Putin to mark Soviet WWII victory as Ukraine decries school bombing

ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine (REUTERS) – Russian forces bombed a village school in eastern Ukraine killing about 60 people, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said, as Russia prepared to mark the Monday (May 9) anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany in World War II.

The governor of the Luhansk region said about 90 people were sheltering at the school in Bilohorivka on Saturday when it was bombed.

“As a result of a Russian strike on Bilohorivka in the Luhansk region, about 60 people were killed, civilians, who simply hid at the school, sheltering from shelling,” Mr Zelensky said in his nightly video address.

There was no response from Moscow to the news.

Luhansk region Governor Serhiy Gaidai said the school in Bilohorivka, where abut 90 people were sheltering, was hit on Saturday by a Russian bomb, setting it ablaze.

“There is almost no hope that anyone survived. The aerial bomb exploded in the middle (of the building),” Mr Gaidai wrote on the Telegram messaging app.

“In the school, there were approximately 90 people, 27 were rescued. About 60 people were probably killed.” Reuters could not immediately verify his account. There was no response from Moscow to the report.

In the besieged southern port of Mariupol, the deputy commander of the Azov regiment holed up in the sprawling Azovstal steel plant pleaded with the international community to help evacuate wounded soldiers.

“We will continue to fight as long as we are alive to repel the Russian occupiers,” Captain Sviatoslav Palamar told an online news conference.

As the fighting, now in its third month, raged on, leaders of the Group of Seven (G-7) industrial nations vowed on Sunday to deepen Russia’s economic isolation and “elevate” a campaign against Kremlin-linked elites.

The G-7 said it was committed to phasing out or banning Russian oil and denounced Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

“His actions bring shame on Russia and the historic sacrifices of its people,” the group said in a statement, referring to Soviet Russia’s role in defeating Nazi Germany 77 years ago.

Mr Putin has repeatedly likened the war in Ukraine – which he casts as a battle against dangerous “Nazi” -inspired nationalists in Ukraine – to the challenge the Soviet Union faced when Adolf Hitler invaded in 1941.

Ukraine and its allies say Russia launched an unprovoked war.

In a video address, filmed in front of charred Ukrainian apartment blocks with footage of Russian missile strikes, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that evil had returned, but his country would prevail.

“We will overcome everything. And we know this for sure, because our military and all our people are descendants of those who overcame Nazism,” Mr Zelensky said.

Mr Putin will preside over a parade in Moscow’s Red Square of troops, tanks, rockets and intercontinental ballistic missiles, making a speech that could offer clues on the future of the war.

Mariupol