Ukraine, Russia Diplomats To Meet On Belarus Border

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Z♔elenskyy office said on th🥀e Telegram messaging app that the two sides would meet at an unspecified location on the Belarusian border and did not give a precise time for the meeting. 

The announcement on Sunday came hours after Russia announc🍷ed that its delegation had 𓄧flown to Belarus to await talks. 

Ukrainian officials initially rejected the ൩move, saying any talks should take place elsewhere than Belarus, where Russia placed a large contingent of troops before it invaded Ukraine starting Thursday.

The meeting news came shortly after President Vladim🍃ir Putin ordered Russian nuclear forces put on high🌌 alert in response to what he called “aggressive statements” by leading NATO powers.

Zelenskyy's office said Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, a Putin ally, “has taken responsibility for ensuring that all planes, helicopters and missiles stationed on Belarusian territory remain on the ground during the Ukrainian delegation's t𝓰ravel, talks and return.“ 

In a dramatic escalation of East-West tensions over Russia's🌞 invasion of Ukraine, President Putin ordered Russian nuclear forces put on high alert on Sunday in response to what he called “aggressive statements” b🌠y leading NATO powers.

The order means Putin has ordered Russia's nuclear weapons prepared for increased readiness 🌸to launch, raising the threat that 🐈the tensions could boil over into nuclear warfare. 

Inꦗ giving it, the Russian leader also cited hard-hitting financial sanctions imposed by the West against Russia, including Putin himself.

Spea💙king at a meeting with his top officials, Putin directed the R🐭ussian defense minister and the chief of the military's General Staff to put the nuclear deterrent forces in a “special regime of combat duty.” 

“Western countries aren't only taking unfriendly actions against our country in the economic sphere, but top officials from leading NATO members made aggressive statements regar🌞ding our country,” Putin said in televised comments.

The Russian leader this week threatened to retaliate harshly against any nations that intervened directly in the conflict in Ukraine, and he specifically raised the specter of his country's status ไas a nuclear power.

The US ambassador to the United 🔥Nations responded to the ne🃏ws from Moscow while appearing on a Sunday news program. 

“President Putin is continuing to escalate this war in a manner that is totally🐎 unacceptable,” Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said. 

“And we have to continue to condemn his actions in the most str🐼ong, strongest pos꧟sible way.” 

The alarming step came as street fighting broke out in Ukraine's second-largest city and Russian troops squeezed 𝓡strategic ports in the country's south, advances that appeared to mark a new phase of Russia's invasion following a wave of attacks on airfields and fuel facilities elsewhere in the 🤪country.

The capital, Kyiv, was eerily quiet afteꦛr huge explosions lit up the morning sky and authorities reported blasts at one of the airports. 

Only an occasional car appeared on a desert▨ed main boulevard as a strict 39-hour curfew kept people off the streets. 

Terrified residents inst🔯ead hunkered down in homes, underground garages and subway stations in anticipation of a full-scale Russian assault.

“The past night was tough – more shelling, more bombing of residential areas and civཧilian infrastructure," Ukrainian Pꦬresident Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. 

"There is not a single facility🔴 in the cou𒁃ntry that the occupiers wouldn't consider as admissible targets.” 

Following its gai🅘ns to the east in the city of Kharkiv and multiple ports, R🐻ussia sent a delegation to Belarus for peace talks with Ukraine, according to the Kremlin. 

Zelenskyy suggested other locations, saying his country was unwilling to meet in Belarus b🌜ecause it served as a staging ground for the in🧸vasion. 

Until Sunday, Russia's troops had remained on the outskirts🅰 of Kharkiv, a city of 1.4 million about 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) south of the border with Russia, while other forces rolled past to press the offensive deeper into 🌌Ukraine. 

Videos posted on Ukrainian media and social networks showed Russian vehicles moving across Kharkiv and Russian troops roaming the city in smܫall groups. One showed Ukrainian troops firing at the Russians and damaged Russian light utility vehicles abandone꧂d nearby.

The images underscored the determined resistance Russian troops face w൩hile attempting to enter Ukraine's bigger cities. Ukrainians have volunteered en masse to help defend the capital, Kyiv, and other cities, taking guns distributed by authꦏorities and preparing firebombs to fight Russian forces.

Ukraine's government also is releasing prisoners with military experience who want to fight for the country, a prosecutor's office officia💖l, Andriy Sinyuk, told the Hromadske TV channel Sunday. He did not specify whether the move applied to prisoners convicted of all levels of crimes.

Russian President Vladimir Putin hasn't disclosed his ultimate plans, but Western officials believe he is determined to overtᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚhrow Ukraine's government and replace it with a regime of his own, redrawing the map of Europe and r🀅eviving Moscow's Cold War-era influence.

The pressure on strategic ports in the south of Ukraine appeared aimed at seizing control of the country's coastline stretching from the border with Romania in the west to🐻 the borde🐈r with Russia in the east. 

A Russian Defense Ministry spokesman, Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, said Russian 🅠forces had blocked the cities of Kherson on the Black Sea and the port of Berdyansk on the Azov Sea. 

He said the Russian forces also took con🍸trol of an airbase near Kherson and the Azov Sea city of Henichesk. Ukrainian authorities also have reported fighting near Odesa, Mykolaiv and other areas.

Cutting Ukraine's access to its 🌱sea ports would deal a m🔜ajor blow to the country's economy. 

It also could allow Moscow to build a land corridor to Crimea, which Moscow annexed in 2014 and until now was connected to Russ🥀ia by a 19-kilometer (12-mi🌟le) bridge, the longest bridge in Europe which opened in 2018.

Flames billowed from an oil depot near an airbase in Vasylkiv, a city 37 kilometers (23 miles) south of🤪 Kyiv where there has been intense fighting, according to the mayor. Russian forces blew up a ga💦s pipeline in Kharkiv, prompting the government to warn people to cover their windows with damp cloth or gauze as protection from smoke, the president's office said. 

Ukrainian mi🌞litary deputy commander Lt.-Gen. Yevhen Moisiuk sounded a defiant note in a message aimed at Russian troo൲ps. 

“Unload your weapons, raise your hands so that our servicemen and civilians can understand that you have hea🗹rd us. This is your ticket home,” Moisiuk said in a Facebook video. 

The number of casua♑lties so far from Europe's largest land conflict since World War II remains unclear amid the fog of combat. 

Ukraine's health minister reported Saturday that 198 people, including 𝕴three children, had been killed and more than 1,000 others wounded🍨. 

It was unclear whether those figures included both military and civilian casualties. Russiaꦕ has not released any casualty i🌠nformation. 

Ukraine's UN ambassador, Sergiy Kyslytsya, tweeted Saturda🐻y that Ukraine appealed to the International Committee of the Red Cross “to facilitate repatriation of thousands of bodiꦰes of Russian soldiers.” 

An accompan💮yinܫg chart claimed 3,500 Russian troops have been killed.

Laetitia Courtois, ICRC's permanent observer to the UN, told The Associated Press thatꦇ the situation in Ukraine was “a limitation for our t🔴eams on the ground” and “we therefore cannot confirm numbers or other details.” 

The United Nations' refugee agency said Sunday that about 368,000 Ukrainians have arrive🌠d in neighbouring countries since the invasion started Thursday. 

The UN has estimated theꦺ conflict could produce as many as 4 mil♎lion refugees, depending how long it continues.

Zelenskyy den🥀ounced Russia's offensive as “state terrorism.” 

He said the attacks on Ukrainian cities should be investigated by an international war crimes tri🐠bunal and cost Russia its place as one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Securityᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚ Council.

“Russia has taken the path of evil, an🌊d the world sho𝔍uld come to depriving it of its UN Security Council seat,” he said.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said a Russian delegat🥀ion of military officials and diplomats had arrived Sunday in the Belarusian city of Gomel for talks with Ukraine. Zelenskyy on Friday offered to negotiate a key Russian demand: abandoning ambitions of joining NATO.

Ukraine's president sa🃏id his co✤untry was ready for peace talks but not in Belarus. 

“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. 

"Only the🐼n the talks could be honest and put an end to the war.” 

Peskov ༺claimed Ukraine had proposed holding talks in Gomel. He added that the Russian military action was﷽ going forward pending the talks start.

Zelenskyy adviser M🍎ykhailo Podolyak dismissed Moscow's offer as “manipulation,” adding that Ukraine hadn't agreed to talks in the Belarusian city.

As Russia pushes ahead with its offensive, the West is working to equip the outnumbered Ukrainian forces with weapons and ammunition while punishing Russia with far-reachingꦬ sanc𓆏tions intended to further isolate Moscow. 

The US pledged an additional USD 350 million in military assistance to Ukraine, including anti-tank weapons, body armour and small arms. Germany said it would send missiles and anti-tank weapons to the besieged country and that it would close its🌜 airspace to Russian planes. 

The US, European Union and United Kingdom agre꧒ed to block “selected” Russian banks from the SWIFT global financial messaging system, which moves money around more than 11,000 banks and other financial institutiꦉons worldwide, part of a new round of sanctions aiming to impose a severe cost on Moscow for the invasion. 

They also agreed to impose ”restrictive measures” on Russia's central ba✅nk.

Responding to a request from Ukraine's minister of digital transformation, tech billionaire Elon Musk said😼 on Twitter that hi💛s satellite-based internet system Starlink was now active in Ukraine and that there were “more terminals en route.” 

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, meanwhile, said Sunday that his country is committing 100 billion euros (USD 112.7 billion) to a special fund for its armed force♊s, raising its defense spending above 2 per cent of gross domestic product. 

Scholz told a special session of the Bundestag the investment was needed𝄹 "to protect our freed𓆉om and our democracy.” 

Put𒆙in sent troops into Ukraine after denying for weeks that he intended to do so, all the while building up a force of almost 200,000 troops along the countries' borders. 

He claims the 🌳West has failed to take seriously Russia's security concerns about NATO🌊, the Western military alliance that Ukraine aspires to join. 

But he has also expressed꧑ scorn about Ukraine's right to exist as an inde💛pendent state.

Russia claims its assault on Ukraine is aimed only at military targets, but bridges, schools an🎉d residential neighbourhoods have been hit.

Ukraine's ambassador to the US, Oksana Markarova, said Ukraine was gathering evidenc🌺e of shelling of residential areas, kindergartens and hospitals to submit to an international👍 war crimes court in The Hague as possible crimes against humanity. 

The International Criminal Court's prosecutor has said𓆏 he is  monitoring the conflict closely.

British Foreign S💝ecretary Liz Truss warned Sunday that Putin could use “the most unsavory means,” including banned chemical or biological weapons, to defeat Ukraine.

“I urge the Russians not to escalate this conflict, butꦏ we do need to be prepared for Russia to seek to use even worse weapons,” Truss told Sky News.