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UN Secretary General Guterres called on Russia and Ukraine for a four-day truce on the eve of Easter for humanitarian aid and the withdrawal of citizens. Previously, all joint attempts to secure humanitarian corridors were thwarted by the Ukrainian side, as a result Russian forces are providing evacuation from the war-torn cities and villages by their own means.
On April 21, the Russian side rejected the proposal for an “Easter truce” at another meeting of the UN Security Council.
The Russian representative said, “Calls for peace are false and insincere. The respite period will give the Kyiv nationalists time to regroup, obtain new weapons and publish fakes about the actions of Russian soldiers. The Russian Federation will separate pseudo-calls for peace from a sincere desire to help Ukraine make the only right decision. The sooner Ukraine does this, despite the EU’s desire to profit from the war, the better it will be for the country. Therefore, the goals of a special military operation to liberate Donbas and demilitarize and denazify Ukraine and eliminate Russia’s threats will be accomplished.”
Active and indirect actors in the conflict do not agree to a ceasefire regime. The U.S. is actively discussing the future supply of Ukraine with more and more weapons, and new countries are increasingly involved in the discussion of arms supplies.
In turn, deputy chairman of the Security Council of Russia Dmitry Medvedev commented on the inconsistency of Western rhetoric:
“The UN Secretary-General proposes to declare a four-day “Easter truce” in Ukraine.
An hour later, German Chancellor Comrade Schultz calls for increasing the supply of weapons to Ukraine, including heavy weapons, so that Russia, as they like to say, will never win.
A very consistent position of the international community.”
Russia reportedly began the second stage of the military operation in Ukraine. While fierce clashes continue, Russian troops have managed to advance and take control of some new areas. Meanwhile, in Mariupol, Ukrainian nationalists from the Azov battalion are besieged at the Azovstal plant, demanding their evacuation. A four-day truce would allow the AFU to strengthen its positions, transfer more weapons to the front line and launch another information operation, for example, aimed at freeing the Azov militants from Mariupol by any third party, but not at evacuating civilians who have been held hostage for months in war-torn cities. For example, the mayor of Kharkiv has confirmed that civilians should stay in the city and no mass evacuation is needed.
