🔴 Live: France says meeting with Chinese envoy a chance for ‘rebuke’ after Ukraine comments

12:36pm: ‘There’s no longer enough medical care’: Evacuating residents in Ukraine’s Donbas

The recent Russian strikes on Siversk, an industrial town in Ukraine’s Donbas, have been devastating. One resident, Karina, has come back to the area to assess the damage to her family’s home and retrieve her belongings.

“My son was born here. It’s my homeland. I know it could be dangerous to stay, but there’s danger everywhere, isn’t there?”

Even some of the most defiant residents have been forced to leave the area, because in Siversk, home to 10,000 people before the Russian invasion, there are no longer any hospitals. The vast majority of doctors have fled.

“In cities situated on the frontline, there’s no longer enough medical care,” said Eduard Skoryk, a member of the Ukrainian NGO Vostok-SOS. “People can’t go to see a doctor, especially sick people. So we’re evacuating them.”

Click on the video to watch the report.

12:13pm: France says meeting with China’s ambassador a chance for ‘stern rebuke’

The French government will use a scheduled meeting with China’s ambassador in Paris on Monday for a “stern rebuke” after his remarks on post-Soviet states sparked outrage, the foreign ministry said.

Beijing’s ambassador to France Lu Shaye triggered a furore by saying on French television that countries that emerged after the fall of the Soviet Union “don’t have effective status under international law because there is not an international agreement confirming their status as sovereign nations”.

An official at the French foreign ministry told AFP that a meeting of its chief of staff with the Chinese ambassador – which had been scheduled before he made the controversial remarks – “will be an opportunity for a stern rebuke”.

Lu’s comments on Friday sparked a wave of outrage across Europe, leading the EU’s three Baltic countries on Monday to summon China’s envoys to explain the remarks.

10:24am: Baltic states summon Chinese envoys over sovereignty comments by Beijing’s ambassador to France

Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia on Monday summoned China’s envoys to account for remarks by Beijing’s ambassador to France that questioned the sovereignty of ex-Soviet nations, officials said.  

Lithuania’s Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said the diplomats would be asked to explain if the “Chinese position has changed on independence and to remind them that we’re not post-Soviet countries but we’re the countries that were illegally occupied by Soviet Union”.

9:57am: China says it respects ‘sovereign state status’ of all ex-Soviet countries

China said it respected the “sovereign state status” of all ex-Soviet countries on Monday, after Beijing’s ambassador to France sparked outrage in Europe by questioning the sovereignty of those nations.

“China respects the sovereign state status of the participating republics after the dissolution of the Soviet Union,” foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning told reporters.

Beijing’s ambassador to France Lu Shaye triggered a furore after suggesting that countries that emerged after the fall of the Soviet Union “don’t have actual status in international law because there is no international agreement to materialise their sovereign status“.

The ambassador’s comments appeared to refer not just to Ukraine, which Russia invaded in February 2022, but also to all former Soviet republics which emerged as independent nations after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, including members of the European Union.

“China respects the sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity of all countries and upholds the purposes and principles of the UN Charter,” Mao insisted Monday.

“After the collapse of the Soviet Union, China was one of the first countries to establish diplomatic relations with relevant countries,” she said.

9:22am: Finland says EU must speed up ammunition supplies to Ukraine

The European Union must accelerate its joint procurement of ammunition for Ukraine, Finland’s Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto said on Monday. “We have to speed up joint procurement of ammunition,” he said as he arrived at a meeting of EU ministers in Luxembourg.

8:53am: Chinese envoy’s remarks on Ukraine sovereignty unacceptable, Czech foreign minister says

Recent remarks by China’s ambassador to France questioning the sovereignty of former Soviet states such as Ukraine are totally unacceptable, Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky said before a meeting with EU colleagues in Luxembourg on Monday.

“It is totally unacceptable”, Lipavsky said. “I hope bosses of this ambassador will make these things straight”.

4:11am: Russia says ‘repelled’ drone attack on Crimea port

Russian authorities said Monday they had “repelled” a drone attack on the port of Sevastopol in Moscow-annexed Crimea, adding that there was no damage nor casualties.

The peninsula, seized by Russia from Ukraine in 2014, is home to Moscow’s Black Sea Fleet and has been hit by a series of drone attacks since the Kremlin launched its war in Ukraine in February last year.

“An attempted attack on Sevastopol was repelled from 3:30 am,” the Russian-installed governor Mikhail Razvozhayev said on Telegram, adding that one unmanned surface vehicle, or drone ship, was destroyed while a second exploded.

4:03am: Russian antisubmarine destroyer to conduct drills in Sea of Japan

A Russian antisubmarine destroyer will conduct exercises in the Sea of Japan involving mock enemy objects, the news agency Interfax reported on Monday, quoting the press service of Russia’s Pacific Fleet.

“In the Sea of Japan, the Admiral Tributs ship will conduct an antisubmarine exercise in accordance with the fleet combat training plan,” the press service said.

As part of the exercises, the ship’s crew, in cooperation with naval helicopters, will search for a mock enemy submarine, as well as perform combat training drills with torpedoes. Launched in 1983, the Admiral Tributs vessel serves in the Russian Pacific Fleet.

12:09am: Ukraine war spurs record global spending on military, Stockholm think tank says

Global military spending rose to a record last year as Russia’s war in Ukraine drove the biggest annual increase in expenditure in Europe since the end of the Cold War three decades ago, a leading conflict and armaments think tank said on Monday.

World military expenditure rose by 3.7% in real terms in 2022 to $2.24 trillion, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said in a statement.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which began in February last year following years of growing tensions, has prompted European countries to rush to bolster their defences.

Key developments on Sunday, April 23

France and the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania expressed dismay after China’s  ambassador to Paris questioned the sovereignty of former Soviet countries. 

Asked about his position on whether Crimea is part of Ukraine, ambassador Lu Shaye said in an interview aired on French television on Friday that it historically was part of Russia, and had been offered to Ukraine by former Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev. 

“These ex-USSR countries don’t have actual status in international law because there is no international agreement to materialise their sovereign status,” he added.

France responded on Sunday by stating its “full solidarity” with all the allied countries affected, which it said had acquired their independence “after decades of oppression”.

>> Read our blog for all of yesterday’s events as they unfolded

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)