In his night speech, Volodymyr Zelenskyy told Ukrainians late Thursday that they should be proud to have survived 50 days of Russian attack when the invaders “gave us a maximum of five.” At the time, even friendly world leaders urged him to leave, unsure if Ukraine could survive, he said: “But they did not know how brave the Ukrainians are, how much we value freedom and the ability to live as we wish.” Describing the ways in which Ukraine defended itself against the attack, Zelensky noted “those who have shown that Russian warships can be removed, even if they are at the bottom” of the sea. It was his only reference to the Moskva cruise missile, named after the Russian capital, which became a strong target of the Ukrainian resistance in the early days of the war. It sank on Thursday while being towed to the port after suffering severe damage under conditions that remained in question. Ukrainian officials said their forces had hit the boat with rockets, while Moscow acknowledged that the ship had caught fire, but not any attack. US and other Western officials could not confirm what caused the blaze. In each case, they have seized it, despite obstacles we can scarcely imagine. ” Moskva had the capability to carry 16 long-range cruise missiles, and its removal reduces Russia’s firepower in the Black Sea. It is also a blow to Moscow’s prestige in a war that is already widely regarded as a historic blunder. Now in its eighth week, the invasion has stopped amid resistance from Ukrainian-backed militants and other aid sent by Western nations. In the early days of the war, Moskva was said to have been the ship that called on Ukrainian soldiers on the Black Sea island of Snake to surrender in a confrontation. In a widely circulated recording, a soldier replied: “Russian warship, go (insultingly) yourself.” The Associated Press has not been able to independently verify the incident, but Ukraine and its supporters see it as an iconic moment of contempt. The country recently unveiled a stamp in her honor. If Ukraine did carry out the attack, the Moskva probably represents the largest warship to be sunk in battle since the Falklands War of 1982, when a similar-sized ARA General Belgrano was torpedoed by a British submarine, killing more than 300 people. The news of the flagship overshadowed Russian claims of progress in the southern port city of Mariupol, where Moscow forces have been fighting Ukrainians since the early days of the invasion in some of the fiercest battles of the war – at a horrific cost to civilians. . The small number of Ukrainian defenders in Mariupol is resisting a siege that has trapped more than 100,000 people in desperate need for food, water and heating. David Beasley, executive director of the UN World Food Program, told the AP in an interview on Thursday that people were “starving to death” in the besieged city. The mayor of Mariupol said this week that more than 10,000 civilians had been killed and that the death toll could rise to more than 20,000, following weeks of attacks and deprivation that covered the streets with corpses. The capture of Mariupol is crucial for Russia because it will allow its forces in the south, which came through the annexed Crimean peninsula, to fully connect with troops in the Donbas region, the eastern industrial heart of Ukraine and the target of the forthcoming attack. . The Russian military continues to assemble helicopters and other equipment for such an effort, according to a senior U.S. defense official, and is likely to add more ground combat units soon. But it is still unclear when Russia could launch a larger attack on Donbas. Moscow-backed separatists have been fighting Ukraine in Donbas since 2014, the same year Russia invaded Crimea. Russia has recognized the independence of the rebel areas in Donbas. Maksym Marchenko, governor of the Odessa region, said Ukrainian forces had hit Moscow with two Neptune missiles and caused “serious damage”. Russia’s Defense Ministry said the ammunition on board was fired as a result of the fire, without specifying what caused the fire. He said the “main missile weapons” had not been damaged and that the crew, which usually numbered about 500 people, had left the ship. It was not clear if there were any casualties. In addition to cruise missiles, the warship also had air defense missiles and other artillery. Neptune is an anti-ship missile recently developed by Ukraine based on an older Soviet design. The launchers are mounted on trucks near the coast and, according to the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, can hit targets up to 280 kilometers (175 miles) away. This would have put Moskva in range, based on where the ship was when the fire started. Launched as Slava in 1979, the cruiser saw service in the Cold War and during the conflicts in Georgia and Syria and assisted in conducting scientific research in peacetime with the United States. During the Cold War, it carried nuclear weapons. On Thursday, other Russian ships in the northern Black Sea moved further south after the Moscow incident, a senior US defense official said on condition of anonymity to discuss internal military assessments. While the United States has not been able to confirm Ukraine’s claims that the warship was hit, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan called it a “major blow to Russia.” “They had to choose between two stories: One was that they were just incompetent and the other was that they were attacked, and neither is a particularly good outcome for them,” Sullivan told the Washington Economic Club. . Russia invaded on February 24 and may have lost thousands of fighters. The conflict has killed countless Ukrainian civilians and forced millions more to flee. It has also pushed up prices in grocery stores and petrol pumps, while dragging the global economy. The head of the International Monetary Fund said on Thursday that the war had helped the agency downgrade economic forecasts for 143 countries. Also Thursday, Russian authorities accused Ukraine of sending two low-flying military helicopters about 11 kilometers (7 miles) across the border and firing on residential buildings in the village of Klimovo in Russia’s Bryansk region. Russia’s Investigative Committee says seven people, including a small child, were injured. Russia’s state security service had earlier reported that Ukrainian forces fired mortars at a border crossing in Bryansk as they were crossing the border, forcing them to flee. The reports could not be independently verified.
Associated Press reporters around the world contributed to this report. Follow the AP coverage for the war at
