Russia warns residents to flee homes as tactics shift to bombarding cities

Agencies | Kyiv

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Russia warned Kyiv residents to flee their homes yesterday and rained rockets down on Kharkiv, as Russian commanders who have failed to achieve a quick victory shifted their tactics to intensify the bombardment of Ukrainian cities.

With armoured column miles long bearing down on the capital, Russia’s defence ministry said it was planning to strike targets in Kyiv used by Ukraine’s security service. Residents near such sites should evacuate their homes, it warned, while giving no information about where in the city of 3 million people those targets were located. Rocket strikes on Kharkiv killed at least 10 people and wounded 35, Ukrainian Interior Ministry adviser Anton Herashchenko said. Similar strikes had killed and wounded dozens in the city the previous day.

“The rubble is being cleared and there will be even more victims and wounded,” he said. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said the artillery barrages on Kharkiv amounted to state terrorism.

Nearly a week since Russian troops poured over the border, they have failed to capture a single major Ukrainian city after running into far fiercer resistance than they expected.

“The Russian army is an artillery army primarily, and it looks like they are shifting into the war-fighting mode,” said Nick Reynolds, a land warfare analyst at RUSI in London. “The failure of the Russians to achieve their goals quickly has galvanised Ukraine's resistance to them.

Really what we are seeing now is the Russian military shifting gears.” Russia still has more forces to throw into the fight even though President Vladimir Putin faces worldwide condemnation and international sanctions. Oil company Shell became the latest big Western firm to announce it was pulling out of Russia.

The sanctions and global financial isolation have already had a devastating impact on Russia’s economy, with the rouble in freefall and queues outside banks as Russians rush to salvage their savings.

New peace talks would be held today, Russia’s TASS news agency reported yesterday. Talks between Russian and Ukrainian officials held on Monday at the Belarus border failed to reach a breakthrough.

Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba said Kyiv was ready to talk but would not just follow Russian ultimatums. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s government remained in control of Kyiv with soldiers and civilians ready to fight invaders street by street.

Pictures released by US satellite company Maxar showed Russian tanks, artillery and fuel trucks stretching for 40 miles (60 km) along a highway to the north. “For the enemy, Kyiv is the key target,” Zelenskiy, who has remained in the capital rallying Ukrainians, said in a message overnight.

“We will neutralise them all.” Some Kyiv residents have been sheltering in underground metro stations at night. There are long lines for fuel and some products are running out in shops, but by day the city is still holding out, with a semblance of ordinary life on the streets. In the south of the country, Russia claimed to have completely encircled Ukraine’s Azov Sea coast.

If confirmed, that would mean Russian forces invading from Crimea had joined up with separatists in the east and had cut off Ukraine’s main eastern port, Mariupol.

Casualties

Ukrainian authorities also reported 70 soldiers killed in a rocket attack in a town between Kyiv and Kharkiv. Zelenskiy, addressing the European Parliament by video link a day after he signed an official request to join the European Union, urged the bloc to prove that it sided with Ukraine. “Do prove that you will not let us go. Do prove that you are indeed Europeans and then life will win over death and light will win over darkness. Glory be to Ukraine,” he said in an emotional speech.