepropetrovsk, Cherkasy and Chernihiv regions), the UN recorded 877 (851) dead and 978 (963) injured . The summary also states that, according to the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine, as of 08:00 on April 2, 158 (153) children were killed and 254 (245) were injured. The increase in indicators in this report compared to the figures in the previous report should not be attributed only to new cases that occurred on April 1, since OHCHR also verified a number of cases that occurred in previous days during the day, the document specifies.
