europe
Zelenskyy center stage: Facing Congress, pleading for help
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will address the U.S. Congress, the actor-turned-wartime leader’s latest video speech as he uses the West’s great legislative bodies as a global stage to orchestrate support against Russia’s crushing invasion.
Zelenskyy’s livestreamed address Wednesday into the U.S. Capitol will be among the most important in a unique and very public strategy in which he has invoked Winston Churchill, Hamlet and the power of world opinion in his fight to stop Russia.
Nearing the three-week mark in an ever-escalating war, Zelenskyy has used his campaign to implore allied leaders to “close the sky” to prevent the Russian airstrikes that are devastating his country. It’s a singular request and now a rallying cry in popular culture. It has also put Zelenskyy at odds with President Joe Biden, whose administration has stopped short of providing a no-fly zone or the transfer of military jets from neighboring Poland as the U.S. seeks to avoid a direct confrontation with Russia.
Instead, Biden will deliver his own address following Zelenskyy’s speech, in which he is expected to announce an additional $800 million in security assistance to Ukraine, according to a White House official familiar with the matter. That would bring the total announced in the last week alone to $1 billion. It includes money for anti-armor and air-defense weapons, according to the official, who was not authorized to comment and spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Read: Russia-Ukraine war: Key things to know about the conflict
Appearing in his now trademark army green T-shirt as he appeals to world leaders, the boyish but unshaven Zelenskyy has emerged as a heroic figure at the center of what many view as the biggest security threat to Europe since World War II. Almost 3 million refugees have fled Ukraine, the fastest exodus in modern times.
Invoking Shakespeare’s hero last week, he asked the British House of Commons whether Ukraine is “to be or not to be.” On Tuesday, he appealed to “Dear Justin” as he addressed the Canadian Parliament and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Zelenskyy called on European Union leaders at the start of the war to do the politically unthinkable and fast-track Ukraine’s membership — and he has continued to push for more help to save his young democracy than world leaders have so far pledged to do.
”I know he will ask for more help,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.
Biden has insisted there will be no U.S. troops on the ground in Ukraine and has resisted Zelenskyy’s relentless pleas for warplanes as too risky, potentially escalating into a direct confrontation with nuclear-armed Russia.
“Direct conflict between NATO and Russia is World War III,” Biden has said.
3 EU prime ministers visit Kyiv as Russian attacks intensify
The prime ministers of Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovenia traveled to the embattled Ukrainian capital of Kyiv and met with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Tuesday in a show of support for Ukraine even as bombardment by the Russian military edged closer to the center of the city.
The three leaders went ahead with the hours-long train trip despite worries within the European Union about the security risks of traveling within a war zone.
“It is here, in war-torn Kyiv, that history is being made. It is here, that freedom fights against the world of tyranny. It is here that the future of us all hangs in the balance,” Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Twitter.
The long journey over land from Poland to Kyiv by Morawiecki, Poland’s deputy Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski and Prime Ministers Petr Fiala of the Czech Republic and Janez Jansa of Slovenia sent the message that most of Ukraine still remains in Ukrainian hands.
But underlining the deteriorating security situation in Kyiv, a series of strikes hit a residential neighborhood in the city again on Tuesday.
Zelenskyy posted a video on Facebook of him sitting around a table with the leaders briefing them on the war’s developments. After the meeting, he said he was sure “with such friends” Ukraine would be able to defeat Russia.
Read: Russia-Ukraine war: Key things to know about the conflict
“And most importantly, we absolutely trust the leaders of these countries and, therefore, when we speak of security guarantees, of our future in the European Union, or speak of sanctions policy, we know 100% that everything we are discussing will really lead to that positive goal for our country, for our security and for our future,” Zelenskyy said.
Fiala said the main purpose of the visit was to tell Ukraine it is not alone.
“We know you’re fighting for your lives ... but we also know you’re fighting for our lives, our freedom,” Fiala said. “Probably the main goal of our visit, the main message of our mission, is to say that you’re not alone. Our countries stand by you. Europe stands by you.”
The Central European leaders said they were on an EU mission. But officials from the 27-nation bloc insisted that the trio had undertaken the trip independently.
All three countries were once part of the communist bloc and now belong to both the EU and NATO.
Jansa described the visit as a way to send a message that Ukraine is a European country that deserves to be accepted one day into the EU. Two weeks earlier, Zelenskyy made an emotional appeal to the European Parliament on that very subject.
“We are fighting also to be equal members of Europe,” Zelenskyy told EU lawmakers on March 1. “I believe that today we are showing everybody that is what we are.”
Jansa said the war has awoken Europeans to idea that the bloc represents fundamental ideas that are under threat — and which Ukrainians are defending with their lives.
Ukraine sees room for compromise, as 20,000 escape Mariupol
Ukraine said it saw possible room for compromise in talks with Russia despite Moscow’s stepped up bombardment Tuesday of Kyiv and new assaults on the port city of Mariupol, from where an estimated 20,000 civilians managed to flee through a humanitarian corridor.
The fast-moving developments on the diplomatic front and on the ground came as Russia’s invasion neared the three-week mark and the number of Ukrainians who have left the country amid Europe’s heaviest fighting since World War II eclipsed 3 million.
After delegations from Ukraine and Russia met again Tuesday via video, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said early Wednesday that Russia’s demands were becoming “more realistic.” The two sides were expected to speak again Wednesday.
“Efforts are still needed, patience is needed,” he said in his nightly video address to the nation. “Any war ends with an agreement.”
Zelenskyy, who was expected to address the U.S. Congress on Wednesday, thanked President Joe Biden and “all the friends of Ukraine” for $13.6 billion in new support.
He appealed for more weapons and more sanctions to punish Russia, and repeated his call to “close the skies over Ukraine to Russian missiles and planes.”
He said Russian forces on Tuesday had been unable to move deeper into Ukrainian territory but had continued their heavy shelling of cities.
Over the past day, 28,893 civilians were able to flee the fighting through nine humanitarian corridors, although the Russians refused to allow aid into Mariupol, he said.
In other developments, the leaders of three European Union countries — Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovenia — visited the embattled capital Tuesday, arriving by train in a bold show of support amid the danger.
Meanwhile, large explosions thundered across Kyiv before dawn from what Ukrainian authorities said were artillery strikes, as Russia’s bombardment of the capital appeared to become more systematic and edged closer to the city center, smashing apartments, a subway station and other civilian sites.
Zelenskyy said Tuesday that barrages hit four multi-story buildings in the city and killed dozens. The strikes disrupted the relative calm that returned after an initial advance by Moscow’s forces was stopped in the early days of the war.
A senior U.S. defense official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the Pentagon’s assessment, said that the Russians were using long-range fire to hit civilian targets inside Kyiv with increasing frequency but that their ground forces were making little to no progress around the country. The official said Russian troops were still about 15 kilometers (9 miles) from the center of the capital.
Read:3 EU prime ministers visit Kyiv as Russian attacks intensify
The official said the U.S. has seen indications that Russia believes it may need more troops or supplies than it has on hand in Ukraine, and it is considering ways to get more resources into the country. The official did not elaborate.
Before Tuesday’s talks, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Moscow would press its demands that Ukraine drop its bid to join NATO, adopt a neutral status and “demilitarize.”
In a statement that seemed to signal potential grounds for agreement with Moscow, Zelenskyy told European leaders gathered in London that he realizes NATO has no intention of accepting Ukraine.
“We have heard for many years about the open doors, but we also heard that we can’t enter those doors,” he said. “This is the truth, and we have simply to accept it as it is.”
NATO does not admit nations with unsettled territorial conflicts. Zelenskyy has repeatedly said in recent weeks that he realizes NATO isn’t going to offer membership to Ukraine and that he could consider a neutral status for his country but needs strong security guarantees from both the West and Russia.
The U.N. said close to 700 civilians in Ukraine have been confirmed killed, with the true figure probably much higher.
Two journalists working for Fox News were killed when the vehicle they were traveling in was hit by fire Monday on the outskirts of Kyiv, the network said. Fox identified the two as video journalist Pierre Zakrzewski and Ukrainian journalist Oleksandra “Sasha” Kuvshynova, who was helping Fox crews navigate the area. Another journalist was killed Sunday in Ukraine.
New efforts to bring civilians to safety and deliver aid were underway around the country. The Red Cross said it was working to evacuate people in about 70 buses from the northeastern town of Sumy, near the Russian border.
The exodus from Mariupol marked the biggest evacuation yet from the southern city of 430,000, where officials say a weekslong siege has killed more than 2,300 people and left residents struggling for food, water, heat and medicine. Bodies have been buried in mass graves.
Kyrylo Tymoshenko, a senior aide to Zelenskyy, said that about 20,000 people managed to leave Mariupol on Tuesday in 4,000 private vehicles via a designated safe corridor leading to the city of Zaporizhzhia.
On a day when thousands managed to leave Mariupol, Russian troops seized the city’s largest hospital, said regional leader Pavlo Kyrylenko. He said the troops forced about 400 people from nearby homes into the Regional Intensive Care Hospital and were using them and roughly 100 patients and staff as human shields by not allowing them to leave.
Kyrylenko said shelling had already heavily damaged the hospital’s main building, but medical staff have been treating patients in makeshift wards in the basement.
Read: Russia-Ukraine war: Key things to know about the conflict
Doctors from other Mariupol hospitals made a video to tell the world about the horrors they’ve been seeing. “We don’t want to be heroes and martyrs posthumously,” one woman said. She also said it’s insufficient to simply refer to people as the wounded: “it’s torn off arms and legs, gouged out eyes, bodies torn into fragments, insides falling out.”
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian army’s general staff said Tuesday evening that Russian troops had launched another assault on the strategically important city.
Fighting has intensified on Kyiv’s outskirts in recent days, and air raid sirens wailed inside the capital. The mayor imposed a curfew extending through Thursday morning.
Tuesday’s artillery strikes hit the Svyatoshynskyi district of western Kyiv, adjacent to the suburb of Irpin, which has seen some of the worst fighting of the war.
Flames shot out of a 15-story apartment building and smoke choked the air as firefighters climbed ladders to rescue people. The assault blackened several floors of the building, ripped a hole in the ground outside and blew out windows in neighboring apartment blocks. Rescue workers said at least one person was killed.
“Yesterday we extinguished one fire, today another. It is very difficult,” a firefighter who gave only his first name, Andriy, said outside the building, tears falling from his eyes. “People are dying, and the worst thing is that children are dying. They haven’t lived their lives and they have already seen this.”
City authorities also tweeted an image of the blown-out facade of a downtown subway station that had been used as a bomb shelter and said trains would no longer stop at the station.
A 10-story apartment building in the Podilsky district of Kyiv, north of the government quarter, was damaged. Russian forces also stepped up strikes overnight on Irpin and the northwest Kyiv suburbs of Hostomel and Bucha, said the head of the capital region, Oleksiy Kuleba.
“Many streets have been turned into a mush of steel and concrete. People have been hiding for weeks in basements, and are afraid to go out even for evacuations,” Kuleba said on Ukrainian television.
In the country’s east, Russian forces launched more than 60 strikes overnight Monday into Tuesday on Ukraine’s second-largest city, Kharkiv, according to regional administration chief, Oleh Sinehubov. The strikes hit the city’s historical center, including the main marketplace.
He said the bodies of dozens of civilians were pulled from destroyed apartment buildings.
On Tuesday evening, Ukrainian forces repelled Russian troops who tried to storm Ukraine’s second-largest city, Kharkiv, from their positions in Piatykhatky, a suburb 15 kilometers (9 miles) to the north, the regional administration chief, Oleh Sinehubov, said on Telegram. He said the Kharkiv’s defenders were able “to push the enemy back beyond its previous position,” in what he described as a “shameful defeat” for Russia.
Russia steps up bombardment of Kyiv, civilians flee Mariupol
Russia stepped up its bombardment of Kyiv on Tuesday, smashing apartments and a subway station, while civilians in 2,000 cars fled Mariupol along a humanitarian corridor in what was believed to be the biggest evacuation yet from the desperately besieged seaport.
On the diplomatic front, another round of talks began between Russia and Ukraine via video, and the leaders of three European Union countries — including Poland, a NATO member on Ukraine’s doorstep — planned a visit to the embattled capital in a bold show of support.
With the number of people driven from the country by the war eclipsing 3 million, l arge explosions thundered across Kyiv before dawn from what Ukrainian authorities said were artillery strikes, as Russia’s assault on the capital appeared to become more systematic and edged closer to the city center.
READ: Ukraine's capital barraged; 3 EU nation leaders to visit
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said barrages hit four multi-story buildings in the city and killed dozens of people. The shelling ignited a huge fire in a 15-story apartment building and spurred a frantic rescue effort.
The strikes, carried out of the 20th day of Russia’s invasion, targeted a western district of Kyiv, disrupting a relative calm that returned after an initial advance by Moscow’s forces was stopped in the early days of the war.
The U.N. said close to 700 civilians in Ukraine have been confirmed killed, with the true figure probably much higher.
Fox News video journalist Pierre Zakrzewski was killed when the vehicle he was traveling in was hit by fire Monday on the outskirts of Kyiv, the network said. He was the second journalist killed in Ukraine in two days.
The leaders of Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovenia set out for Kyiv by train despite the security risks, in a visit EU officials said was not sanctioned by other members of the 27-nation bloc.
“The aim of the visit is to express the European Union’s unequivocal support for Ukraine and its freedom and independence,” Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said in a tweet. He was joined by fellow Prime Ministers Janez Jansa of Slovenia and Mateusz Morawiecki of Poland, as well as Jaroslaw Kaczynski, Poland’s de facto leader.
New efforts to bring civilians to safety and deliver aid were underway around the country. The Red Cross said it was working to evacuate people from the northeastern town of Sumy near the Russian border in about 70 buses.
READ: UN says women pay highest price in conflict, now in Ukraine
One of the most desperate situations is in Mariupol, the southern city of 430,000 where officials say a weekslong siege has killed more than 2,300 people and left residents struggling for food, water, heat and medicine.
The Mariupol city council reported that 2,000 civilian cars had managed to leave along a humanitarian corridor that runs for more than 260 kilometers (160 miles) west to the city of Zaporizhzhia. Another 2,000 cars were waiting to leave along the route, the council said.
As for the latest round of talks, Ukrainian presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak said they were discussing a cease-fire and Russian troop withdrawal. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Moscow would press its demands that Ukraine drop its bid to join NATO, adopt a neutral status and “demilitarize.”
Zelenskyy told European leaders gathered in London that his country realizes it can’t join NATO.
“We have heard for many years about the open doors, but we also heard that we can’t enter those doors,” he said. “This is the truth, and we have simply to accept it as it is.”
When Russia launched the war three weeks ago, fear of an imminent invasion gripped the Ukrainian capital, and residents slept in subway stations or crammed onto trains to flee. But as the Russian offensive bogged down, Kyiv saw a relative lull. U.S. officials said Russian forces were about 15 kilometers (9 miles) from the center of the city as of Monday.
Fighting has intensified on Kyiv’s outskirts in recent days, and air raid sirens wailed inside the capital. Mayor Vitali Klitschko announced a 35-hour curfew extending through Thursday morning.
Tuesday’s artillery strikes hit the Svyatoshynskyi district of western Kyiv, adjacent to the suburb of Irpin, which has seen some of the worst fighting of the war.
Flames shot out of the 15-story apartment building and smoke choked the air as firefighters climbed ladders to rescue people. The assault blackened several floors of the building, ripped a hole in the ground outside and blew out windows in neighboring apartment blocks. Rescue workers said at least one person was killed.
“Yesterday we extinguished one fire, today another. It is very difficult,” a firefighter who gave only his first name, Andriy, said outside the building, tears falling from his eyes. “People are dying, and the worst thing is that children are dying. They haven’t lived their lives and they have already seen this.”
Resident Volodymr Trophimov said he watched as a building was hit. “And then there was a howl, and I watched out of the window, and it crashed into the building and all the windows were smashed,” he said.
Shockwaves from an explosion also damaged the entry to a downtown subway station that has been used as a bomb shelter. City authorities tweeted an image of the blown-out facade and said trains would no longer stop at the station.
A 10-story apartment building in the Podilsky district of Kyiv, north of the government quarter, was damaged. Russian forces also stepped up strikes overnight on Irpin and the northwest Kyiv suburbs of Hostomel and Bucha, said the head of the capital region, Oleksiy Kuleba.
“Many streets have been turned into a mush of steel and concrete. People have been hiding for weeks in basements, and are afraid to go out even for evacuations,” Kuleba said on Ukrainian television.
In the country’s east, Russian forces launched more than 60 strikes overnight on Ukraine’s second-largest city, Kharkiv, according to regional administration chief Oleh Sinehubov. The strikes hit the city’s historical center, including the main marketplace.
Sinehubov said fires were raging and rescuers pulled dozens of bodies of civilian from the ruins of destroyed apartment buildings.
Ukraine’s parliament voted to extend martial law for another month, until April 24. Under the measure, requested by Zelenskyy, men between 18 and 60 are barred from leaving the country so they can be called up to fight.
In Mykolaiv, a strategic southern city near the Black Sea where airstrikes killed nine people Sunday, residents braced for more attacks. Volunteers prepared food and sorted donated clothes at an abandoned naval yard that was turned into a support center for troops. Molotov cocktails were on hand to take on invaders.
“We are bombed during the day and during the night,” said Svetlana Gryshchenko, whose soldier son was killed in the fighting. “It’s a nightmare what Russia is doing on the territory of Ukraine.”
Slovaks charge 2 with spying for Russia's military service
Slovak authorities have broken a Russian spying network that was operating on Slovak territory, officials said on Tuesday.
Stefan Hamran, the country’s chief police officer said four Slovak nationals have been detained in the case with two of them facing spying and bribery charges.
Prosecutor Daniel Lipsic said the two face up to 13 years in prison if tried and convicted.
“We’re talking about serious cases,” Lipsic said. “It’s about a long term, paid cooperation with the Russian military intelligence service" (known as GRU).
The two are accused of seeking out and gathering highly sensitive, strategic and classified information about Slovakia, its armed forces and NATO and handed them over to undercover GRU officers who were based at the Russian Embassy in the Slovak capital, Bratislava, in exchange for money, Hamran said. He said such a case has not been known in Slovakia before.
Lipsic said the suspects received tens of thousands euros (dollars) from the Russian spies.
“The information the Russian intelligence service was looking for also involved Ukraine,” Lipsic said. He didn’t elaborate at a news conference in Bratislava.
Officers from Slovakia’s National Criminal Agency and the country’s Military Intelligence service joined forces to investigate the case.
Tuesday’s move came a day Slovakia’s Foreign Ministry announced it was expelling three Russian diplomats following its assessment of information from the country’s intelligence services on possible spying and bribery.
The ministry said the diplomats have 72 hours to leave the country. It said their activities violated the Vienna Convention on diplomatic relations.
The ministry said it has also strongly urged the Russian Embassy to make sure the activities of its diplomats were in line with the convention, which both countries are obliged to do.
One of the two charged men was pro-rector and the head of the Security and Defense Department at the Armed Forces Academy in the northern town of Liptovsky Mikulas. The officials identified him as Pavel B., and said he had secret contacts with four GRU officers dating to 2013.
The other one, identified as Bohus G., was working for a leading pro-Russian conspiracy website known as Hlavne spravy. He cooperated with the Russians at least from April 2021 and was using his contacts with a former assistant of a lawmaker in the Slovak Parliament and a former member of the Slovak spy service known as SIS, officials said.
The officials said the two confessed their guilt. The investigation is continuing.
Ukraine's capital barraged; 3 EU nation leaders to visit
Russia’s relentless bombardment of Ukraine edged closer to central Kyiv as a series of strikes hit a residential neighborhood Tuesday, while the leaders of three European Union countries planned a bold visit to Ukraine’s capital and the number of people the war has driven from the country passed 3 million.
Large explosions thundered across Kyiv before dawn from what Ukrainian authorities said were artillery strikes, as Russia’s assault on the city appeared to become more systematic. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said barrages hit four multi-story buildings in the city and caused dozens of deaths.
The strikes targeted a western district of Kyiv, disrupting a relative calm that returned after an initial advance by Russian forces was stopped in the early days of the war. Tuesday's shelling ignited a huge fire in a 15-story apartment building and spurred a frantic rescue effort.
As Russia stepped up its assault on Kyiv, the leaders of Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovenia set out for Ukraine’s embattled capital by train to show support for the country.
“The aim of the visit is to express the European Union’s unequivocal support for Ukraine and its freedom and independence,” Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said in a tweet. He was joined by Janez Jansa of Slovenia, Mateusz Morawiecki of Poland and Jaroslaw Kaczynski, Poland’s de-facto leader.
EU officials characterized the visit as one the central European leaders had undertaken independently despite security risks. The 27-nation bloc's other leaders were “informed” of the trip but did not sanction it, EU officials said.
The International Organization for Migration said the number of people who have fled Ukraine since Russia invaded on Feb. 24 passed 3 million on Tuesday. The U.N. has described the flood of people crossing into Poland and other neighboring countries as Europe’s biggest refugee crisis since World War II.
Russian and Ukrainian negotiators also planned to hold a second day of talks as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine reached its 20th day. The Red Cross and the United Nations refugee agency say millions of people face food and medicine shortages along with the immediate conflict threats of shelling and air attacks.
The Ukrainian government said new aid and evacuation efforts would take place Tuesday along nine corridors around the country, including the Kyiv region. But past attempts have repeatedly failed amid continued fighting.
The International Committee of the Red Cross said an evacuation involving 30 buses was planned from Sumy in northeast Ukraine. The organization said it still had not gotten aid to Mariupol, an encircled port city of 430,000 where local officials estimate a lethal siege has killed more than 2,300 people and left residents desperate for food, water, heat and medicine.
Russia’s invasion has shocked the world, upended Europe’s post-Cold War security order and driven millions from their homes. Russia’s military is bigger and better equipped than Ukraine’s, but its troops have faced stiffer-than-expected resistance, bolstered by arms supplied by the West.
When Russia launched the war three weeks ago, fear of an imminent invasion gripped the Ukrainian capital, and residents slept in subway stations or crammed onto trains to flee. But as the Russian offensive bogged down, Kyiv saw a relative lull. U.S. officials say Russian forces were about 15 kilometers (9 miles) from the center of the city as of Monday.
Fighting has intensified on Kyiv's outskirts in recent days, and sporadic air raid sirens ring out around the capital.
The early morning artillery strikes hit the Svyatoshynskyi district of western Kyiv, adjacent to the suburb of Irpin, which has seen some of the worst battles of the war.
Flames shot out of the 15-story apartment building and smoke choked the air as firefighters climbed ladders to rescue people. The assault blackened several floors of the building, ripped a hole in the ground outside and blew out windows in neighboring apartment blocks.
Rescue workers said one person died and several were rescued but others remained inside.
“Yesterday we extinguished one fire, today another, it is very difficult,” said one young firefighter as he took a brief break outside the building, tears falling from his eyes.
“People are dying, and the worst thing is that children are dying. They haven’t lived their lives and they have already seen this, this is the worst,” said the rescuer, who gave only his first name, Andriy.
Shockwaves from an explosion also damaged the entry to a downtown subway station that has been used as a bomb shelter. City authorities tweeted an image of the blown-out facade, saying trains would no longer stop at the station.
A 10-story apartment building in the Podilsky district of Kyiv, north of the government quarter, was damaged by unspecified ammunition. Russian forces also stepped up strikes overnight on Irpin and the northwest Kyiv suburbs of Hostomel and Bucha, said the head of the capital region, Oleksiy Kuleba.
“Many streets (in those areas) have been turned into a mush of steel and concrete. People have been hiding for weeks in basements, and are afraid to go out even for evacuations,” Kuleba said on Ukrainian television.
In the country's east, Russian forces launched more than 60 strikes overnight on Ukraine’s second-largest city, Kharkiv, according to regional administration chief Oleh Sinehubov. The strikes hit the city’s historical center, including the main marketplace.
Sinehubov said fires were raging and rescuers had pulled “dozens of bodies of civilian residents,” from the ruins of destroyed apartment buildings.
Zelenskyy is seeking to extend martial law until April 24 and to require men ages 18 to 60 to stay in the country to fight. Ukraine's parliament is expected to vote on the measure this week.
The Ukrainian leader appealed for more weapons to counter Russia’s military. He said Ukraine's forces are rapidly using up weapons and other hardware supplied by Western nations, and he asked northern European leaders to “help yourself by helping us.”
As Russia struggled to gain ground in Ukraine, U.S. administration officials alleged that Moscow had asked China for help, and Beijing had signaled that it would be willing to provide both military support and financial backing to help stave off effects of Western sanctions.
Russia and China denied military assistance had been asked for or granted.
Talks between Russian and Ukrainian negotiators were due to resume Tuesday, after failing to make a break through — or to break down — on Monday. The two sides had expressed some optimism about the negotiations, which Ukrainian presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak said would discuss “peace, ceasefire, immediate withdrawal of troops & security guarantees.”
With each day, the human cost of the grinding war continues to rise. The Ukrainian general prosecutor’s office released details of two deadly Russian attacks that took place Monday: an artillery strike that hit a university and open-air market in the northern city of Chernihiv, killing 10, and the shooting of a 65-year-old woman on a bus that was evacuating civilians from a Kyiv suburb.
The number of people killed in a Russian rocket attack on a TV tower in western Ukraine on Monday rose to 19, authorities in the Rivne region said Tuesday. A further nine people were injured in the strike on the TV tower in Antopol, a village about 160 kilometers (100 miles) from the border of NATO member Poland.
In Mykolaiv, a strategic southern city near the Black Sea where airstrikes killed nine people Sunday, residents braced for more attacks. Volunteers prepared food and sorted donated clothes at an abandoned naval yard that was turned into a support center for troops. Molotov cocktails were already on hand to take on invaders.
Svetlana Gryshchenko, whose soldier son was killed in the fighting, said it was “impossible to put into words” what was happening to the city.
“We are bombed during the day and during the night …. It’s a nightmare what Russia is doing on the territory of Ukraine,” she said.
Ukraine’s capital under fire; 3 EU nation leaders to visit
Russia’s relentless bombardment of Ukraine edged closer to central Kyiv on Tuesday, with a series of strikes hitting a residential neighborhood as the leaders of three European Union countries planned a bold visit to Ukraine’s embattled capital in a show of support.
Shortly before dawn, large explosions thundered across Kyiv from what Ukrainian authorities said was artillery strikes. The shelling ignited a huge fire and a frantic rescue effort in a 15-story apartment building. At least one person was killed and others remain trapped inside.
Shockwaves from an explosion also damaged the entry to a downtown subway station that has been used as a bomb shelter. City authorities tweeted an image of the blown-out facade, saying trains would no longer stop at the station.
As Russia stepped up its assault on Kyiv, the leaders of Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovenia announced they would travel to Ukraine’s capital Tuesday on a European Union mission to show support for the country
“The aim of the visit is to express the European Union’s unequivocal support for Ukraine and its freedom and independence,” Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said in a tweet.
He will be joined by Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Janša, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who is Poland’s deputy prime minister for security and the leader of the conservative ruling party.
Russian and Ukrainian negotiators also planned to hold a second day of talks as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine entered its 21st day.
Read: Russian strikes hit apartment building in Kyiv
When Russia launched the war nearly three weeks ago, fear of an imminent invasion gripped the Ukrainian capital, and residents slept in subway stations or crammed onto trains to flee. But as the Russian offensive bogged down, Kyiv saw a relative lull.
Fighting has intensified on the city’s outskirts in recent days, and sporadic air raid sirens ring out around the capital.
Tuesday’s early morning artillery strikes hit the Svyatoshynskyi district of western Kyiv, adjacent to the suburb of Irpin, which has seen some of the worst battles of the war.
Flames shot out of the 15-story apartment building as firefighters climbed ladders to rescue people. Smoke choked the air. A firefighter at the scene confirmed one person had died and that several had been rescued, but others remained inside as rescuers tried to reach them.
A 10-story apartment building in the Podilsky district of Kyiv, north of the government quarter, also was damaged by unspecified ammunition.
Russian forces also stepped up strikes overnight on Irpin and the northwest Kyiv suburbs of Hostomel and Bucha, said the head of the capital region, Oleksiy Kuleba.
“Many streets (in those areas) have been turned into a mush of steel and concrete. People have been hiding for weeks in basements, and are afraid to go out even for evacuations,” Kuleba said on Ukrainian television.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is seeking to extend martial law until April 24 and to require men ages 18 to 60 to stay in the country to fight. Zelenskyy submitted the extension in a bill to parliament, which is expected to vote on it this week.
Talks between Russian and Ukrainian negotiators were due to resume Tuesday, after failing to make a break through — or to break down — on Monday. The two sides had expressed some optimism about the negotiations, which Ukrainian presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak said would discuss “peace, ceasefire, immediate withdrawal of troops & security guarantees.”
Russia’s military is bigger and better equipped than Ukraine’s, but its troops have faced stiffer-than-expected resistance, bolstered by arms supplied by the West.
U.S. officials say Russian troops have made little progress on the ground in recent days and were still about 15 kilometers (9 miles) from the center of Kyiv as of Monday. The Pentagon said Russian forces have launched more than 900 missiles but have not taken control of the air above Ukraine.
U.S. administration officials say Russia has asked China for help, and Beijing had signaled to Moscow that it would be willing to provide both military support in Ukraine and financial backing to help stave off effects of Western sanctions.
U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan warned China against helping Russia during a meeting in Rome on Monday with a senior Chinese diplomat.
The Kremlin has denied asking China for military equipment to use in Ukraine.
Read: UN says women pay highest price in conflict, now in Ukraine
With each day the human cost of the grinding war continues to rise. The Ukrainian general prosecutor’s office on Tuesday released details of two deadly Russian attacks the day before. The office said an artillery strike had hit a university and open-air market in the northern city of Chernihiv, killing 10, and that a 65-year-old woman had been shot in a bus that was evacuating civilians from a Kyiv suburb.
A Russian airstrike near a Ukrainian checkpoint caused extensive damage to a downtown Kyiv neighborhood, killing one person, Ukraine’s emergency agency said.
Kateryna Lot said she was in her apartment as her child did homework when they heard a loud explosion and ran to take shelter.
“The child became hysterical. Our windows and the balcony were shattered. Part of the floor fell down,” she said. “It was very, very scary.”
In an area outside Kyiv, Fox News reporter Benjamin Hall was injured while reporting and was hospitalized, the network said.
In Russia, the live main evening news program on state television was briefly interrupted by a woman who walked into the studio holding a poster against the war. The OVD-Info website that monitors political arrests identified her as a Channel 1 employee and said she was taken into police custody.
There was a rare glimmer of hope in the encircled port city of Mariupol after a convoy of 160 civilian cars left along a designated humanitarian route, the city council reported Monday. Over the past 10 days or so, the lethal siege has pulverized homes and other buildings and left people desperate for food, water, heat and medicine.
Previous attempts to evacuate civilians and deliver humanitarian aid to the southern city of 430,000 were thwarted by fighting.
Ukraine’s military said it repelled an attempt Monday to take control of Mariupol by Russian forces, who were forced to retreat. Satellite images from Maxar Technologies showed fires burning across the city, with many high-rise apartment buildings heavily damaged or destroyed.
Ukraine claims its forces have killed 150 Russian troops and destroyed two Russian tanks in the battle for Mariupol.
The Kremlin-backed leader of the Russian region of Chechnya said on a messaging app that Chechen fighters were spearheading the offensive on Mariupol.
Elsewhere, the Russian military said 20 civilians in the separatist-controlled city of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine were killed by a ballistic missile launched by Ukrainian forces. The claim could not be independently verified.
The U.N. has recorded at least 596 civilian deaths since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, though it believes the true toll is much higher. Millions more have fled their homes, with more than 2.8 million crossing into Poland and other neighboring countries in what the U.N. has called Europe’s biggest refugee crisis since World War II.
Russian strikes hit apartment building in Kyiv
A series of Russian strikes hit a residential neighborhood of Ukraine’s capital on Tuesday, igniting a huge fire and frantic rescue effort in a 15-story Kyiv apartment building. At least one person was killed and others remain trapped inside.
The Ukrainian military said in a statement that the strikes were artillery strikes. They hit the Svyatoshynskyi district of western Kyiv, adjacent to the suburb of Irpin that has seen some of the worst battles of the war.
Flames shot out of the apartment building as firefighters rescued people from ladders. Smoke choked the air.
Also read: UN says women pay highest price in conflict, now in Ukraine
A firefighter at the scene confirmed one person died and that several have been rescued alive but others are still inside as rescuers try to reach them.
Russian forces also stepped up strikes overnight on the northwest suburbs of Irpin, Hostomel and Bucha, the head of the Kyiv region Oleksiy Kuleba said on Ukrainian television.
Russian forces also renewed efforts Tuesday to capture the important port city of Mariupol in the south, and unleashed new artillery strikes on downtown Kharkiv in the east, the general staff of Ukraine’s armed forces said on Facebook.
Also read: Ukraine war may lead to rethinking of US defense of Europe
UN chief warns war is hurting poor countries
The United Nations chief warned Monday that Russia’s war on Ukraine is holding “a sword of Damocles” over the global economy, especially poor developing countries that face skyrocketing food, fuel and fertilizer prices and are now seeing their breadbasket “being bombed.”
Also read: Russia keeps up attacks in Ukraine as two sides hold talks
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told reporters that “Russia and Ukraine represent more than half of the world’s supply of sunflower oil and about 30 percent of the world’s wheat” and that “grain prices have already exceeded those at the start of the Arab Spring and the food riots of 2007-2008.”
He told reporters that 45 African and least developed countries import at least one-third of their wheat from Ukraine and Russia, and 18 of them import at least 50%. These countries include Egypt, Congo, Burkina Faso, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen, he said.
Also read: Asian stocks mixed, oil falls as Russian attacks intensify
“All of this is hitting the poorest the hardest and planting the seeds for political instability and unrest around the globe,” Guterres warned.
Watchdog: European arms imports rise despite global fall
European countries bought 19% more major arms in the five years to 2021 than they did in the five years before that, even though the global figure was down 4.6%, reflecting the building tensions with Russia, a Swedish watchdog said in a report released Monday.
The largest European arms importers were Britain, Norway and the Netherlands, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, or SIPRI, said. Other nations in Europe are also expected to increase their arms imports significantly over the coming decade, having recently placed large orders for major arms, in particular combat aircraft from the United States.
“The severe deterioration in relations between most European states and Russia was an important driver of growth in European arms imports, especially for states that cannot meet all their requirements through their national arms industries,” said Pieter D. Wezeman, a senior researcher with SIPRI's arms transfer program.
Arms exports from the largest seller, the United States, grew by 14%, increasing its global share from 32% to 39%. That included a 106% rise in deliveries of major arms to Saudi Arabia.
Russian exports shrank by 26% to give it a 19% share of the global market. SIPRI said the fall was almost entirely due to a fall in arms deliveries to India and Vietnam, noting that several large arms deliveries from Russia to India are expected in the coming years.
France, the world's third-largest arms exporter, increased sales by almost 60% in the five years to 2021, SIPRI said.
Fourth-placed China saw international sales decline by 31%, and fifth-placed Germany's exports were down by 19%.
Globally, “whereas there were some positive developments, including South American arms imports reaching their lowest level in 50 years, increasing or continuing high rates of weapons imports to places like Europe, East Asia, Oceania and the Middle East contributed to worrying arms build-ups,” Wezeman said.