Russian Forces Target Ukrainian Civilian Areas as Missile Hits Central Kharkiv
KYIV, Ukraine—Russian forces struck the central square of the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv early Tuesday, as Moscow, frustrated in its plans for a quick victory, switched to a new strategy of pummeling civilian areas in an attempt to demoralize Ukrainian resistance.
Live-cam footage from Kharkiv’s central Freedom Square showed a missile landing just outside the local government’s headquarters, with a fireball charring nearby buildings and cars. Local officials said there were fatalities.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, launched last week by President
with the aim of overthrowing the country’s elected government and ending its alignment with the West, has made slower progress than most military analysts had expected, as Russian forces struggle with fierce Ukrainian resistance and logistical problems.
Mr. Putin, who claims that Russians and Ukrainians are the same people, initially abstained from the kind of indiscriminate shelling of civilian areas that Russia used to subjugate its rebellious province of Chechnya in 1999-2000. The new barrages indicate that this relative restraint is falling away as Moscow seeks to crush Ukrainian resistance.
Heavy fighting continued throughout Ukraine on Tuesday, with Russian forces making advances in the south of the country and trying to push into the capital, Kyiv. A large column of Russian forces was heading toward Kyiv from the northwest, U.S. officials said. Satellite imagery from
also showed the miles-long convoy.
A Ukrainian armored personnel carrier stood destroyed on Monday after fighting not far from the center of Kharkiv.
Photo:
sergey bobok/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
A school was left in ruins near the center of Kharkiv on Monday.
Photo:
sergey bobok/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
A first round of cease-fire talks between Russian and Ukrainian delegations meeting in Belarus on Monday produced no immediate results, and the two sides agreed to meet again in coming days on the Ukrainian-Polish border.
Russia is facing growing international isolation and its financial system is reeling under the impact of Western sanctions imposed over the weekend. The ruble nosedived and Russia’s central bank raised its key interest rate to 20% on Monday in an attempt to prevent a run on Russian…
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