During the ESC final: air alert throughout Ukraine
Von t-online, dpa, afp, Reuters
Updated on 05/13/2023 – 21:39Reading time: 51 min.
Hard to beat in combat: However, the use of the M1 Abrams main battle tank poses enormous challenges, as a retired colonel shows in the video. (What: t-online)
Day 443 since the beginning of the war: Selenskyj is visiting Italy. Then he should travel on to Germany. All information in the blog.
The most important things at a glance
Embed
During the ESC final: air alert in Ukraine
9:31 p.m.: At the beginning of the final of the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC), air raid alarms were raised in most regions of Ukraine, which was attacked by Russia. Ukraine won the singing competition last year and, according to the ESC rules, would have hosted the competition. Because that would have been too dangerous, the event was moved to Liverpool, England. It was still unclear in the evening whether there were actually attacks.
Hours before the final, there was another reference to the live broadcast of the music show in the app on the information pages of the state app Dija in Ukraine. A smiley face was added to the hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian refugees: “Don’t forget to vote for ours (boys) when you’re in Europe.”
In the country itself, the culture channel of the public broadcaster broadcast the show. Last year, the Kalush Orchestra won. Russia is not allowed to participate in the ESC.
Report: Helicopters and jets shot down in Russia
5:37 p.m.: Not three, but a total of four Russian aircraft are said to have been shot down in the Bryansk region near the border with Ukraine on Saturday. This is reported by the Russian daily newspaper “Kommersant”. Accordingly, it is said to be a Sukhoi SU-34 fighter jet, a SU-35 type fighter and two Mi-8 helicopters from the Russian Aerospace Forces.
Several Russian media had previously reported the crash of two helicopters and a fighter jet. The background was initially unclear. Bryansk Governor Alexander Bogomas has so far only confirmed one helicopter crash near Klintsy. Five properties were damaged and one woman was injured. “Kommersant” is now saying that all the crews are said to have been killed, and there are reports of nine people killed. There was no official information on this. According to “Kommersant”, the four machines are said to have traveled together.
The Russian media speculates that the machines were shot down by “enemy planes or helicopters”. Others, including French Russia correspondent Paul Gogo and the Belarus-based opposition portal Nexta, suggested that it was Russian anti-aircraft defenses that shot down their own aircraft. The information could not initially be independently verified.
Video footage that is supposed to show the crash of the SU-34 fighter jet and one of the two helicopters can be seen here:
On the Ukrainian border: Two military aircraft have crashed on Russian territory. (What: t-online)
Zelenskyj to Pope: “Victim and aggressor cannot be equated”
5:11 p.m.: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was received by Pope Francis during his visit to Rome in the Vatican. After his meeting with Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Zelenskyy reached the Vatican on Saturday afternoon.
During the conversation, Zelenskyy called on the Pope to condemn Russia’s crimes in the aggressive war against Ukraine. The politician reported on Twitter on Saturday after the approximately 40-minute audience with the head of the Catholic Church. “Victims and aggressors cannot be equated,” added Zelenskyj.
The meeting was eagerly awaited: the Pope repeatedly emphasizes that he wants to seize every opportunity to promote peace in Ukraine. The 86-year-old pontiff regularly recalls the suffering of the people in Ukraine. On such occasions, however, he usually does not name the attacker Russia. He had agreed several times to travel to Kiev – but only on the condition that he would then be able to travel to Moscow.
