Russian soldiers had hoped for a swift victory in Mykolaiv, a key staging post for control of the Black Sea, and the eventual assault on Odesa, Ukraine’s largest port and home to the country’s navy. Their hopes have been dashed.

They encountered an obstinate resistance, typical of the country’s determination to prevail against the odds. Residents of the historic city have fought back to force President Putin’s troops to retreat from the airport that they seized over the weekend.

As shells flew over the city yesterday, General Dmytro Marchenko, of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, was undaunted by the prospect that the Russians would return. The enemy were leaving bodies of their dead where they fell, he said. “It’s unpleasant to say this but their corpses are food for stray dogs,” he told The Times yesterday. “We’re not able to retrieve them because of continuing Russian fire in those areas.”

He vowed that his men would kill ten Russians for each civilian killed in the battle for Mykolaiv, northeast of Odesa. “We know who these people are,” he added. “We have a vast amount of intelligence, including much from our American partners, that consists of photos where we can see faces. We can see when those guys go for a piss.

“We guarantee we won’t shoot any Russian soldiers who give up,” he added. “Also, we guarantee that no harm will come to Russian tank crews if they come toward our lines with their main guns turned away from us. If they have committed crimes, they will be tried but they will be alive. The rest of them will become dog food.”

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/2cf18ab2-9fe4-11ec-a33b-e5ebed659a52?shareToken=86057228f347c0484e9220dc8b98bcab

LVIV, Ukraine — The top diplomats from Ukraine and Russia failed to reach an agreement on Thursday to calm the fighting in Ukraine or even to ease the worsening humanitarian crisis, dashing hopes for a swift end to a two-week-old conflict that has killed hundreds and displaced millions.

Speaking to reporters after the meeting in the Turkish resort of Antalya, Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s foreign minister, said that “we did not make progress” in reaching a cease-fire, but “agreed to continue efforts to seek a solution to the humanitarian issues on the ground.”

…But remarks by Sergey V. Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, indicated that Moscow’s position on the invasion it launched 14 days ago was far from softening.

“We are not planning to attack other countries,” he told a Turkish reporter. “We didn’t attack Ukraine, either.” He was repeating Russian claims that the country was forced to conduct a “special military operation” in Ukraine to assure its own security.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/03/09/world/ukraine-russia-war

Russian soldiers shot dead a ten-year-old girl in a village near Kyiv after they got drunk, heard a gun go off and began firing at random, her cousin said.

…Recounting what the friend had said, Anya’s adoptive mother Vera Dmitrienko, 40, said: “People say that the soldiers just got so bored. They were even telling this to people in the village. They looted all the stores in the village, of course they got a lot of alcohol from the stores and got drunk and started shooting. They shot into Nastya’s house, she was there with her uncle, and she died immediately. Her uncle was taken to hospital and we still don’t have any information from him.”

Dmitrienko said that the soldiers had started shooting after a Ukrainian teenage boy found a gun and shot it in the air. “The soldiers heard it but since they were so drunk they didn’t know where it was from so they just started shooting everywhere they could see. They shot in four houses and in one of those houses was Nastya,” she said.

Anya said that at the weekend the friend in the village had got in touch again and told her that the Russians were taking away phones and there was no electricity or food. “She said that soldiers come into their homes and if they don’t open the door they just break it and can beat you up if you don’t let them take your food,” said Anya, who was born in Shybene.

She said one of the men who had been posing as a villager in the video had never been seen there before. There were other claims by the Ukrainian armed forces yesterday that reports have been staged for Russian TV about the humanity of the Russian soldiers.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/3aef57a6-9e55-11ec-b38e-10b333e9179b?shareToken=bc123aa4568efcaf281c31e2e94a184a

Robert Lewandowski has cut ties with Chinese technology company Huawei amid unconfirmed rumours they are helping Russia defended themselves against cyber attacks.

Huawei have firmly denied claims of involvement with Russia and there is no evidence to support the claims. But Lewandowski has taken a stand and cut ties with the company in a move that will cost him around €5m (£4.14m) having recently signed a three-year deal with the technology giants.

The striker's agent, Tomasz Zawiślak…was asked whether Lewandowski's decision was also inspired by the fact that Huawei are one of the few companies still operating in Russia.

He remained coy, claiming: "We do not have full information on this, so I will stop at what we have already stated."

…The Bayern Munich star first agreed a deal with Huawei in November 2015.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/lewandowski-sponsor-huawei-russia-ukraine-26406843