Russia celebrates the capture of the Mariupol Steelworks as a major partial victory in its war of aggression.Meanwhile, the Russians are probably trying to cover up crimes in Mariupol.The developments in the ticker.After weeks of fierce fighting, the Russian army has claimed complete control of the Azovstal steelworks in the Ukrainian port of Mariupol.All enemy fighters surrendered, the Ministry of Defense announced on Saturday night in Moscow.The sprawling industrial complex on the Azov Sea was the last place in the strategically important port city in south-eastern Ukraine that had not yet been fully under Russian control.According to statements by the prominent Russian foreign politician Leonid Slutsky, a possible exchange of the Ukrainian fighters captured in Mariupol for the pro-Russian politician Viktor Medvedchuk is under discussion."We will examine the possibility of replacing Medvedchuk with the Azov fighters," Slutsky said on Saturday, according to the Interfax agency.The Ukrainian side initially did not comment on the alleged capture of the plant.According to information from Moscow, a total of 2,439 Ukrainian soldiers holed up in Soviet-era bunkers have been taken prisoner by the Russians since May 16.The last group of 531 fighters was captured on Friday, it said.The steelworks had been besieged by Russian troops since April 21.In a television interview recorded before the Russian announcement of the capture, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy blamed the West for the development.He has repeatedly called on Western heads of state and government to provide his country with "appropriate weapons" so that we can reach Mariupol to liberate these people."Meanwhile, Ukraine fears a further advance of Russian troops.The Ukrainian military governor of the Luhansk region, Serhiy Hajday, reported massive fighting in the Donbass on Saturday.For example, the eastern Ukrainian city of Sievjerodonetsk has been under fire for days, there are dead and injured."The Russians are wiping out Sieverodonetsk like Mariupol.Fighting is going on in the suburbs of the city,” Hajdaj said on the Telegram news channel.The governor complained of aerial bombardments in the region, and that Russia wanted to reduce the area to rubble.At the same time, he dismissed statements by Russia's Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu that he was about to take over the entire Luhansk region as "nonsense".Shoigu no longer has an overview of the situation of his own armed forces.Despite the defeat in the port city of Mariupol, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy believes that the Ukrainian army has inflicted serious damage on Russia's armed forces.Ukraine "broke the backbone of the Russian army," Zelensky said in a television interview broadcast on Saturday."You won't be able to get back on your feet for the next few years," said the 44-year-old.Shortly before, the last more than 2,400 Ukrainian defenders of the port city in the south-east of the country had surrendered and been taken prisoner by the Russians.Zelenskyy emphasized that Kyiv will take everything back.A return to the front lines before February 24 - the day Russia's war of aggression began - will already count as a victory."It will mean that they have not conquered us and we have defended our country," said the head of state.But getting there will be very difficult.In the end there is diplomacy.The most important things at a glanceUkraine has blamed Russia for the deaths of seven civilians in the government-held part of the Donetsk region in the east of the country.This is what the governor of the region, Pavlo Kirilenko, wrote on Saturday in the Telegram news channel.Three people were killed in Lyman alone.The governor initially did not comment on the exact circumstances.In addition, a total of seven people were injured.This information has not been independently verified."Every war criminal will be punished," said Kirilenko.In the Russian-occupied region of Cherson in southern Ukraine, the local administration accused Ukraine of killing three civilians and injuring ten in the town of Biloserka on Saturday.That too could not be verified.The administration did not tell Telegram exactly what had happened.Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke to the Swedish Prime Minister and the Finnish President about his reservations about Sweden and Finland joining NATO.Erdogan's communications office said that in telephone calls on Saturday with Finnish head of state Sauli Niinistö and Swedish head of government Magdalena Andersson, he raised concerns about the Kurdish Workers' Party PKK, among others.According to the office, Erdogan said the Swedish government must take "concrete and serious steps" against the banned PKK.Ankara considers the members of the PKK to be terrorists.Erdogan also called on Sweden to lift arms export restrictions imposed on Turkey.Sweden decided on the restrictions because Turkey invaded northern Syria in 2019.According to statements by the prominent Russian foreign politician Leonid Slutsky, a possible exchange of the Ukrainian fighters captured in Mariupol for the pro-Russian politician Viktor Medvedchuk is under discussion."We will examine the possibility of replacing Medvedchuk with the Azov fighters," Slutsky said on Saturday, according to the Interfax agency.Over the past few days, more than 2,400 Ukrainian soldiers have surrendered in Mariupol.For weeks they had holed up in the bunkers of the Azov steelworks and defended the port city against the Russian occupiers.The politician and oligarch Medvedchuk, who was arrested in mid-April, is considered Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin's closest ally in Ukraine.He is accused of high treason and embezzlement in Kyiv.Weeks ago, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy suggested exchanging him for Ukrainian prisoners.The managing director of the owner of the Azovstal steel factory in Mariupol, Yuriy Ryzhenkov, described the destruction in the Ukrainian city."The Russians are trying to clean them up to cover up their crimes," Ryzhenkov of the Metinvest company said in an interview with the Corriere della Sera newspaper published on Saturday.Attempts are being made to restore operations in Mariupol.In addition to Azovstal, Metinvest also owns the Ilyich steel factory in Mariupol.The infrastructure there is still partially intact, Ryschenkow said in the interview.Should Russia try to start operations there, Ukrainians would refuse to work there again, he said."We will never work under Russian occupation."Russia claimed on Friday it had captured the Azovstal steel factory.This had become a symbol of the Ukrainian resistance against Russia.The Russian Defense Ministry said soldiers removed the last Ukrainian fighters from the facility.There were more than 2,400 fighters there.The Ukrainian government has not yet commented on the Russian claims.Activists have occupied a sea villa in Austria over their alleged connection to a Russian oligarch.The group called for the property in Unterburgau am Attersee near Salzburg to be expropriated.They hung banners with slogans like "Anarchos instead of Oligarchos" on scaffolding.According to the activists, up to forty people were involved in the action, according to the police there were only ten.Officials are in contact with them on site, said a police spokesman for the German Press Agency.Breaking News: Occupation of Russian oligarch Igor Shuvalov's villa on Lake Attersee pic.twitter.com/ft2BJD9ByfAccording to the Austrian land register and a register from the Ministry of Finance, the villa is not owned by the oligarch, who is subject to EU sanctions.It therefore belongs to a company that is in turn attributed to a family member of the oligarch.The Directorate for State Security and Intelligence, which is responsible for the allocation of oligarch assets in Austria, has pointed out that it often encounters circumvention structures that conceal the true ownership structure.Turkey has asked Sweden to end its support for "terrorist groups" and an arms embargo in order to join NATO.President Recep Tayyip Erdogan mentioned these demands to Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson on Saturday, Erdogan's office said.During the phone call, both heads of state and government discussed, among other things, Sweden's application to join NATO, which Turkey had initially blocked.Sweden must end its "political, financial and military support" for terrorist groups and end "defense industry embargoes" imposed after a Turkish military operation against the Syrian Kurdish militia, the statement from Ankara said.Erdogan told the Swedish Prime Minister that these are two "concrete and serious steps" that show that Stockholm shares Turkey's security concerns.Andersson then told Swedish broadcaster SVT that she stressed that Sweden welcomes cooperation in the fight against international terrorism and clearly supports the fight against terrorism and the classification of the banned PKK party as a terrorist organization.Appreciate today's talk with Turkish President @RTErdogan on Sweden's NATO application.We look forward to strengthening our bilateral relations, including on peace, security, and the fight against terrorism.According to the General Staff of the Ukrainian military, there has been heavy fighting in eastern Ukraine.The areas affected include Sievjerodonetsk, Bakhmut and Avdiyvka, the general staff said on Saturday.The Russian Defense Ministry reported on Saturday that the Russians had destroyed a Ukraine special operations base in the Odessa region on the Black Sea.Russia has also destroyed a key cache in northern Ukraine's Zhytomyr region with weapons supplied by the West, Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said.The information was not confirmed by Ukraine.Despite the defeat in the port city of Mariupol, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy believes that the Ukrainian army has inflicted serious damage on Russia's armed forces.Ukraine "broke the backbone of the Russian army," Zelensky said in a television interview broadcast on Saturday."You won't be able to get back on your feet for the next few years," said the 44-year-old.Shortly before, the last more than 2,400 Ukrainian defenders of the port city in the south-east of the country had surrendered and been taken prisoner by the Russians.Zelenskyy emphasized that Kyiv will take everything back.A return to the front lines before February 24 - the day Russia's war of aggression began - will already count as a victory."It will mean that they have not conquered us and we have defended our country," said the head of state.But getting there will be very difficult.In the end there is diplomacy.In response to Western sanctions, Russia has extended travel bans against Americans and Canadians.The State Department in Moscow published on Saturday a list with the names of a total of 963 US citizens who are now banned from entering Russia.It was previously known that President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, as well as hundreds of members of the US House of Representatives, were affected.From Canada, the wife of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Sophie Trudeau, and the husband of Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, Graham Bowley, are now also on the so-called stop list.The move comes in response to Canada -- like the US and -- putting two adult daughters of Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin on its sanctions list in the wake of Russia's war on Ukraine.Your assets in Canada will be frozen and you will no longer be able to do business there.Putin's daughter Katerina Vladimirovna Tikhonova is a technical executive whose work supports the Russian government and the defense industry, Washington said in early April.Her sister Maria Vladimirovna Vorontsova runs state-funded programs that the Kremlin is funding with billions for genetic research and that Putin personally monitors.Little is known about Putin's daughters.Tikhonova was born in 1986, her sister in 1985.In a video, the Russian Ministry of Defense shows the captured last Ukrainian defenders of Mariupol like trophies of victory.In front of the backdrop of the Asovstal steelworks, the men with beards are lined up.Their faces are bleached out after weeks without sun in the bunkers of the industrial zone.State television in Moscow raves about an "unprecedented operation" - to "liberate" the steelworks and the complete takeover of the strategically important port city.Russian photos of the men and women are also circulating on the Ukrainian Internet.The joy of their rescue outweighs the sadness of the defeat.The loss of the largely destroyed city is Ukraine's heaviest loss to date in the war that Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin began on February 24.The Russian media used the moment when the last men and women left the plant to once again brand them as «neo-Nazis».They have to undress in front of the cameras, tattoos can be seen, skulls, Celtic crosses and a swastika, as well as a "black sun" again and again, allegedly the identification symbol of the nationalists.If charged with war crimes, prisoners in the pro-Russian separatist-controlled Donetsk Oblast, where Mariupol is located, face the death penalty.The city, which once had almost 500,000 inhabitants, has been a symbol of Ukrainian resistance against Russia for weeks.That's over now - also because, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, the West didn't deliver heavy weapons sooner.The Russian border region of Kursk now accuses Ukraine of daily shelling.On Saturday, the Glushkovo region was attacked, Governor Roman Starovoit wrote in the Telegram news service.At first he did not comment on possible victims.In the past few days, Starovoit had already blamed the Ukrainians for the destruction in towns near the border.A person is said to have died in the village of Tjotkino on Thursday.Ukraine has not commented on the allegations.Russia, which itself launched the war of aggression against Ukraine on February 24, has been complaining about Ukrainian attacks on its own territory for weeks.US President Joe Biden signed legislation on Saturday to provide Ukraine with another $40 billion in US aid.The bill passed Congress with a large majority of votes from members of both parties.The aid package is intended to cover a period up to the end of September.Among other things, it provides for 20 billion dollars in military aid for Ukraine and thus secures arms deliveries that can be used to ward off Russian attacks.It also provides $8 billion in general economic aid and $5 billion to alleviate global food shortages, a possible consequence of Ukraine's agricultural collapse.More than a billion dollars will benefit the support of refugees.Biden signed the law under unusual circumstances: during a trip to Asia.According to the White House, a government official flew a copy to South Korea for Biden to sign off on.Delegates from five countries left the hall at the start of a speech by Russia's envoy at an APEC meeting in protest at the Russian attack on Ukraine.Japanese Trade Minister Koichi Hagiuda and his colleagues from the US, Australia, New Zealand and Canada left when the Russian representative began his opening speech on Saturday, the Japanese delegation said.The trade ministers of the Asia-Pacific Economic Community met in the Thai capital, Bangkok.On the red carpet at the Cannes Film Festival, a nearly naked woman protested against sexual violence against Ukrainian victims by Russian soldiers.Background are allegations of rape of Ukrainian civilians by the Russian army.Recently, the Ukrainian Attorney General Iryna Venediktova and the human rights organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) made such allegations.Since the beginning of the Russian attack on Ukraine, more than 3.5 million people have fled to neighboring Poland.This was announced by the Polish border guard on Twitter on Saturday.Recently, however, the number of people returning to Ukraine was greater than the number of people newly arriving in Poland.On Friday alone, 23,700 people crossed the Polish border from Ukraine, and on the same day 28,400 people crossed the border in the opposite direction.According to the United Nations, more than 6.4 million people have fled abroad since the Russian war of aggression began on February 24.In addition, there are still more than eight million people in Ukraine who have lost their homes and been displaced.Before the start of the war, around 44 million people lived in Ukraine.The Ukrainian General Staff has registered a large number of Russian attacks in the country and warned of the risk of air strikes from neighboring Belarus.According to the situation report on Saturday, the focus of the fighting is further east in Ukraine.There, eleven enemy attacks were fended off and, among other things, eight tanks were destroyed.The artillery shelling of Ukrainian positions is also continuing, it said.Ukraine also sees itself threatened by Russia's ally Belarus, which is not officially a participant in the war.In addition, ships of the Russian Navy are on the move in the Black and Azov Seas for combat operations and reconnaissance, the staff said in Kyiv.The military complained that the Russian occupiers also used terror on the ground against the Ukrainian civilian population.For example, they prevented people from fleeing from the Cherson region they occupied to the territory controlled by Ukraine.The opening of humanitarian corridors is also blocked so that no food and medicine can be brought into the area.Elderly people, the sick and children were trapped there, it said.Russia says it has destroyed a "large" shipment of Western weapons in north-western Ukraine.The Russian army destroyed a "large load of weapons and military equipment near the Malyn train station in the Schotoymr region" with "high-precision long-range sea-based weapons" of the Kalibr type, the Defense Ministry said in Moscow on Saturday.Ukraine received the delivery from the «United States and European countries».According to the ministry, the western arms shipments were destined for Ukrainian troops in eastern Ukraine's Donbass region, which has been partially controlled by pro-Russian separatists since 2014.The fiercest fighting in Ukraine is currently taking place in the Donbass.Among other things, Ukraine will receive artillery weapons, anti-aircraft missiles and anti-tank weapons from the West.The government in Kyiv has been asking for more support for weeks.EU Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders has pledged to prosecute war crimes in Ukraine."I want the message to get through clearly: it will take time, it will be a long process, but the atrocities committed in Ukraine will not go unpunished," Reynders said in an interview with the Italian newspaper "La Stampa" ( Saturday).Investigations into war crimes, crimes against humanity and possibly genocide have already begun.There are currently around 10,000 files and investigations into this.More than 600 suspects have been identified so far.The investigations are ongoing at the crime scene in Ukraine, but also in various European countries, where evidence and testimonies from refugees are being collected, as Reynders explained.Eleven EU countries are currently investigating war crimes committed in Ukraine.In addition to witness statements, there is an enormous amount of photos, videos, audio files and satellite images.The Belgian politician stressed the importance of the evidence being collected and verified correctly."This is crucial: if you included false information or fake news, it would be a disaster."Ukraine fears a further advance by Russian troops after they have completely captured the port city of Mariupol and the Azov Steelworks.The Ukrainian military governor of the Luhansk region, Serhiy Hajday, reported massive fighting in the Donbass on Saturday.For example, the eastern Ukrainian city of Sievjerodonetsk has been under fire for days, there are dead and injured."The Russians are wiping out Sieverodonetsk like Mariupol.Fighting is going on in the suburbs of the city,” Hajdaj said on the Telegram news channel.The governor complained of aerial bombardments in the region, and that Russia wanted to reduce the area to rubble.At the same time, he dismissed statements by Russia's Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu that he was about to take over the entire Luhansk region as "nonsense".Shoigu no longer has an overview of the situation of his own armed forces.The Russian Defense Ministry said on Friday that the last Ukrainian militants at the Azov steel plant in Mariupol had surrendered - more than 2,000 in total.The city is now completely under Russian control, it said.From the Russian point of view, the capture of Mariupol is considered an important partial success.Ukrainian authorities also reported fresh Russian attacks in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv.In the Kiev district of the megacity, the market was shot at on Friday evening.Several merchant pavilions burned down.The published photos of the heavy destruction were initially not verifiable.The Vice-President of the European Parliament, Katarina Barley (SPD), has called for the planned EU oil embargo against Russia to be decided without Hungary.Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban wants to "lead the EU through the ring on the nose," Barley said on Deutschlandfunk on Saturday.She does not see that Orban would agree to the new EU sanctions package, which also includes the planned oil embargo, without anything in return.Barley accused Orban of using the dispute over the oil embargo for his "political games" to channel additional money into his country.The right-wing populist Prime Minister is primarily concerned with letting money flow into the channels of his "family and clans".In Hungary there is an "openly corrupt system".In return for agreeing to the oil embargo proposed by the EU Commission, Hungary had demanded billions in aid from the EU.Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto spoke in a video message published on Facebook this week of investments of 15 to 18 billion euros needed for his country's move away from Russian oil.After the capture of the Mariupol steelworks, it remains to be seen whether Russia will provide information on the whereabouts of the arrested Ukrainian militants.The Defense Ministry in Moscow released a video of the men's arrest.Russian President Vladimir Putin had pledged that if they surrender, they would stay alive and receive medical attention.The last defenders of Mariupol declared their surrender on Friday after weeks of resistance.After weeks of fierce fighting, the Russian army has claimed complete control of the Azovstal steelworks in the Ukrainian port of Mariupol.All enemy fighters surrendered, the Ministry of Defense announced on Saturday night in Moscow.The sprawling industrial complex on the Azov Sea was the last place in the strategically important port city in south-eastern Ukraine that had not yet been fully under Russian control.The Ukrainian side initially did not comment on the alleged capture of the plant.According to information from Moscow, a total of 2,439 Ukrainian soldiers holed up in Soviet-era bunkers have been taken prisoner by the Russians since May 16.The last group of 531 fighters was captured on Friday, it said.The steelworks had been besieged by Russian troops since April 21.In a television interview recorded before the Russian government announced the capture, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy blamed the West for the development.He has repeatedly called on Western heads of state and government to provide his country with "appropriate weapons" so that we can reach Mariupol to liberate these people."Russia no longer supplies gas to Finland."Natural gas deliveries to Finland under the Gasum supply contract have been suspended," said the Finnish state-owned energy company Gasum on Saturday.The Russian energy giant Gazprom announced the delivery stop on Friday, referring to the dispute over ruble payments.Gasum said gas is now being sourced from other sources via the Balticconnector pipeline, which connects Finland and Estonia.Gasum had already emphasized on Friday that a Russian delivery stop would not lead to supply problems in Finland.Gazprom announced on Friday that it would stop gas supplies to Finland from 06:00 CEST on Saturday.The reason given by the company was that the April deliveries had not been paid for on time.Gasum had rejected Moscow's demand that bills for gas deliveries be settled in rubles.Former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen has criticized the German government's cautious course in the face of Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine.Germany is "too hesitant to deliver heavy weapons and impose sanctions," Rasmussen told the Handelsblatt newspaper.“Of course, Germany is highly dependent on Russian gas imports, but I think a clear stance from the federal government would change the whole dynamic in Ukraine.We need German leadership."The Dane, who was Prime Minister of his country from 2001 to 2009 and Secretary General of the transatlantic military alliance from 2009 to 2014, called on Europeans to stop importing oil and gas from Russia immediately.«Certainly an energy embargo will have a price.But compared to the cost of a protracted war, that price would be small," argued Rasmussen.The greatest risk is a war of attrition.«The Russians are experts at playing with unresolved conflicts.We see this in Georgia, in Moldova and in Ukraine's Donbass region, which they invaded back in 2014.We should do what is necessary to end this conflict quickly."The most effective means is to stop the financing of Putin's war machine - and this requires a freeze on all oil and gas imports.Image: KEYSTONE/EPA/SERGEY KOZLOVImage: KEYSTONE / AP Photo / Natacha PisarenkoImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/MYKOLA TYSImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/SERGEY KOZLOVCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Bernat ArmangueImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/STEPAN FRANKOImage: KEYSTONE/Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via APCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Natacha PisarenkoImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/SERGEY KOZLOVCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Natacha PisarenkoImage: KEYSTONE/DPA/Marijan MuratImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/SERGEY KOZLOVCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Natacha PisarenkoImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/SERGEY KOZLOVCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Natacha PisarenkoCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Natacha PisarenkoImage: KEYSTONE/KEYSTONE/Laurent GillieronCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Max PshybyshevskyCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Bernat ArmangueImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/RUSSIAN DEFENSE MINISTRY PRESS SERVICECredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Bernat ArmangueCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Ahn Young-joonCredit: KEYSTONE/EPA/ALESSANDRO GUERRACredit: KEYSTONE/EPA/ALESSANDRO GUERRACredit: KEYSTONE/EPA/ALESSANDRO GUERRACredit: KEYSTONE/EPA/ALESSANDRO GUERRAImage: Johanna Geron/Reuters Pool/dpaImage: Uncredited/Maxar Technologies/dpaCredit: KEYSTONE/EPA/Darek Delmanowicz POLAND OUTCredit: KEYSTONE/EPA/Wojtek Jargilo POLAND OUTCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Andriy AndriyenkoCredit: KEYSTONE/EPA/OLEG PETRASYUKPICTURED: KEYSTONE/EPO/ROMAN PILIPEYImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/SERGEY KOZLOVImage: KEYSTONE / AP Photo / Natacha PisarenkoImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/MYKOLA TYSImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/SERGEY KOZLOVCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Bernat ArmangueImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/STEPAN FRANKOImage: KEYSTONE/Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via APCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Natacha PisarenkoImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/SERGEY KOZLOVCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Natacha PisarenkoImage: KEYSTONE/DPA/Marijan MuratImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/SERGEY KOZLOVCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Natacha PisarenkoImage: KEYSTONE/EPA/SERGEY KOZLOVCredit: KEYSTONE/AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko