On Friday, Russian forces approached Kyiv, where officials said the Ukrainian capital was turning into a “fortress”, while military reports differed about the extent of… Russian forces advance from Kyiv. According to US reports, the Russian forces are now 15-40 km away from Kyiv, after they made “progress” on the ground during the past 24 hours.
And the Ukrainian Emergency Management announced that air strikes hit civilian areas on Friday, killing one person in the Ukrainian city of Dnipro, which was not hit by Russian bombing before. The administration said in a statement on Friday morning that “three air strikes took place in the city and hit a kindergarten, an apartment building, and a two-story shoe factory in which a fire broke out,” noting that “one person died.”
And the British Ministry of Defense indicated in a statement today, Friday, that Russia is likely to seek to reposition its forces in order to renew its offensive activity in Ukraine in the coming days. The statement added that the repositioning of forces will likely include operations against the capital, Kyiv, while stating that it remains unlikely that Russia will achieve its specific goals before the military operation. The ministry indicated that the Russian ground forces continue to make progress, which it described as “limited”, with continued logistical problems and the presence of “strong” Ukrainian resistance.
Satellite images revealed a change in formation and spread in the large Russian military convoy heading towards the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv. Meanwhile, a US official said that the Russian forces are now about 40 km from the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv. The photos also showed that the Russian armored units were maneuvering in the vicinity of the cities adjacent to Antonov Airport.
In the capital, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said half the population had fled. He added that the city “turned into a fortress,” stressing that “every street, every building, and every observation point in it has been fortified.”
Russian forces are currently besieging at least four major Ukrainian cities. Armored vehicles reached the northeastern outskirts of Kiev, where the suburbs, including Irbin and Bucha, were subjected to intense bombardment for days.
Ukrainian soldiers speak of fierce battles for control of the main highway to the capital.
In a video recording, Mariupol Mayor Vadim Boychenko said that on Thursday, Russian warplanes bombed residential areas in the city “every 30 minutes (…) which resulted in the” killing of civilians, including the elderly, women and children.” The mayor described the situation in the city as “horrific”, in which more than 1,200 civilians were killed in ten days of continuous attacks.
The International Committee of the Red Cross said some residents had started fighting for food, and many had no water.
There were conflicting reports about Russian forces approaching a distance of 15 to 40 km from the Ukrainian capital.
The US official said Russia had made progress toward Kyiv in the past few days. The official pointed out that there were fierce battles between the Ukrainian and Russian army in the vicinity of the capital.
However, despite this progress and the conflicting extent of the Russian forces’ approach to Kyiv, US intelligence reports indicate that Kyiv will not be under Moscow’s military control for 4 to 6 weeks.