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Russia’s guided-missile cruiser Moskva sinks in the Black Sea after being damaged, Russia’s defence ministry says. Online News

“While being towed … towards the destination port, the vessel lost its balance due to damage sustained in the hull as fire broke out after ammunition exploded. Given the choppy seas, the vessel sank,” the state news agency TASS quotes the ministry as saying.

The ministry had earlier said that the fire had been contained and the ship could remain afloat.

• Russia accuses Ukraine of attacks –

Russian officials accuse Ukraine of sending two helicopters across the border to bomb a town in Russia’s southern Bryansk region, after initially reporting seven injured in shelling.

Moscow says at least six residential buildings were damaged and that a toddler was among the injured.

It is not possible to immediately verify the report.

Elsewhere, the governor of Russia’s Belgorod region claims that the village of Spodaryushino, “came under shelling” from the Ukrainian side of the border and that it and a nearby village had been evacuated as a precaution.

• Ukraine resumes evacuations –

Ukraine says it is reopening humanitarian corridors through nine routes in the east and south, to facilitate the evacuation of civilians from war-scarred regions after a day-long pause that Kyiv attributed to Russian violations.

• CIA nuclear warning –

Russia’s setbacks could lead President Vladimir Putin to resort to using a tactical or low-yield nuclear weapon, CIA director William Burns says.

“Given the potential desperation of President Putin and the Russian leadership, given the setbacks that they’ve faced so far, militarily, none of us can take lightly the threat posed by a potential resort to tactical nuclear weapons or low-yield nuclear weapons,” Burns says.

• Genocide debate –

Leaders on either side of the Atlantic diverge on whether to label Russia’s actions in Ukraine as “genocide”.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says US President Joe Biden, who has accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of genocide, was “right” in his choice of words.

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But French President Emmanuel Macron, who is campaigning for re-election, said such “verbal escalations” were unhelpful, and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz steers clear of using the term.

• $800mn US aid package –

The United States unveils a major new package of aid to Ukraine, including equipment such as helicopters, howitzers and armoured personnel carriers.

The package includes equipment Washington had previously refused to provide to Kyiv for fear of escalating the conflict with nuclear-armed Russia.

• Kharkiv offensive continues –

Russia’s offensive on Ukraine’s second city of Kharkiv has claimed a further four lives, governor Oleg Synegubov says. The city near the Russian border has been on the eastern frontline since the start of the war and suffered massive destruction.

• Le Pen for NATO-Moscow rapprochement –

French far-right leader Marine Le Pen says she will back closer ties between NATO and Russia and pull Paris out of the alliance’s military command if elected president in an April 24 runoff with Emmanuel Macron.

Following accusations she is too close to President Vladimir Putin, Le Pen said a “strategic rapprochement” is required and questions need to be asked about the role of the alliance after the end of the Warsaw Pact.

• US warns China –

US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen warns that China’s stance towards Russia and its invasion of Ukraine could affect countries’ willingness to collaborate and trade with Beijing.

• Prisoner swap –

Ukraine says that 30 prisoners of war are being returned to the country as part of the most recent exchange of captives with Russia, following an order from President Volodymyr Zelensky.

It says in a statement on social media the swap involves five officers and 17 servicemen, along with eight civilians, including one woman.

• 4.7 million refugees –

More than 4.7 million Ukrainians have fled their country in the 50 days since Russia invaded, the United Nations says.

bur-reb/ssy

© Agence France-Presse. All rights are reserved.

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Notes from APS Radio News

As is true of all news stories and of life in general, there are different interpretations of events.

One such interpretation is offered at Startegic Culture.org…..

The War in Ukraine Is Really About U.S. Pursuing Regime Change in Russia

Finian Cunningham

American peace activist, documentary filmmaker and author Bruce Gagnon analyses the current war in Ukraine with a critical bigger picture of political and strategic context that is so woefully – and deliberately – missing in Western media.

In the following interview, Gagnon points out that the Russian military intervention in Ukraine that began on February 24 can only be properly understood by viewing it as a response to eight years of relentless military assault by the NATO-backed Kiev regime against the ethnic Russian population of the Donbass region. Nearly 14,000 people were killed by the NATO-backed Kiev regime and its Russian-hating Nazi regiments. Where were Western government and media condemnations?

The current expansion of the war, he contends, is really just the front line in a bigger war that the United States and its NATO-European allies are waging against Russia. The ultimate objective is regime change in Moscow. This objective is to satisfy Western corporate interests and includes the eventual targeting of China. In this way, the U.S. and its imperialist allies are trying to thwart the emergence of a multipolar world and to offset the historic decline of Western corporate power. As he says: “China is also on the regime-change list of the West, and due to the new economic and military pact between Russia and China, it becomes essential to take out Russia first before going after China. The United States is currently using Taiwan in a similar way to how it has used Ukraine as a tool of destabilization.”