Ukraine News Items.

Regular News Items comes later.

1. Russia’s military yesterday pushed deeper into Ukraine, attacking strategic airfields and advancing toward major cities as President Vladimir Putin defied mounting sanctions and recriminations from the West. Explosions continued to rock areas around the eastern city of Kharkiv and the capital, Kyiv, sending residents to shelter in subway stations and prompting others to flee the country. U.S. officials said the expanding offensive may be aimed at toppling Ukraine’s elected government and installing a pro-Kremlin regime. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told lawmakers Thursday that the Biden administration was examining ways to provide Ukraine with more defensive equipment, and ways that it could continue training Ukrainian soldiers outside Ukraine even if the government in Kyiv falls. “The clarity of the discussion was that even if Kyiv is taken by the Russians, the Ukrainian government would continue to exist and we would continue to support them," said Rep. John Garamendi (D-CA). (Source: washingtonpost.com)

2. Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky has warned that “enemy saboteur groups” have entered Kyiv and Russia is planning to assassinate him as Vladimir Putin’s invading forces intensified their attack on Ukraine’s capital and other cities on Friday. “According to our information, the enemy has identified me as the number-one target,” Zelensky said in an early-morning video address in which he wore a military-style green T-shirt and sweater. “My family is the number-two target. They want to destroy Ukraine politically by destroying the head of state.” (Source: ft.com)

3. For most of his 22-year rule, Vladimir V. Putin presented an aura of calm determination at home — of an ability to astutely manage risk to navigate the world’s biggest country through treacherous shoals. His attack on Ukraine negated that image, and revealed him as an altogether different leader: one dragging the nuclear superpower he helms into a war with no foreseeable conclusion, one that by all appearances will end Russia’s attempts over its three post-Soviet decades to find a place in a peaceful world order. Russians awoke in shock after they learned that Mr. Putin, in an address to the nation that aired before 6 a.m., had ordered a full-scale assault against what Russians of all political stripes often refer to as their “brotherly nation.” (Source: nytimes.com)

4. President Vladimir V. Putin has ordered Russian troops into Ukraine but made clear his true target goes beyond his neighbor to America’s “empire of lies,” and he threatened “consequences you have never faced in your history” for “anyone who tries to interfere with us.” In another rambling speech full of festering historical grievances and accusations of a relentless Western plot against his country, Mr. Putin reminded the world on Thursday that Russia “remains one of the most powerful nuclear states” with “a certain advantage in several cutting-edge weapons.” In effect, Mr. Putin’s speech, intended to justify the invasion, seemed to come closer to threatening nuclear war than any statement from a major world leader in recent decades. His immediate purpose was obvious: to head off any possible Western military move by making clear he would not hesitate to escalate. Given Russia’s nuclear arsenal, he said, “there should be no doubt that any potential aggressor will face defeat and ominous consequences should it directly attack our country.” He added: “All necessary decisions have been taken in this regard.” (Source: nytimes.com)