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Russia Seeks Monday UN Security Council Meet on Bucha, Ukraine

A man gestures at a mass grave in the town of Bucha, northwest of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on April 3, 2022. (AFP)
A man gestures at a mass grave in the town of Bucha, northwest of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on April 3, 2022. (AFP)
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Russia Seeks Monday UN Security Council Meet on Bucha, Ukraine

A man gestures at a mass grave in the town of Bucha, northwest of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on April 3, 2022. (AFP)
A man gestures at a mass grave in the town of Bucha, northwest of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on April 3, 2022. (AFP)

Moscow has called for a special UN Security Council meeting Monday to address claims that Russian forces committed atrocities against Ukrainian civilians in Bucha, a town outside Kyiv.

"In the light of heinous provocation of Ukrainian radicals in #Bucha Russia requested a meeting of UN #SecurityCouncil on Monday April 4," Dmitry Polyanskiy, Russia's deputy ambassador to the United Nations, said Sunday on Twitter.

Ukraine and Western leaders have erupted in outrage over the discovery of mass graves and hundreds of dead people in Bucha, a small town northwest of Kyiv. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky directly blamed Moscow for the "killings" of civilians, AFP reported.

Russia denied the accusations and said Kyiv staged footage of the corpses.

A senior Washington official swiftly slammed Moscow's UN move and said it was designed to "feign outrage."

"Russia is drawing from the playbook it used for Crimea & Aleppo: forced to defend the indefensible (here, the Bucha atrocities), Russia is calling a @UN Security Council meeting so it can feign outrage & call for accountability," tweeted Samantha Power, a former US ambassador to the UN.

"Nobody is buying it," added Power, who is the current administrator of the US Agency for International Development.

UN authorities have yet to publicly state whether a Security Council emergency meeting will take place Monday.

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Taiwan Reports Chinese Balloon, First Time in Six Months

A woman holds flags amid celebrations of the 130th foundation anniversary of Taiwan's largest opposition party Kuomintang (KMT), in Taoyuan, Taiwan November 24, 2024. (Reuters)
A woman holds flags amid celebrations of the 130th foundation anniversary of Taiwan's largest opposition party Kuomintang (KMT), in Taoyuan, Taiwan November 24, 2024. (Reuters)
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Taiwan Reports Chinese Balloon, First Time in Six Months

A woman holds flags amid celebrations of the 130th foundation anniversary of Taiwan's largest opposition party Kuomintang (KMT), in Taoyuan, Taiwan November 24, 2024. (Reuters)
A woman holds flags amid celebrations of the 130th foundation anniversary of Taiwan's largest opposition party Kuomintang (KMT), in Taoyuan, Taiwan November 24, 2024. (Reuters)

Taiwan's defense ministry on Monday reported that a Chinese balloon had been detected over the sea to Taiwan's north, the first time since April it has reported such an incident in what Taipei views as part of a pattern of harassment by Beijing.

Taiwan, which China claims as its own territory, complained that in the weeks leading up to its presidential election in January Chinese balloon activity took place at an "unprecedented scale".

It described the incidents as part of a Chinese pressure campaign - so-called grey-zone warfare designed to exhaust a foe using irregular tactics without open combat.

Taiwan strongly objects to China’s sovereignty claims and says only the island’s people can decide their future.

The ministry, in its regular morning update on Chinese military activities over the previous 24 hours, said the single balloon was detected at 6:21 p.m. (1021 GMT) on Sunday 60 nautical miles (111 km) to the north of Taiwan's Keelung port.

It then vanished some two hours later, having flown at an altitude of 33,000 ft (10,000 meters), but without crossing Taiwan itself, the ministry said.

China's defense ministry did not respond to a request for comment.

China has previously dismissed Taiwan's complaints about the balloons, saying they were for meteorological purposes and should not be hyped up for political reasons.

The potential for China to use balloons for spying became a global issue last year when the United States shot down what it said was a Chinese surveillance balloon. China said the balloon was a civilian craft that accidentally drifted astray.