Ukrainian and Russian forces were fighting pitched street battles in Kharkiv, Ukraine‘s second-largest city, on Sunday as President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on volunteers from around the world to travel to his country and help repel Putin’s army.
While fighting was intensifying as it entered its fourth day, Kyiv residents awoke to find that the capital was still in Ukrainian hands.
“Anyone who wants to join the defense of Ukraine, Europe and the world can come and fight side by side with the Ukrainians,” Zelenskyy’s office said in a statement. “There is no greater contribution which you can make for the sake of peace.”
His foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, echoed the call, inviting foreigners to contact Ukraine’s foreign diplomatic missions in their respective countries.
According to regional officials, Russian vehicles broke into Kharkiv, a city of 1.4 million people some 12 miles to the south of the border with Russia.
Overnight, Russian forces blew up a gas pipeline in the city, officials said. Officials tried to reassure residents that it was not a nuclear strike after the explosion sent a huge fireball into the sky.
“It is quite dangerous on the streets of the city now,” Chief of Police Volodymyr Tymoshko said as he pleaded with residents not to go outside. “Due to the small groups of the enemy who broke into the city, fighting continues.”
Speaking in a video message posted on his Instagram account Sunday, Zelenskyy called the night “brutal” around the country. Russian forces were targeting residential buildings, kindergartens and even ambulances, he said.
Russia has denied it has been targeting civilians.
Kyiv will remain under strict curfew until 8 a.m. local time on Monday, complicating the task of assessing the intensity of the fighting, as residents were told to avoid venturing out onto the streets and seek shelter.
Authorities reported clashes with Russian “sabotage groups” overnight.
Russian munitions struck a radioactive waste site, but the extent of the damage wasn’t known because of ongoing shelling and missile fire, the State Inspectorate for Nuclear Regulation of Ukraine said in a statement.
“The situation in Kyiv is calm, the capital is completely controlled by the Ukrainian army and defense,” Mykola Povoroznyk, Kyiv’s deputy leader said on Telegram. “Let’s hold on!”
Russian forces on Sunday blocked the southern Ukrainian cities of Kherson, a port and gateway into the Black Sea, and the port of Berdyansk on the Sea of Azov, Russian state-run Interfax news agency quoted Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov as saying.
The pressure on strategic cities in the south of Ukraine, including ports, appeared aimed at seizing control of Ukraine’s coastline.
While the fighting continued to intensify, a Russian delegation that included military officials and diplomats arrived in Belarus for what they said was negotiations with Ukraine.
Zelenskyy responded by saying that while his country was ready for peace talks, these couldn’t happen in Belarus given the Russian ally’s role in the invasion.
“Warsaw, Bratislava, Budapest, Istanbul, Baku we offered all of them to the Russian side and we will accept any other city in a country that hasn’t been used for launching missiles,” Zelenskyy said speaking in Russian, addressing Belarusian people directly. “Only then the talks can be honest and really put an end to the war.”
But while the Russian offensive appeared to have been stymied by stiffer-than-expected resistance from highly motivated Ukrainian armed forces, thousands of Ukrainians have fled to the country’s Western borders to escape the fighting.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said Sunday the number of Ukrainian refugees fleeing the country has reached 368,000 and continues to rise.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian government human rights ombudsman Lyudmyla Denysova said Sunday that more than 210 Ukrainian civilians have been killed and more than 1,100 wounded. Moscow has not released casualty numbers for Russian forces.
