The defense council of this Saturday, February 26, recorded military aid, equipment, and financial punishment.
On the third day of the invasion led by Russian President Vladimir Putin, heavy fighting took place on Saturday in Kiev, the capital which has become a ghost town with a curfew introduced on Saturday until Monday 8 a.m. “I am here and we will defend ourselves, we will not lay down our arms”Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelinski said in the early hours of Saturday morning, denying the leak rumors in a video message recorded on his mobile phone, calling on the population to resist.
All day the capital remained under fire from Moscow, Ukrainian forces reported “violent” fighting 30 km southwest of the capital where the Russian army, which was ordered on Saturday to expand its offensive on Ukraine “in all directions”.
However, Russia has not taken over Ukrainian airspace, according to British authorities. According to a senior Pentagon official, in the United States, Russia is “increasingly frustrated” by the firm resistance of the Ukrainian army, when it engaged “more than 50% of the force she had massed at the borders of the country”.
Russian forces have penetrated deeply from the north, east and south, but are facing resistance from the Ukrainian army and have so far not taken full control of any Ukrainian city, according to several sources. Western.
But the Ukrainian government nevertheless counted hundreds of victims, at least 198 Ukrainians died, including three children, and more than a thousand injured, not to mention dozens of soldiers killed. Greece will summon the Russian ambassador to Athens to protest against the death of six civilians from the Greek minority during the bombardment of the Ukrainian village of Sartana, near Mariupol. Russia does not give any assessment of its losses. The Ukrainian Minister of Defense claims that 3,500 Russian soldiers have been killed since Thursday, without providing material elements.
On the diplomatic level, Germany, hitherto inflexible, has taken a step towards Ukraine, with the shipment of arms and, for the first time, has expressed its readiness to accept “targeted restrictions” from Russia to Swift, an essential cog in global finance.
In the evening, Volodymyr Zelensky also announced on Twitter that he had agreed with Boris Johnson, the British Prime Minister, to “new common measures to counter the aggressor”.
“This war will last”, warned Emmanuel Macron in the morning, during a flash visit to the inauguration of the Agricultural Show. In the evening, the Élysée communicated on the conclusions of the defense council organized at 5 p.m.: increase in the delivery of military equipment to Ukraine, strengthening of economic sanctions against Russia in coordination with the Europeans and the Americans, strengthening of measures against propaganda coming from Russia.
This Sunday at 6 p.m., a videoconference is to bring together the foreign ministers of the European Union, while a meeting is also scheduled for the evening at the UN Security Council.
How can they do that?
In Kiev, war is under Vera’s windows: “We live near a power station, a target. Our defenders have installed a battery, an anti-aircraft gun downstairs from our house. Putin says he is not attacking civilians, that’s wrong. Yesterday, a Russian tank, lost in the neighborhood, deliberately ran over a car with someone in it, he was seriously injured and had to be evacuated to the hospital,” Véra told the telephone. “How can kids aged 20-22 do this to people who share a good part of their culture, their religion?”
