(Reuters) – Ukrainian President Zelenskiy told the U.N. Security Council that Russia must be held accountable over allegations of war atrocities as the West prepared to expand sanctions to include a ban on all new investments in Russia.
MASS GRAVE
* The Ukrainian human rights ombudswoman said between 150 and 300 bodies may be in a mass grave by a church in the northern town of Bucha, where Ukraine accuses Russian troops of killing civilians.
* Russia called the allegations out of Bucha a “monstrous forgery” aimed at denigrating the Russian army. Russia’s U.N. ambassador told the Security Council that Russian troops are not targeting civilians, dismissing accusations of abuse as lies.
FIGHTING
* Russia is likely to launch a new offensive soon in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, NATO chief Stoltenberg said.
* The Russian defence ministry says its forces will “liberate” the southeastern port of Mariupol from Ukrainian “nationalists”.
* A Dominica-flagged cargo ship sank in the besieged southern Ukrainian port of Mariupol after being targeted by Russian missile strikes, the vessel’s flag registry said.
ECONOMY
* The sanctions to be announced by the United States and its allies on Wednesday will target Russian banks and officials and ban investment in Russia, a source familiar with the announcement said after officials in Washington and Kyiv accused Moscow of committing war crimes in Bucha.
* The European Commission proposed new sanctions including banning Russian coal imports and halting trade worth nearly 20 billion euros ($22 billion) in retaliation over possible war crimes in Ukraine.
* Thousands of auto workers have been furloughed and food prices are soaring as Western sanctions pummel the small Russian city of Kaluga and its flagship foreign carmakers.
REFUGEES
* People are still only able to flee Mariupol on foot or by private car as attempts to organise mass evacuations by bus to safer parts of Ukraine have failed, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister said.
QUOTES
* “Every Euro, every cent that you receive from Russia or that you send to Russia has blood, it is bloody money and the blood of this money is Ukrainian blood,” Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko said.
“The challenge is internal, first of all, one’s own, human challenge,” Zelenskiy said of considering negotiations with Russia. “Then, when you pull yourself together, and you have to do it, I think that we have no other choice.”
(Compiled by Catherine Evans and Grant McCool)
