Ukraine: US backs international war crimes probe — live updates

• US vows to hold Ukraine war criminals accountable
• Russians partially retreat from Sievierodonetsk, according to Luhansk governor
• NATO to hold BALTOPS 22 maritime exercises 

This article was last updated at 00:05 UTC/GMT

Russian sanctions could cost Germany an extra €5 billion

Gas industry representatives told German newspaper Welt am Sonntag that the cost of the sanctions regime against Russia could be an extra €5 billion ($5.4 billion) annually for replacement gas.

Last month, Russia halted supplies to Gazprom Germania, the German subsidiary of Gazprom, after Berlin placed the company under trustee management by regulators.

Germany’s Economy Minister Robert Habeck estimates an additional 10 million cubic meters per day are needed, costing €3.5 billion annually at current cost.

US ambassador vows to hold war criminals accountable

The US Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink said the US will back an international war crimes probe during a trip to the Kyiv suburb of Borodyanka, which was under siege in the earliest phase of Russia’s invasion. 

On Twitter Brink wrote, “Bearing witness to atrocities committed in Russia’s brutal war, including families killed in their own homes, only strengthens my resolve to do everything we can to hold the perpetrators of these awful crimes to account.”

NATO’s annual Baltic Sea exercise kicks off

The BALTOPS 22 naval exercise involving 14 NATO countries plus Finland and Sweden kicks off and will run until June 17. Finland and Sweden have applied to join NATO but are facing opposition from Turkey within the military alliance.

The US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley was in Stockholm for a joint press conference with Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson and to visit the USS Kearsarge, a US Navy Wasp-class amphibious assault ship currently docked in the Swedish capital.

Milley said his visit and the presence of the USS Kearsage “demonstrates commitment in a common cause, in the rules-based international order, in the idea that large countries cannot invade small countries at no cost.”

Milley noted the purpose of BALTOPS 22 is to train for “amphibious assaults and scenarios that would involve attacking land that is seized by an adversary or an enemy country.”

While BALTOPS 22 is an annual exercise, it takes on renewed significance due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Russia has an exclave on the Baltic Sea, the highly militarized region of Kaliningrad which was seized from the Germans after the Second World War.

Summary of Saturday’s events in Ukraine-Russia crisis

The governor of the Luhansk region, Serhiy Haidai, said Russia had retreated in the industrial city of Sievierodonetsk — now one of only two settlements in the province that aren’t under Russian control. Haidai’s claim of Ukrainian advances could not immediately be verified.  

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Telegram that Russian forces had struck the All Saints Monastery in Svyatohirsk Lavra in the Donetsk region again with artillery. He also posted a video of the church engulfed in flames and said 300 civilians, 60 of them children, had been sheltering there amid intense fighting.

Zelenskyy also called for “barbaric” Russia to be expelled from UNESCO, the United Nations (UN) cultural agency, saying, “Every church burned by Russia in Ukraine, every school blown up, every destroyed memorial proves that Russia has no place in UNESCO.”

The monastic settlement of Svyatohirsk Lavra dates back to 1627 and the wooden church is one of the country’s most sacred Orthodox sites. The monastery was consecrated in 1912 and first destroyed during the Soviet era and later rebuilt prior to its destruction by the Russian army.

Russia’s tactics have changed on the battlefield, according to Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podoliak, adding that Russian losses had now decreased to around 100 to 200 casualties per day — a figure he said was “roughly comparable” with Ukrainian losses.

Ukraine’s official volunteer brigade, the International Legion of Defense, has paid tribute to four foreigners from Germany, France, the Netherlands and Australia who were killed in recent weeks. 

The deaths of the Frenchman and the Australian had been confirmed by their respective governments, while reporters from French news agency AFP were present for the burial of the Dutch fighter in Kharkiv on May 21.

Kyiv on Saturday announced that Ukraine and Russia exchanged the bodies of 320 soldiers — 160 each — on June 2. The exchange took place at the front in the southeastern Ukrainian region of Zaporizhzhya.

Ukraine has repeatedly called on Moscow to take possession of the bodies of its fallen soldiers and to give them a dignified burial. Kyiv accuses the Kremlin of using its young as “cannon fodder” to be simply left to rot on the battlefield after they are killed. 

The Russian Defense Ministry denied involvement in the incident, instead deflecting blame to Ukrainian troops, whom it claims set the blaze themselves as they retreated from advancing Russian forces.

The UK Defense Ministry has accused Russia of launching unguided airstrikes over the Donbas region.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Saturday told a Bosnian-Serb television broadcaster that Western sanctions would actually benefit Russia by driving up energy prices.

“Oil, generally speaking, is not subject to politics, there is a demand for it,” Lavrov said, adding, “We have alternative sales markets, where we are already increasing sales.” 

French President Emmanuel Macron has offered to mediate between Russia and Ukraine after Vladimir Putin “isolated himself” on the world stage.

The European Union is set to introduce special regulations that will recognize Ukrainian driver’s licenses, according to the German government.

You can revisit our live updates from June 4 here.  

ar/wd (AFP, AP, dpa, Reuters)

Article source: https://www.dw.com/en/ukraine-us-backs-international-war-crimes-probe-live-updates/a-62035893?maca=en-rss-en-all-1573-rdf