[앵커]
I told you regarding the situation in Ukraine earlier. Despite the outcome of the peace negotiations, Russia has announced that it will continue military operations in Donbas and other places. The horrors of war are also horrendous. Let’s take a look at reporter Ahn Eui-geun, who is in charge of in-depth coverage of international diplomacy and security at Morning & World.
It may have something to do with the negotiations, but I think Russia’s war goals have changed.
[기자]
The Russian Defense Minister also said similarly, saying that the first stage goal had been achieved. Let’s listen.
[세르게이 쇼이구/러시아 국방부 장관 : 우크라이나 군의 전력이 크게 떨어진 만큼 우리는 돈바스 해방이란 주요 목표에 집중할 수 있게 됐습니다.]
The Donbas region refers to the Lugansk and Donetsk People’s Republic regions on the Russian border, which is interpreted as a focus on separating these regions from Ukraine.
When Russia started the war, the pretexts were the demilitarization and de-Naziization of Ukraine and the protection of pro-Russian residents in the Donbas region.
De-Naziization, which means the demilitarization of Ukraine and the change of the Zelensky regime, required an attack on the capital, Kiiu.
In fact, Russia is being pushed back around Kiiu, but airstrikes on the southern coast are continuing.
The state capitol of Mykolayu was also attacked by Russian rockets.
Mykolayu is a city on the way to Odessa, Ukraine’s largest water port.
Until a final peace treaty is signed, the Russian military is expected to focus on building a pro-Russian belt linking the Crimean Peninsula, which was annexed in 2014, and this eastern Donbas region.
[앵커]
However, in the midst of such progress in the peace negotiations, the gruesome devastation of war seems to continue.
[기자]
The Times interviewed a Ukrainian woman who was sexually assaulted by Russian soldiers.
The woman, alias Natalia, lived with her husband and four-year-old son in a village on the outskirts of Kiiu.
A Russian commander named Romanov came and shot her husband, and said she had been sexually assaulted several times by Russian soldiers.
The woman was able to flee the house with her son while Russian soldiers were asleep while drunk.
Throughout the phone interview, the woman said she was afraid her son would hear it, but she said that she was sharing this horrific experience “to inform the atrocities of Russian soldiers who murdered their husbands and raped them.”
Ukrainian prosecutors say they have launched an official investigation into the case.
[앵커]
Lastly, European and New York stocks both rose, perhaps because of the peace negotiations?
[기자]
European stock markets rose all at once as a result of the 5th peace negotiations between Ukraine and Russia.
The Paris stock market in France rose 3.08 percent, and the Frankfurt stock market in Germany rose 2.79 percent.
The Pan-European Euro index rose 2.96% and the London stock market closed 0.86% higher.
“European stock markets rose following seeing the possibility of a breakthrough in the peace negotiations,” Sussani Streeter of Hargreaves Lancedown, a British investment firm, told Archyde.com.
The New York Stock Exchange also rose at the same time in all three major indices.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.97%, the S&P 500 rose 1.23% and the Nasdaq rose 1.84%.
Oil prices in New York fell as well, leading the stock to rise.
