Ukrainians on Friday were wary of Russia’s pledge to pause fighting for an Orthodox Easter ceasefire – first proposed by Kyiv – this weekend. The Kremlin said it had ordered a temporary truce to be in effect from Saturday afternoon until the end of Sunday, a 32-hour period during which Russia would stop fighting “in all directions”. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy – who has repeatedly called for a ceasefire in the four-year war – said Kyiv was willing to reciprocate.
But in Kyiv there was scepticism over whether Moscow would keep to its promise. “No one believes in these fairytales anymore,” Yevgeniy Lamakh, an IT specialist, told AFP in central Kyiv. “The Russian military lie a lot, usually, as history shows. And in general, they say one thing, but in fact do something completely different,” the 29-year-old said. “Even today… Shaheds, missiles are flying at Ukraine. Well, come on then, start the ceasefire,” Dmytro Sova, a 42-year-old actor, told AFP in Kyiv on Friday.
Just hours before the Orthodox Easter truce, two night-time Russian attacks in Ukraine left one dead and 15 injured, authorities said. The fatal attacks included an “enemy drone attack” on a store and a cafe in the central town of Poltava, killing one person and injuring another, the regional head of the military administration, Vitalii Diakivnych, posted on Telegram. In the north-eastern region of Sumy, bordering Russia, drone strikes on residential areas wounded 14 people including a 14-year-old boy and an 87-year-old woman, according to Oleg Grygorov, head of the regional military administration there, via Telegram.
Moscow has rejected calls for a longer-term unconditional ceasefire, something that Kyiv has called for, saying it is instead pushing for a final peace settlement. Negotiations between the two sides, brokered by the United States, have stalled over the fate of Ukraine’s eastern regions, partly occupied by Russia and that Moscow wants Kyiv to cede. The two sides also held a ceasefire for the Orthodox Easter last year. But the respite comes amid deadlocked efforts to halt Russia’s invasion, with US attention now focused on the Middle East war.
US president Donald Trump’s administration is likely to extend as soon as Friday a waiver allowing countries to buy some sanctioned Russian oil and petroleum products, two sources familiar with the matter told Reuters. The US treasury department has allowed purchases of Russian oil and products at sea since mid-March with a 30-day waiver that expires on 11 April, part of efforts to control global energy prices during the US-Israeli war with Iran. The waivers have been criticised by politicians in the US and abroad as they could complicate the West’s efforts to deprive Russia of revenue for its war in Ukraine and put Washington at odds with its allies.
A Russian court on Friday placed a journalist from the independent Novaya Gazeta newspaper in pre-trial detention until 10 May, a day after police raided the paper’s Moscow headquarters. Oleg Roldugin was arrested on Thursday. He had reported on alleged corruption among top Russian officials including former president Dmitry Medvedev and Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov. Russia has waged a crackdown on independent news outlets since launching its offensive on Ukraine in February 2022.
Nato member Estonia will refrain from detaining Russia’s “shadow fleet” vessels in the Baltic Sea, worried that seizing oil tankers and other ships sanctioned by the West could lead Moscow to defend them militarily, a senior commander said on Friday. Britain and other European nations, including France, Belgium and Sweden, have stepped up efforts to detain ageing tankers used by Moscow to secure vital funding for its four-year war against Ukraine. But Estonia, the northernmost Baltic state located close to Russia’s main oil and fuel export facilities in the Gulf of Finland, is practicing restraint after an unsuccessful attempt to board a Russian vessel last year.