Ukraine war latest: Besieged city Irpin liberated, as Russia claims it ‘does not want Kyiv regime change’

Almost 5,000 people have been killed in Mariupol since Putin’s forces laid siege to it, a spokesperson for the city mayor said today.

They quoted data from the mayor’s office that said about 90 per cent of buildings in Mariupol had been damaged and about 40 per cent had been destroyed.

Kyiv has urged its allies around the world to change the road name where Russian embassies and consulates are located to “Ukraine Street” as a show of support for the besieged nation.

The campaign contains petitions to rename streets with the embassies and consulates in 53 cities in 34 countries worldwide.

That includes a call to rename part of the Kensington Palace Gardens in London to Ukraine Street.

“The UK has a great track record in solidarity with what is right. In the 1980s Glasgow’s St George’s Place was renamed Nelson Mandela Place due to its position as the home of the Apartheid South African consulate. Let’s do it again for Ukraine!” the petition states.

“We call for global solidarity and address officials, mayors, activists to initiate and support the renaming of the streets with Russian Embassies and consulates into Ukraine Streets all over the world!”

A change in government in Ukraine is not Moscow’s goal, the Interfax news agency cited Security Council chief Nikolai Patrushev as saying on Monday.

Mr Patrushev said Western suggestions that this was Russia’s aim were inaccurate, Interfax reported.

With Russia’s invasion faltering, in recent days it has scaled back its publicly declared mission in the country. Last week Moscow said it had concluded the first part of its war and would now focus on the conflict in the east of the country.

Russia’s parliament is to consider a bill that would recognise all those who speak Russian as “compatriots”.

Sergej Sumlenny, an expert on eastern Europe, said on Twitter the term compatriot was “Russian wording for ‘a Russian citizen living abroad’” and claimed the bill “creates a legal basis for a military intervention into almost any country”.

The draft bill presented to the State Duma also proposes to clarify the list of “peoples historically living in Russia”, which is designed to include Belarusian and Ukrainian people living in the country.

The mayor of Irpin, a town close to Kyiv which has seen some of the heaviest fighting of the war, has claimed it is now fully liberated after Ukrainian forces pushed back invading Russian troops.

In a video shared on Telegram, Oleksandr Markushyn claimed Ukrainian soldiers had not fully retaken the town.

“We have good news today – Irpin has been liberated,” he said. “We understand that there will be more attacks on our town and we will defend it courageously.”

People who use the “Z” symbol to show support for Russia’s attack on Ukraine may be liable for prosecution under new measures being considered by German authorities.

Russian troops in Ukraine have painted the letter Z on the side of vehicles and it has been adopted by some in Russia as a symbol of support for the Kremlin’s invasion.

A spokesman for the German Interior Ministry said on Monday that security services are aware the symbol is also being used at rallies in Germany. 

The spokesman, Marek Wede, said the “Russian attack on Ukraine is a crime and whoever publicly approves of this war can thereby become criminally liable”.

Danish brewery group Carlsberg says it has decided to pull out of Russia, saying it’s “the right thing to do in the current environment”.

The announcement came hours after its competitor, Dutch brewing giant Heineken, said it was doing the same. 

The Copenhagen-based Carlsberg said Monday it “will have no presence in Russia.” Its business in Russia will no longer be included in the Danish brewer’s revenue and operating profit, and the business “will be treated as an asset held for sale until completion of the disposal”.

Wealthy Russians are pouring money into property in Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, seeking a financial haven in the wake of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine and Western sanctions, according to property companies (Reuters reports).

“We sell seven to eight units to Russians every day,” said Gul Gul, co-founder of the Golden Sign real estate company in Istanbul. “They buy in cash, they open bank accounts in Turkey or they bring gold.”

In Dubai, Thiago Caldas, CEO of the Modern Living property firm, has hired three Russian-speaking agents to meet Russian interest, which he says has leapt tenfold.

“They are wealthy Russians but not oligarchs,” said Ms Gul of Golden Sign, one of a dozen real estate companies interviewed by Reuters. “They are finding ways to bring their money to Turkey.”

“There are customers buying three to five flats,” she added.

Kyiv is opposed to “slicing up our country” in any peace talks with Russia, an adviser to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has said.

When suggested to him that Ukraine might have to give up land in the east to end the conflict, Alexander Rodnyansky told BBC Radio 4: “That’s not clear. Right now, the pressure is on Russia and we don’t know what is going to happen within Russia at some point if this continues.

“Clearly they can’t sustain this war for years and their morale is so low that they cannot even keep up the supplies and logistics, so I wouldn’t say that is a given whatsoever. We’re certainly not willing to give up any territory or talk about our territorial integrity.”

Mr Rodnyansky, an assistant professor of economics at Cambridge University, added: “If you ask the people who live in these areas, they wouldn’t want to live in Russia, so how can we leave them, let alone the whole idea of just slicing up our country?”

The presidential aide said Ukraine was open to signing a neutrality agreement but stressed that security guarantees would need to be offered by other nations – possibly Nato members – in the event “our security or territorial integrity is threatened”.

With Ukraine having accused Russia of using white phosphorous bombs – amid warnings over the deployment of chemical weapons in the conflict – my colleague Joe Sommerlad has more details on the substance allegedly used in attacks on Lutsk, Popasna and Kramatorsk.

The acid – which cannot be put out with water and burns at up to 1,300C – is commonly used in warfare to create smoke screens to conceal troop movements, to illuminate the battlefield at night or to mark targets and, because of these practical applications and the fact that it is not explicitly intended to target the body’s life systems, is not currently recognised as a chemical weapon under the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention.

However, it can certainly be used as an incendiary weapon to maim, poison or kill indiscriminately and is known to cause instant scarring of the lungs, heart, liver and kidneys and to be capable of burning through muscle to the bone, often causing severe second and third-degree burns that typically require skin grafts.

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