A day after taking control of their first major Ukrainian city, Russian forces on Thursday besieged urban areas across the country in a crippling offensive that has hit civilian neighborhoods with increasingly heavy artillery and reduced public services to rubble. The attacks have deepened a humanitarian crisis that has prompted a million people to flee the country and many more to leave their homes for Ukrainian cities furthest from the conflict.
The rapid fall of Kherson, a major city in the south of the country, raised fears that other cities could soon follow, as Russian bombardment created pressure for people to surrender. Russian forces appeared to be making their biggest gains in the south, where they had nearly encircled two strategic cities in an apparent bid to capture Ukraine’s entire Black Sea coast, potentially cutting off the country from global shipping. Here are the most recent happenings:
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Russian troops have surrounded the port city of Mariupol, a key point between the Russian border and the Crimean peninsula that is under Russian control. Further west, just north of Kherson, they were pressing on the city of Mykolaiv. Military experts say capturing such cities would achieve Russia’s strategic goal of isolating Ukrainian forces that have been fighting Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine from the rest of the country.
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Russia’s advance appeared to be making less headway in Kiev, the capital. A convoy of hundreds of military vehicles stretching for miles and remaining about 17 miles from the city center, hampered by what British intelligence officials described on Thursday as “steady Ukrainian resistance, mechanical breakdown and congestion.”
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United Nations He said that in the week since Russia launched its invasion, a million Ukrainians had become refugees, one of the largest exoduses in recent times. Many more have fled their homes and seek protection in the western reaches of Ukraine or take refuge underground.
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With more and more parts of Ukraine without reliable communications, the satellite images provided a glimpse of the humanitarian crisis, showing people outside grocery stores in various parts of the country.
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In the latest sign of President Vladimir V. Putin’s swift crackdown on dissent since the invasion, the Kremlin ordered the shutdown of the radio broadcast and website of Echo of Moscow, Russia’s flagship liberal radio station. Hours later, Dozhd, Russia’s only independent general news channel, announced it would temporarily stop broadcasting after Thursday due to an impending law criminalizing “fakes” about the war.