After explosions in Crimea: Zelenskyj calls on Ukrainians in occupied territories to exercise caution

After a series of heavy explosions at Russian military installations in Crimea, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has called on Ukrainians in occupied territories to exercise caution.

"Please do not go near the military installations of the Russian army and all those places where they store ammunition and equipment, where they have their headquarters!" Zelenskyy said in his video address on Tuesday evening.

He addressed this appeal to "all our people in Crimea, in other regions of southern Ukraine, in the occupied territories of Donbass and in the Kharkiv region".

Zelenskyy did not claim the detonations as successful attacks on Ukraine.

The triggers are "very different", the Russians could also be to blame.

Nevertheless, the following applies: "The fewer opportunities the occupiers have to do evil and kill Ukrainians, the sooner we can end this war by liberating our country."

Lines in front of train stations

The queue at the bridge to mainland Russia proves "that the absolute majority of citizens of the terror state already understands or at least feels that Crimea is not a place for them," said Zelenskyy.

Videos on social networks show that many Russian vacationers have been leaving the peninsula for days and there are traffic jams in front of the Kerch bridge.

The Russian state news agency Ria Novosti reported a record 38,300 vehicles on the bridge for Monday – albeit in both directions.

At the train station in the Crimean capital Simferopol, many tourists tried to get a train ticket on Tuesday.

Russia took Crimea from Ukraine in 2014.

Meeting with Guterres and Erdogan

According to Turkey, Zelenskyy's meeting with UN Secretary-General António Guterres and the Turkish head of state Recep Tayyip Erdogan will also be about diplomatic ways out of the war.

At the tripartite summit on Thursday in the Ukrainian Lviv (Lemberg), among other things, the "end of the war between Ukraine and Russia will be discussed through diplomatic channels," according to a statement by the Turkish Presidential Office on Tuesday.

The United Nations had shown much more reluctance to talk to Zelenskyy about ending hostilities.

"There are a number of issues that are being addressed: the conflict in general, the need for a political solution to this conflict," said Stephane Dujarric in New York when asked whether negotiations for a permanent ceasefire were also being discussed.

Guterres repeatedly emphasizes that he is a friend of the quiet diplomacy that negotiates ways out of a conflict behind closed doors.

UN chief Guterres and President Erdogan brought Russia and Ukraine to an important agreement on the agreement on the export of Ukrainian grain at the end of July.

At the time, it was said from New York that they wanted to build on this success.

UN circles believe that negotiations for a nationwide ceasefire are only possible if none of the warring parties can record significant gains in territory and refrain from the goal of victory.

60,000 shots every day

Meanwhile, the Russian army is firing 40,000 to 60,000 rounds of ammunition at Ukrainian army positions every day, according to estimates by Ukrainian supreme commander Valeriy Zalushny.

The situation is currently the most difficult near Donetsk, where the Ukrainian positions at Avdiivka, Pisky and Marjinka are under heavy fire, Zalushnyj wrote on Facebook on Tuesday.

He also reported this to Canadian Chief of Staff Wayne Donald Eyre in a telephone call.

In its situation report for Tuesday evening, the Ukrainian general staff also spoke of violent attacks on Ukrainian positions on the north-western edge of the separatist stronghold of Donetsk.

Further north in the Donbass near Bakhmut and Soledar it was possible to fend off Russian assaults.

The enemy had to withdraw with casualties.

There was no independent confirmation of the military information.

An air force base near Zhytomyr in western Ukraine was fired upon by Russian planes with cruise missiles, the responsible Ukrainian air force command said.

The runway was damaged and several vehicles were destroyed.

According to the information, the Russian fighter planes had started in Belarus, had first faked a training flight and then shot down the guided missiles.

Selensky speaks to Washington Post

In an interview with the US newspaper "Washington Post", Zelenskyy also justified the decision not to openly prepare for war before February 24 by saying that his country should not have been panicked.

From autumn 2021, the United States would have warned him more and more urgently about a Russian invasion ordered by President Vladimir Putin, he said.

His leadership wanted to avoid an economic collapse and keep the population in the country.

If he had said then that his countrymen should hoard money and food, "I would have lost $7 billion every month since last October," the president said.

"And if Russia then attacks, they would have captured us in three days."

Zelenskyj justified himself: “In general, our inner feeling was correct: if we sow chaos among the people before the invasion, the Russians will eat us up.

Because in the chaos, people flee the country.” Keeping the people in Ukraine was the key to defending the country.