LVIV: Ukrainian negotiators at talks with Russian officials on Thursday demanded a ceasefire and humanitarian corridors to evacuate besieged citizens as Moscow’s invasion forces surrounded and bombarded Ukrainian cities.
Hundreds of Russian soldiers and Ukrainian civilians have been killed since President Vladimir Putin sent his troops over the border on Feb. 24. Russia itself has been plunged into isolation.
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The United Nations said more than 1 million refugees had fled in just seven days and the humanitarian crisis was growing worse.
Ukrainian presidential adviser Mikhailo Podolyak tweeted a picture of himself and other negotiators seated at a conference table in an undisclosed location. The Ukrainians wore battle fatigues and winter jackets, the Russians wore suits and ties.
Ukraine would demand an immediate ceasefire, armistice and “humanitarian corridors for the evacuation of civilians from destroyed or constantly shelled villages/cities,” Podolyak said.
Neither side suggested it was expecting breakthroughs after a first round of talks held in Belarus on Monday made no progress.
Despite an initial battle plan that Western countries said was aimed at swiftly toppling the Kyiv government, Russia has captured only one city – the southern Dnipro River port of Kherson, which its tanks entered on Wednesday.
With its main assault force halted for days on a highway north of Kyiv, Russia has shifted tactics, escalating its bombardment of cities. Swathes of central Kharkiv, a city of 1.5 million people, have been blasted into rubble.
Mariupol, eastern Ukraine’s main port, has been surrounded under heavy bombardment, with no water or power. Officials say they cannot evacuate the wounded. The city council compared the situation to the World War Two siege of Leningrad.
