INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Ukraine on Friday ordered its remaining troops holed up in Mariupol's besieged Azovstal steelworks to lay down their arms after nearly three
months of desperate resistance.Russia's flattening of the strategic port city has drawn multiple accusations of war crimes, including a
deadly attack on a maternity ward, and Ukraine has begun a reckoning for captured Russian troops.The first post-invasion trial of a Russian
soldier for war crimes neared its closely watched climax in Kyiv, after 21-year-old sergeant Vadim Shishimarin admitted to killing an
unarmed civilian early in the offensive
the young soldier was "not guilty" of premeditated murder and war crimes.While Ukrainian forces fended off the Russian offensive around
Kyiv, helped by a large infusion of Western arms, both eastern Ukraine and Mariupol in the south have borne the brunt of a ferocious ground
and artillery attack.President Volodymyr Zelensky's government received a fresh boost as the U.S
Congress approved a $40-billion (38-billion-euro) aid package, including funds to enhance Ukraine's armored vehicle fleet and air defense
system.And meeting in Germany, G7 industrialized nations pledged $19.8 billion to shore up Ukraine's shattered public finances.Ukraine
sorely needs enhanced capability to fend off the kind of onslaught Russia is waging in the eastern region of Donbas, a Russian-speaking area
that has been partially controlled by pro-Kremlin separatists since 2014."In Donbas, the occupiers are trying to increase pressure,"
Zelensky said in his nightly video address late on Thursday
Russian shelling, the regional governor said.Burial with honorsZelensky described the bombardment of Severodonetsk as "brutal and absolutely
pointless," as residents cowering in basements described an unending ordeal of terror.The city forms part of the last pocket of Ukrainian
resistance in Lugansk, which along with the neighboring region of Donetsk comprises the Donbas war zone.Russian Defense Minister Sergei
Shoigu said his forces' campaign in Lugansk was "nearing completion."Also apparently complete is the capture of the Azovstal steelworks, a
totemic symbol of Ukraine's dogged resistance since Russian President Vladimir Putin launched the invasion on Feb
24 to remove a Western-leaning, "Nazi" threat on his borders.Russia released a video appearing to show exhausted Ukrainian soldiers trudging
out of the sprawling steel plant, after weeks during which the besieged defenders and civilians huddled in tunnels, enduring shortages of
food, water and medicine."The higher military command has given the order to save the lives of the soldiers of our garrison and to stop
defending the city," Azov battalion commander Denys Prokopenko said in a video on Telegram.He said efforts continued to remove killed
fighters from the plant."I now hope that soon, the families and all of Ukraine will be able to bury their fighters with honors," he
But in Donetsk, the pro-Kremlin authorities are in turn threatening to put some of them on trial."Our expectation is ..
that all prisoners of war will be treated in accordance with the Geneva Convention and the law of war," Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said
President Joe Biden has cast the Ukraine war as part of a great U.S.-led struggle of democracy against authoritarianism.Biden offered "full,
total, complete backing" to Finland and Sweden in their bid to join the NATO military alliance, when he gave their leaders a red-carpet
welcome at the White House on Thursday.'We're not idiots'But all 30 existing NATO members need to agree on any new entrants and Turkey has
any NATO expansion by creating more military bases in western Russia.As well as redrawing the security map of Europe, the conflict has sent
shockwaves through the global economy, especially in energy and food markets.Russia and Ukraine produce 30% of the world's wheat supply and
the war has sent food prices surging
Russia is also a major exporter of fertilizer.United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned the war could trigger years of
Russian president Dmitry Medvedev blamed the West."On the one hand, insane sanctions are being imposed against us
On the other hand, they are demanding food supplies," he said
"Things don't work like that
