Skip to Content Facebook Feature Image

Ukraine's president acknowledges military incursion onto Russian soil

News

Ukraine's president acknowledges military incursion onto Russian soil
News

News

Ukraine's president acknowledges military incursion onto Russian soil

2024-08-12 05:24 Last Updated At:05:31

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Days after Ukraine began a surprise military incursion into Russia’s Kursk border region, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has broken the government’s silence on it by indirectly acknowledging the ongoing military actions to “push the war out into the aggressor’s territory.”

Zelenskyy's comment came in his nightly address late Saturday.

More Images
EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - In this photo provided by the Ukrainian Emergency Service, emergency services personnel retrieve bodies of a 35-year old man and his son, 4, from the rubble after Russian missile hit their house during the night missile attack in the village of Rozhyvka close to capital Kyiv Ukraine, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (Ukrainian Emergency Service via AP)

EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - In this photo provided by the Ukrainian Emergency Service, emergency services personnel retrieve bodies of a 35-year old man and his son, 4, from the rubble after Russian missile hit their house during the night missile attack in the village of Rozhyvka close to capital Kyiv Ukraine, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (Ukrainian Emergency Service via AP)

Residents of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side stand near the building in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Residents of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side stand near the building in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

People walk near an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side, in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

People walk near an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side, in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Residents of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side leave the area in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Residents of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side leave the area in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Residents of the apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side leave an area in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Residents of the apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side leave an area in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Russian Emergency paramedics roll a stretcher with a resident of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side into an ambulance in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Russian Emergency paramedics roll a stretcher with a resident of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side into an ambulance in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

A resident of the apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side holds her smart phone sitting at the door of the shelter in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

A resident of the apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side holds her smart phone sitting at the door of the shelter in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Ukraine’s incursion into Russia continued for a sixth day Sunday. It's the largest such attack since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion on Feb. 24, 2022 and is unprecedented for its use of Ukrainian military units on Russian soil. Ukraine's raid into Russia caught Moscow unaware and was an embarrassment to Russian military leaders who have scrambled to contain the breach.

The Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement on Sunday that its forces engaged Ukrainian troops in Tolpino, Zhuravli and Obshchy Kolodez, the official Tass news agency reported. Tolpino is 25 kilometers (15 miles) from the Ukrainian border.

Evacuation of civilians living in Russia’s border areas with Ukraine continued Sunday. Russian state television aired footage of evacuees at a tent camp in the city of Kursk. According to the report by RTR, more than 20 temporary accommodation centers have been set up in the region.

The exact aims of the operation remain unclear, and Ukrainian military officials have adopted a policy of secrecy, presumably to ensure its success. Military experts have said that it is likely intended to draw Russian reserves away from the intense fighting in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, while a presidential adviser suggested that it may strengthen Kyiv’s hand in any future negotiations with Russia.

But Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Sunday that Ukraine “understands perfectly well” that the recent attacks “make no sense from a military point of view.”

“The Kyiv regime is continuing its terrorist activity with the sole purpose of intimidating the peaceful population of Russia,” she added.

Meanwhile, a fire in the vicinity of the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Power Plant was reported by Ukrainian officials late Sunday. According to Yevhen Yevtushenko, the head of the military administration of Nikopol, which is across the river from occupied Enerhodar where the plant is located, Russian forces set fire to automobile tires in the cooling towers to make it appear as though a fire had broken out.

“Perhaps this is a provocation or an attempt to create panic in the settlements on the right bank of the former reservoir,” he said. Zelenskyy also said Russia was using the plant to blackmail Ukraine and playing on Western fears of escalation. Yevhen Balytskyi, the Russia-appointed governor of the occupied Zaporizhzhia region, accused Ukrainian forces of shelling the plant and causing the fire. He provided no evidence for the claim.

Overnight into Sunday, a Russian drone and missile barrage on Kyiv killed two people, including a 4-year-old boy. Russia attacked Ukraine with four ballistic missiles and 57 Shahed drones, Ukraine's air force said. Air defenses shot down 53 of the drones.

The bodies of a 35-year-old man and his son were found under rubble after missile fragments fell on a residential area in Kyiv’s suburban Brovary district, according to Ukraine’s State Emergency Service. Another three people in the district were wounded in the attack. It was the second time this month that Kyiv has been targeted, said Serhii Popko, head of the Kyiv City Military Administration.

Popko said ballistic missiles didn't reach the capital, but that suburbs took the hit, while drones aiming for the capital were shot down.

In Russia, Kursk’s regional governor said that a Ukrainian missile shot down by Russian air defenses fell on a residential building, wounding 15 people. The Russian Defense Ministry said that 35 drones were shot down overnight over the Kursk, Voronezh, Belgorod, Bryansk and Oryol regions.

Ukraine hasn't commented on the Sunday drone attacks inside Russia. But they come as Ukraine has increased the pace of similar drone attacks largely targeting military infrastructure and oil depots in recent weeks.

Meanwhile, Belarus said that it was sending more troops to its border with Ukraine on Saturday, saying Ukrainian drones had violated its airspace as part of Kyiv’s military incursion into Russia’s Kursk region.

Authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko said Belarusian air defense forces destroyed dozens of targets flying from Ukraine over the Mogilev region, which borders Russia, on Friday evening.

“The Ukrainian armed forces violated all rules of conduct and violated the airspace of the Republic of Belarus. In the eastern direction, very close to us in the Kostyukovichi district,” Lukashenko said at a meeting in Minsk on Saturday.

Belarusian Defense Minister Viktor Khrenin said the government regards the violation of its airspace as a provocation and is “ready for retaliatory action."

Follow the AP’s coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - In this photo provided by the Ukrainian Emergency Service, emergency services personnel retrieve bodies of a 35-year old man and his son, 4, from the rubble after Russian missile hit their house during the night missile attack in the village of Rozhyvka close to capital Kyiv Ukraine, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (Ukrainian Emergency Service via AP)

EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - In this photo provided by the Ukrainian Emergency Service, emergency services personnel retrieve bodies of a 35-year old man and his son, 4, from the rubble after Russian missile hit their house during the night missile attack in the village of Rozhyvka close to capital Kyiv Ukraine, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (Ukrainian Emergency Service via AP)

Residents of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side stand near the building in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Residents of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side stand near the building in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

People walk near an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side, in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

People walk near an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side, in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Residents of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side leave the area in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Residents of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side leave the area in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Residents of the apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side leave an area in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Residents of the apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side leave an area in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Russian Emergency paramedics roll a stretcher with a resident of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side into an ambulance in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

Russian Emergency paramedics roll a stretcher with a resident of an apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side into an ambulance in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

A resident of the apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side holds her smart phone sitting at the door of the shelter in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

A resident of the apartment building damaged after shelling by the Ukrainian side holds her smart phone sitting at the door of the shelter in Kursk, Russia, Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024. (AP Photo)

President Donald Trump moved to end a decades-old immigration policy known as birthright citizenship when he ordered the cancellation of the constitutional guarantee that U.S.-born children are citizens regardless of their parents’ status.

Trump's roughly 700-word executive order, issued late Monday, amounts to a fulfillment of something he's talked about during the presidential campaign. But whether it succeeds is far from certain as attorneys general in 18 states and two cities challenged the order in court on Tuesday, seeking to block the president.

Here's a closer look at birthright citizenship, Trump's executive order and reaction to it:

Birthright citizenship means anyone born in the U.S. is a citizen, regardless of their parents' immigration status. People, for instance, in the United States on a tourist or other visa or in the country illegally can become the parents of a citizen if their child is born here.

It's been in place for decades and enshrined in the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, supporters say. But Trump and allies dispute the reading of the amendment and say there need to be tougher standards on becoming a citizen.

The order questions that the 14th Amendment extends citizenship automatically to anyone born in the United States.

The 14th Amendment was born in the aftermath of the Civil War and ratified in 1868. It says: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

Trump's order excludes the following people from automatic citizenship: those whose mothers were not legally in the United States and whose fathers were not U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents; people whose mothers were in the country legally but on a temporary basis and whose fathers were not citizens or legal permanent residents.

It goes on to bar federal agencies from recognizing the citizenship of people in those categories. It takes effect 30 days from Tuesday, on Feb. 19.

The 14th Amendment did not always guarantee birthright citizenship to all U.S.-born people. Congress did not authorize citizenship for all Native Americans born in the United States, for instance, until 1924.

In 1898 an important birthright citizenship case unfolded in the U.S. Supreme Court. The court held that Wong Kim Ark, who was born in San Francisco to Chinese immigrants, was a U.S. citizen because he was born in the country. After a trip abroad, he had faced denied reentry by the federal government on the grounds that he wasn't a citizen under the Chinese Exclusion Act.

But some advocates of immigration restrictions have argued that while the case clearly applied to children born to parents who are both legal immigrants, it’s less clear whether it applies to children born to parents without legal status.

Eighteen states, plus the District of Columbia and San Francisco sued in federal court to block Trump's order.

New Jersey Democratic Attorney General Matt Platkin said Tuesday the president cannot undo a right written into the Constitution with a stroke of his pen.

“Presidents have broad power but they are not kings,” Platkin said.

Not long after Trump signed the order, immigrant rights groups filed suit to stop it.

Chapters of the American Civil Liberties Union in New Hampshire, Maine and Massachusetts along with other immigrant rights advocates filed a suit in New Hampshire federal court.

The suit asks the court to find the order to be unconstitutional. It highlights the case of a woman identified as “Carmen," who is pregnant but is not a citizen. The lawsuit says she has lived in the United States for more than 15 years and has a pending visa application that could lead to permanent status. She has no other immigration status, and the father of her expected child has no immigration status either, the suit says.

“Stripping children of the ‘priceless treasure’ of citizenship is a grave injury,” the suit said. "It denies them the full membership in U.S. society to which they are entitled."

In addition to New Jersey and the two cities, California, Massachusetts, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin joined the lawsuit to stop the order.

President-elect Donald Trump, from left, takes the oath of office as Barron Trump and Melania Trump watch at the 60th Presidential Inauguration in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025. (Kevin Lamarque/Pool Photo via AP)

President-elect Donald Trump, from left, takes the oath of office as Barron Trump and Melania Trump watch at the 60th Presidential Inauguration in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025. (Kevin Lamarque/Pool Photo via AP)

President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

U.S. flags around the Washington Monument are at full staff during the 60th Presidential Inauguration, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. Flags are supposed to fly at half-staff through the end of January out of respect for former President Jimmy Carter, who died Dec. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)

U.S. flags around the Washington Monument are at full staff during the 60th Presidential Inauguration, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. Flags are supposed to fly at half-staff through the end of January out of respect for former President Jimmy Carter, who died Dec. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)

A young man reacts to information on how to prepare for the upcoming changes to undocumented families living in the U.S., Sunday, Jan. 19, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)

A young man reacts to information on how to prepare for the upcoming changes to undocumented families living in the U.S., Sunday, Jan. 19, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)

Sonia Rosa Sifore and other anti-Trump protesters gather in Federal Plaza to rally for a number of issues, including immigrant rights, the Israel-Hamas war, women's reproductive rights, racial equality and others, on the day of President Trump's Inauguration, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Erin Hooley)

Sonia Rosa Sifore and other anti-Trump protesters gather in Federal Plaza to rally for a number of issues, including immigrant rights, the Israel-Hamas war, women's reproductive rights, racial equality and others, on the day of President Trump's Inauguration, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Erin Hooley)

President Donald Trump signs an executive order on birthright citizenship in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

President Donald Trump signs an executive order on birthright citizenship in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Recommended Articles
Hot · Posts