Kyiv, Ukraine (AP) – Russian forces escalated attacks on crowded urban areas on Tuesday, bombing the central square of Ukraine’s second largest city and Kiev’s main TV tower in what the country’s president called a screaming campaign of terror.
“No one will forgive. No one will forget, “President Vladimir Zelensky promised after the bloodshed in Kharkiv’s square.
In the United States, President Joe Biden plans to use his first address to the state of the Union on Tuesday night to promise to make Russian President Vladimir Putin “pay the price” for the invasion. Biden was to underscore the determination of the renewed Western Alliance, which is working to rearm the Ukrainian military and adopt tough sanctions.
“Throughout our history, we have learned this lesson – when dictators do not pay the price for their aggression, they cause more chaos,” Biden said, according to preliminary excerpts published by the White House. “They are still moving. And the costs and threats to America and the world continue to rise. “
Biden also had to announce that the United States was closing its airspace to Russian planes in retaliation for the invasion, according to two people familiar with the decision. They spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the speech in advance.
Meanwhile, a 40-mile (64-kilometer) convoy of hundreds of Russian tanks and other vehicles is advancing slowly toward Kyiv, the capital of nearly 3 million people, which the West fears is Putin’s proposal. to overthrow the government and install a Kremlin-friendly regime.
The invading forces are also pushing to attack other cities, including the strategic ports of Odessa and Mariupol to the south.
Day 6 of Europe’s biggest land war since World War II has found Russia increasingly isolatedobsessed with sanctions that have shaken its economy and left the country virtually without friends, with the exception of several nations such as China, Belarus and North Korea.
As fighting raged in Ukraine, the death toll remained unclear. A senior Western intelligence official estimates that more than 5,000 Russian soldiers have been captured or killed. Ukraine did not give an overall assessment of the losses of troops.
The UN Office of Human Rights said it had registered 136 civilian deaths. It is believed that the real fee is much higher.
The British Ministry of Defense said it had seen an increase in Russian air and artillery strikes on urban areas over the past two days. It also says that three cities – Kharkov, Kherson and Mariupol – are surrounded by Russian forces.
Many military experts are worried that Russia may change its tactics. Moscow’s strategy in Chechnya and Syria was to use artillery and aerial bombardment to smash cities and crush the fighters’ resolve.
Ukrainian authorities say five people were killed in the attack on the TV tower, a few kilometers from the center of Kyiv and a short walk from many apartment buildings. A TV control room and an electrical substation were hit, and at least some Ukrainian channels stopped broadcasting briefly, officials said.
The bombing came after Russia announced it would target transmission facilities used by Ukraine’s intelligence agency. He urged people living near such places to leave their homes.
Zelenski’s office also announced a powerful rocket attack on the site of the Babi Yar Holocaust Memorial near the tower. A spokesman for the memorial said the Jewish cemetery at the site where the Nazi occupiers killed more than 33,000 Jews in two days in 1941 had been damaged, but the extent would not be clear until daylight.
In Kharkov, with a population of about 1.5 million, at least six people were killed when the Soviet-era administration building in Freedom Square was hit by what was thought to be a rocket.
The Slovenian Foreign Ministry said its consulate in Kharkov, located in another large building on the square, was destroyed in the attack. The entrance to the consulate was between a jewelry store and a bank.
The attack on Svoboda Square – the largest square in Ukraine and the center of public life in the city – was seen by many Ukrainians as blatant evidence that the Russian invasion was not only to strike at military targets, but also to break their spirits. .
The bombing blew up windows and walls of buildings that surrounded the massive square, which was littered with debris and dust. Pieces of plaster were scattered inside a building, and the hinged doors lay through the corridors.
“People are under the rubble. We took out bodies, “said Evhen Vasilenko, an ambulance officer.
Zelenski called the attack on the square “outright, undisguised terror” and a war crime. “This is state terrorism of the Russian Federation,” he said.
In an emotional appeal to the European Parliament, Zelenski later said: “We are also fighting to be equal members of Europe. I believe that today we show everyone what we are. “
Another Russian air strike hit a residential area near a hospital in the city of Zhytomyr, Mayor Serih Sukhomlin said in a Facebook video. Ukraine’s emergency services say at least two people were killed in a strike Tuesday, setting fire to three homes and breaking hospital windows. About 85 miles (140 kilometers) west of Kyiv, Zhytomyr is home to the elite 95th Air Assault Brigade, which may have been the intended target.
Zelensky said 16 children had been killed around Ukraine on Monday and scoffed at Russia’s claim that it was only for military purposes.
“Where are the children? What military factories do they work in? What tanks do they go to?” Said Zelensky.
Human Rights Watch says it has documented a cluster bomb attack in front of a hospital in eastern Ukraine in recent days. Locals also reported using such weapons in Kharkov and the village of Kiyanka, but the Kremlin has denied using cluster bombs.
Cluster bombs shoot smaller “bombs” over a large area, many of which fail to explode long after they have been released. If their use in Ukraine is confirmed, it would represent a new level of brutality in the war and could lead to further isolation of Russia.
The first talks between Russia and Ukraine since the invasion took place on Monday, but ended only with a re-talks agreement. On Tuesday, however, Zelensky said Russia must first stop the bombing.
“As for the dialogue, I think so, but first stop bombing people and start negotiating after that,” he told CNN.
Moscow has made new threats of escalation, days after raising the specter of nuclear war. A senior Kremlin official has warned that the West’s “economic war” against Russia could become “real.”
In Russia, a leading Kremlin-critical radio station was taken off the air after authorities threatened to shut it down to cover the invasion. Among other things, the Kremlin does not allow hostilities to be called “invasion” or “war.”
Nearly 660,000 people have fled Ukraineand countless others have taken refuge underground. The bombings have left hundreds of thousands of families without drinking water, said UN humanitarian aid coordinator Martin Griffiths.
“It’s a nightmare and it overwhelms you inside. This cannot be explained in words, “said Kharkov resident Ekaterina Babenko, taking shelter in a basement with neighbors for the fifth day in a row. “We have young children, elderly people and to be honest it’s very scary.”
A Ukrainian military official said Belarusian troops joined the war on Tuesday in the northern Chernihiv region, without giving details. But just before that, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said his country had no plans to join the battle.
As for the Russian advance on the capital, the front end of the convoy was 17 miles (25 kilometers) from the city center, according to satellite images from Maxar Technologies.
A senior U.S. defense official said Russia’s military progress – including through the massive convoy – has slowed, plagued by logistical and supply problems. Some Russian military convoys have run out of gas and food, the official said, and morale has suffered as a result.
In general, the Russian military was stopped by fierce resistance on the ground and a surprising inability to completely dominate Ukraine’s airspace.
The huge convoy of vehicles crammed together on narrow roads appears to be a “big fat target” for Ukrainian forces, a senior Western intelligence official said on condition of anonymity.
“But it also shows you that the Russians are quite comfortable being outdoors in these concentrations because they think they will not be subjected to an air strike or a missile or rocket attack,” the official said.
The Ukrainians used what they had to try to stop Russia’s offensive. On the highway between Odessa and Nikolaev in southern Ukraine, residents piled up tractor tires filled with sand and covered with sandbags to block convoys.
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Isachenkov and Litvinova announced from Moscow. Mstislav Chernov in Mariupol, Ukraine; Sergei Grits in Odessa, Ukraine; Robert Burns, Zeke Miller and Eric Tucker in Washington; Francesca Ebel, Josef Federman and Andrew Drake in Kyiv; Lorne Cook in Brussels; and other PA journalists from around the world contributed to this report.
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Follow the PA’s coverage of the crisis in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine