(Reuters)-President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Sunday that the Russian army was pretending to be an Easter ceasefire declared by President Vladimir Putin, pursuing attempts at night to inflict front line losses on Ukraine.
“In general, from Easter morning, we can say that the Russian army is trying to create a general impression of a ceasefire, but in certain places, it does not give up individual attempts to advance and inflict losses to Ukraine,” said Zelenskiy in an article on social media.
Putin, a few hours before going to an Orthodox Easter service on Saturday, announced the surprise of a day's ceasefire, ordering its forces to “stop all military activities” along the front line in the three-year war.
The gesture followed an American announcement that she could abandon the peace talks in a few days unless Moscow and kyiv show that they were serious about the negotiation.
The fighting had to stop from 6 p.m. Moscow time (1500 GMT) Saturday at midnight on Sunday evening, said Putin.
But Zelenskiy said there were hundreds of bombing cases on Saturday evening. Early on Sunday, Ukrainian forces brought in 59 cases of bombing and five attempts to assault along the front line, he said.
“Russia must be fully in line with the conditions of silence,” said Zelenskiy.
He reiterated that kyiv was willing to extend the ceasefire for 30 days, but said that if Russia continued to fight on Sunday, Ukraine too.
“Ukraine will continue to act mirror,” he said.
(Report by Lidia Kelly in Melbourne; edition by William Mallard)
