"How dare you hold us here?" The now-evacuated Mariupol residents were being held captive inside the Azovstal steelworks by Ukrainian neo-Nazis who wouldn't let them leave to get to a safe place.

🗣 “We tried to leave two or three times, even by bus, as there was no heavy shelling at the time, but they forced us back, and wouldn’t let anyone out,” one of the evacuated witnesses recalls

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📌 The latest update on the Ukraine operation from the Russian Defence Ministry:

▪️ Russian air defences shot down 10 Ukrainian drones, two Tochka-U missiles and one MIG-29 fighter overnight;

▪️ Artillery units have eliminated up to 280 Ukrainian servicemen and six ammunition depots;

▪️ Operational-tactical and army aviation destroyed up to 160 Ukrainian servicemen and 26 armoured vehicles;

▪️ Russian air forces hit 27 targets, areas of concentrated manpower, a Ukrainian military equipment and ammunition depot;

▪️ Russian missile troops hit nine Ukrainian fortified position, areas of concentrated manpower and one BM-21 "Grad" multiple rocket launcher;

▪️ High-precision air-based missiles have hit 38 Ukrainian military targets

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🏀 A jersey worn by late basketball star Kobe Bryant in his 1996-1997 rookie season will be auctioned from May 18-June 4 by SCP Auctions. The lot is expected to fetch up to $5 million, a record price for a basketball jersey, media report.

Photo credit: AP

Footage released by the Russian MoD shows Iskander operational-tactical missile systems during the special military operation in Ukraine

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📹 ⚡️ Women who were able to get out of Azovstal described what is happening in the grounds of the plant.

According to them, people have no way out, they are intimidated by Ukrainian militants and are afraid to go out.

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❗️ 🇭🇺 Hungary will veto the EU proposal to limit the import of Russian energy resources, despite previous reports to the contrary.

This was confirmed by the press secretary of Hungary's prime minister Viktor Orban.

Earlier, Germany's national public television channel, ZDF TV, citing a high-ranking EU diplomat, reported that Austria, Hungary and Slovakia would not exercise their right to veto the EU embargo on Russian oil.

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⚡️ 📹 The Russian MoD has published footage showing the evacuation of civilians from the grounds of Azovstal.

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⚡️ 📹 A resident of Mariupol describes how she came under fire by the Armed Forces of Ukraine as she was trying to check up on her grandmother.

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⚡️ 📹 A resident of Pionerskoye village in the Donetsk region tells of the crimes committed by Ukrainian nationalists

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⚡️ 📹 Ukrainian Armed Forces prevented people from driving through checkpoints in Mariupol, keeping them in the city and using them as human shields.

🗣 “Nobody provided us with a corridor, it was thanks only to Russian troops setting up a checkpoint that we got out at all - we just took advantage of it to escape from Mariupol.”

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⚡️📹 One of the civilians released from the Azovstal plant describes how he survived there.

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‼️ US allows deals with Gazprom Germania GmbH until 30 September

⚡️ 📹 A refugee from Mariupol describes the horrible conditions she had to live in and how she fled the city.

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⚡️ 📹 A Sputnik correspondent has published footage from this morning of a bus convoy heading along the road to Bezymenny, which more than 200 people were evacuated to from Mariupol in the afternoon.

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❗️ A new NATO strategic concept will address the "pacing challenge” allegedly posed by China for the United States and for European countries, US Assistant Secretary of Defence for International Security Affairs Celeste Wallander said on Monday.

▪️ “The strategic concept we expect will and from the United States point of view must include addressing, what in the United States we refer to as ‘the pacing challenge’ of China, which is a more strategic challenge, including for Europe and we're seeing good signs, strong evidence that European countries do take this seriously and that will be addressed and strategic concept,” Wallander said during a virtual talk organized by the Atlantic Council.

▪️ The United States is looking for a strong and unified statement on the new security environment in Europe, in which the region is no longer viewed as an environment of peace but rather of “acute threat,” Wallander added.

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⚡️ 📹 One of the civilians released from the Azovstal plant describes how they were forced to dig trenches by Ukrainian nationalists.

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⚡️ 📹 A resident of liberated Mariupol accuses the Ukrainian Army of destroying the city where she lived.

In the video, the woman emphasises that she saw with her own eyes how Ukrainian soldiers, including from the Azov Battalion, destroyed Mariupol.

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❗️ Over 170 Ukrainian soldiers trained in handling US howitzers, more than 50 are completing training - Pentagon

⚡️ The US Federal Communications Commission says that interfering with the Tesla CEO’s acquisition of Twitter is not permitted by its regulations

❗️ US defense official confirms over 5,000 Javelins have made it to Ukraine since Russia's operation began

❗️ Russian MoD’s latest statement on the Ukraine crisis:

▪️ A warehouse with rockets, artillery, and ammunition has been destroyed near the settlement of Pokrovskoye in the Dnepropetrovsk region.

▪️ Up to 170 nationalists, as well as 36 weapons and Ukrainian military equipment, have been destroyed by the Russian Armed Forces.

▪️ Russian operational-tactical and Army aviation hit 13 strongholds and concentrations of manpower and military equipment of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

▪️ Four S-300 air defence system launchers as well as a reconnaissance and guidance radar station have been destroyed in the area of the settlement Mezhevaya in Ukraine.

▪️ High-precision air-launched missiles have hit 36 Ukrainian military facilities over the past day.

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