April 28, 2023 - Russia-Ukraine news

President Vladimir Putin signed a decree Thursday that allows the deportation of Ukrainian citizens from the territories declared annexed by Russia if they are considered a "national security threat."

According to the decree published online, residents from the annexed territories in Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson who have not taken Russian citizenship will be recognized as foreigners. They could be expelled from Russia if they pose a threat to national security, the decree said, including where residents are allegedly advocating for "a violent change in the constitutional order of the Russian Federation, planning or financing terrorist attacks or extremist crimes."

Some background: In September 2022, Putin announced Russia would seize of nearly a fifth of Ukraine — which is illegal under international law — in the four regions, some of which are not even under full Russian control. It followed so-called referendums in the regions that were universally dismissed as "shams" by Ukraine and Western nations.

The decree also establishes that Ukrainians living in such areas who do not carry a Russian passport would have to apply for a residence permit. They will have to undergo fingerprint registration and provide a package of documents translated into Russian.

Ukrainian officials have repeatedly said that people living in Russian-occupied areas are being denied services when they don’t hold Russian documents.

Responding to the latest decree, Mykhailo Podolyak, adviser to the Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, said, "The occupier has seized a part of foreign territory, killed a certain number of civilians, and is forcibly throwing others out of their homes by the thousands. Only because they do not want to become 'citizens of the country-murderer'..." 

Remember: In March, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Putin and a Russian official for an alleged scheme to deport Ukrainian children to Russia.

Seventeen people have been confirmed dead in the city of Uman following the Russian missile strike early Friday, officials have said.

A CNN team at the site of the attack saw bodies carried out of a decimated residential building. 

Local officials told the CNN crew that three children were among the dead. Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelensky earlier said on Twitter that two children killed in Uman “can’t be identified” and the fate of their parents was unknown. 

The death toll from Russia’s cruise missile and drone strikes overnight is now 19, according to CNN’s reporting. The other two casualties were a woman and her two-year-old child in Dnipro. 

The death toll from Russia's strikes across Ukraine on Friday morning has risen to 16 after two more bodies were found in Uman, with the total of those killed in the city now standing at 14, with two 10-year-old children among the dead.

Two other deaths were reported earlier in the city of Dnipro - a 31-year-old woman and her 2-year-old child.

Fragments from a missile intercepted over the Kyiv region hit a multi-story residential building and injured two people, including a 13-year-old girl, the Kyiv region police chief Andrii Nebytov said.

Missiles and drones were also shot down over the capital Kyiv, in what authorities called the first missile attack on the Ukrainian capital in 51 days.

Here are the latest developments:

Ukraine’s armed forces are finishing their preparations for a counteroffensive against Russian troops, defense minister Oleksii Reznikov has said.

Asked whether Ukraine had received the weapons promised by its international allies in order to launch a counteroffensive, Reznikov said his country had received Leopard 2 and Challenger tanks and was expecting Leopard 1 tanks “a little later.” He said US-made Abrams tanks would not arrive in time to participate in the counteroffensive.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Thursday that Ukraine’s foreign allies had delivered more than 98% of the combat vehicles promised to Kyiv.

Some background: Ukraine has made extraordinary efforts to conceal the start of its strategically vital counteroffensive, and deputy defense minister Hanna Maliar stated last week that the counteroffensive would not be announced.

The death toll from Russia's strikes across Ukraine on Friday morning has risen to 16 after two more bodies were found in Uman, with the total of those killed in the city now standing at 14.

Two other deaths were reported earlier in the city of Dnipro.

Children among the dead: Cruise missiles were launched at Ukrainian cities in the early hours of Friday morning.

In Dnipro, a 31-year-old woman and her 2-year-old child died, according to Dnipropetrovsk Regional Prosecutor's Office in a post on Telegram. Two 10-year-old children are among the dead in Uman, Ihor Taburets, the head of the Cherkasy region, said.

Missiles and drones were also shot down over the capital Kyiv, in what authorities called the first missile attack on the Ukrainian capital in 51 days.

Fragments from a missile intercepted over the Kyiv region hit a multi-story residential building and injured two people, including a 13-year-old girl, the Kyiv region police chief Andrii Nebytov said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered museums to be built which are dedicated to commemorating the events of the war in Ukraine, the Kremlin said Friday.

The museums, which will be built across the country, will showcase “the events of the special military operation and the heroic deeds of its participants,” according to a Kremlin statement.

Putin has set a deadline of the end of the year for the heads of the Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Education and Science, and the Ministry of Education to report on the progress of implementing the galleries which are to be handled by regional and municipal authorities. The Ministry of Defense has also been directed to identify artifacts suitable for display in these museums.

Controlling the narrative: On February 24 2022, Russia launched its all-out invasion of Ukraine and began Europe’s biggest land war since 1945 -- and the Kremlin has been working hard to control the narrative.

Draconian new censorship laws target any media still operating outside the controls of the Kremlin and most independent journalists have left the country.

Meanwhile, a digital Iron Curtain has been reinforced, shutting Russians off from Western news and social media sites, and authorities have rounded up thousands in a crackdown on anti-war protests.

The death toll from Russia’s deadly, early-morning missile strikes across Ukraine on Friday has risen to 14, officials said, after two more bodies were pulled from the rubble of a residential building in the city of Uman. 

“As of 11:50 a.m., the body of one more dead person was removed from the rubble of a residential building,” Ukraine’s state emergency service said on the Telegram messaging app. The press office of Ukraine’s Minister of Internal Affairs later said another body had been found.

The search operation in Uman continues. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Twitter earlier that one apartment building in Uman had been “destroyed” and many others damaged before dawn on Friday. 

The damage: According to the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, Ihor Klymenko, there were 46 apartments inside the building that was hit, 27 of which were completely destroyed. He said it may take a day to clear all the rubble.

Klymenko said authorities had set up tents for survivors and their neighbors to wait in “until the local authorities provide them with places of refuge."

"At the moment, the authorities have provided everyone with food. There is also a hotline that can be contacted by relatives and friends of our citizens who lived in this and other houses that were damaged in this area," he said. 

Bridget Brink, America’s ambassador to Ukraine, responded to Friday’s attack in a tweet. “More lives tragically lost as Russia’s missiles hit another apartment building. Russia still hasn’t learned that its brutality only reinforces Ukrainian resolve and deepens our commitment to support in the fight,” she said. 

Russia's missile attacks on Ukrainian cities overnight is Moscow's “response to all peace initiatives," Ukraine’s foreign minister has said.

Children among the dead: Cruise missiles were launched at Ukrainian cities in the early hours of Friday morning, killing at least 12 people.

In Dnipro, a 31-year-old woman and her 2-year-old child died, according to Dnipropetrovsk Regional Prosecutor's Office in a post on Telegram. In Uman, 10 people died, including two 10-year-old children, Ihor Taburets, the head of the Cherkasy region, said.

Missiles and drones were also shot down over the capital Kyiv, in what authorities called the first missile attack on the Ukrainian capital in 51 days.

Fragments from a missile intercepted over the Kyiv region hit a multi-story residential building and injured two people, including a 13-year-old girl, the Kyiv region police chief Andrii Nebytov said.

Most missiles launched at Ukraine in the early hours of Friday morning were intercepted, the country’s air force said in a Telegram post.

The Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said it intercepted 21 out of 23 cruise missiles and destroyed two drones.

At least 12 people have been killed in the attacks, Ukrainian officials say. This includes a 31-year-old woman and her 2-year-old child who died in the attack in central Ukraine's Dnipro, according to the Dnipropetrovsk Regional Prosecutor's Office.

In the city of Uman in the central Cherkasy region, 10 people were killed when Russian rockets hit several high-rises, including residential buildings, according to Ihor Klymenko, Ukraine's Minister of Internal Affairs.