Latest breaking news Russian forces try to crush Ukraine defences amid diplomacy
Latest breaking news Russia's military forces blasted Ukraine's capital region and other major cities on Wednesday as they tried to crush a Ukrainian defence that has frustrated their progress nearly three weeks after invading.
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| Former Ukrainian tennis player Sergiy Stakhovsky patrols at Independence Square inKyiv, Tuesday. Stakhovsky bSwitzerland's R Federer at Wimbledon in 2013. |
With Russia's ground advance on Kyiv stalled despite the sustained bombardment, a glimmer of optimism emerged that talks between the two sides could make progress, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said negotiations would continue and Russia's demands for ending the war were becoming "more realistic."
Russia rained shells on areas around Kyiv and within the city, where a 12story apartment building erupted in flames after being hit by shrapnel.
Zelenskyy said Russian forces had been unable to. move deeper into Ukrainian territory but had continued their heavy shelling of cities. British and US intelligence assessments supported the Ukrainian leader's view of the fighting
"Efforts are still needed, patience is needed," he said in his nightly video address to the nation. "Any war ends with an agreement." A senior US defence official, speaking on the condition
of anonymity to discuss the Pentagon's assessment, said the Russians were using long-range fire to hit civilian targets inside Kyiv with increasing frequency
using secret 'decoy latest breaking news LONDON: Russia is using secret decoy dart' missiles to strike Ukrainian targets, the US intelligence has claimed, Daily Mail reported. Mobile rocket launchers in Russia and Belarus are believed to be shooting Moscow's Iskander-M missiles while deploying decoy systems to fool Ukrainian air defence. These dart-shaped armaments, originally thought to be clúster bombs, have been seen on social media from almost the beginning of Russia's invasion, the report said. The darts protect the Iskander rockets from air defence missiles by using heat-seeking and radar technology to fool defence systems, a US intelligence officer claims according to the New Y
but that their ground forces were making little to no progress around the country. The official said Russian troops were still about 15 km from the centre of the capital.
Developments on the diplomatic front and on the ground occurred as the number of people fleeing Ukraine amid Europe's heaviest fighting since World War II passed 3 mil
Lion. The artillery shrapnel that hit the 12-story apartment building in central Kyiv on Wednesday obliterated the top floor and ignited a fire that sent plumes of smoke over the area, according to a statement and images released by the Kyiv emergencies agency.
The neighbouring building was also damaged. The agency reported two victims, without saying if they were injured or killed.
Russian forces have intensified fighting in the Kyiv suburbs, notably around the town of Bucha in the northwest and the highway leading west toward Zhytomyr, regional leader Oleksiy Kuleba said.
Twelve townsaround Kyiv were reported to be without water and six with out heat. Across the capital region, "kindergartens, museums, churches, resi. dential blocks and engineering infrastructure are suffering from the endless firing," Kuleba said.
He said Russian troops were trying to cut off transport links to the capital and destroy logistic capabilities while planning a wide-ranging attack to seize the capital. Russian forces succeeded in occupying the city of Ivankiv, 80 kilometers (50 miles) north of Kyiv, and control the surrounding region on the border with Belarus, Kuleba said. Read news on latest breaking news. Newsflixall.com
