Europe

April 19 (Reuters) - The Ukrainian port city of Mariupol could fall to Russian forces within days, a European official said on Tuesday, saying it may suffer more than the town of Bucha, where Russian forces have been accused of atrocities that the Kremlin has denied.

"At the end of the day, we do expect a complete destruction of the city and many civilian casualties in Mariupol," said the European official who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the topic.

KYIV/KHARKIV, April 19 (Reuters) - Russian troops seized a frontline Ukrainian city on Tuesday, hours after starting a long-anticipated offensive in eastern Ukraine that the Kyiv government has called the Battle of the Donbas.

Thousands of troops pressed an advance across almost the entire stretch of the eastern front as the assault began with massive Russian artillery and rocket barrages. Ukrainian officials said their soldiers would withstand the offensive.

Lviv, Apr 19 (AP) After days of regrouping and reinforcing, the Russian military began a new and potentially climactic phase of the war in Ukraine by launching its long-feared, full-scale ground offensive to take control of the country's industrial heartland, the Donbas, Ukrainian officials said.

The stepped-up assaults began Monday along a broad front of over 300 miles (480 kilometers), Ukrainian officials said.

KIEV, April 18 (Xinhua) -- Russian forces have begun the battle for the Donbas region, but Ukraine will defend itself, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a video address on Monday.

"Now we can say that Russian troops have started the battle for Donbas, for which they have been preparing for a long time. A very large part of the entire Russian army is now focused on this offensive," Zelensky was quoted as saying by the state-run Ukrinform news agency.

"No matter how many Russian troops are driven there, we will fight," he added.

BRUSSELS (AP) — The number of migrants trying to enter the European Union without authorization in the first three months of this year has risen to its highest level since 2016, even excluding refugees arriving from Ukraine, the EU’s border and coast guard agency said Tuesday.

Frontex estimated that more than 40,300 “illegal crossings” were made into the 27-nation EU between January and March, up by 57% over the same period last year.

LONDON (AP) — Prime Minister Boris Johnson is facing British lawmakers on Tuesday for the first time since he was fined by police for attending a birthday party in his office that broke coronavirus lockdown rules.

As the House of Commons returns from an 11-day Easter break, Johnson is expected to apologize for what he insists was a minor slip-up — but rebuff opposition calls to resign for flouting the restrictions that he imposed on the country during the pandemic.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian forces attacked along a broad front in eastern Ukraine on Tuesday as part of a full-scale ground offensive to take control of the country’s eastern industrial heartland in what Ukrainian officials called a “new phase of the war.”

Ukraine’s General Staff said Russian forces are focusing their efforts on taking full control of the Donbas region. “The occupiers made an attempt to break through our defenses along nearly the entire frontline,” the General Staff said in a statement early Tuesday.

LONDON, April 18. /TASS/: UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson claimed that he did not violate Covid-related restrictions in 2020 despite the fine he paid, the Times reported Sunday citing its source.

According to the report, Johnson will try to minimize the consequences of the scandal around the parties at Downing Street held at the peak of the first waves of the pandemic in his speech at the House Monday. He also plans to touch upon the new fines that the police imposed on him, his spouse Carrie and Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak over the 2020 parties, the source said.

MOSCOW, April 18. /TASS/: Russia’s COVID-19 case tally rose by 9,434 over the past day to 18,084,151, the anti-coronavirus crisis center reported on Monday.

The country reports less than 10,000 daily cases for the first time since June 8, 2021. In relative terms, the growth rate reached 0.05%.

KIEV, April 18. /TASS/: Ukrainian politician Viktor Medvedchuk has called on Presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia and Vladimir Zelensky of Ukraine, to swap him for servicemen and Mariupol residents.