Live: Explosions in Kyiv on second day of Russia’s Ukraine invasion
Kyiv was under “horrific” fire on Friday as Russian troops edged closer to the Ukrainian capital on their second day of an invasion described as a “brutal act of war” by the West.
A man walks past a building damaged following a rocket attack the city of Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, Feb. 25, 2022. – Copyright AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti
Kyiv was under “horrific” fire on Friday as Russian troops edged closer to the Ukrainian capital on their second day of an invasion described as a “brutal act of war” by the West.
“Horrific Russian rocket strikes on Kyiv,” Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister said just before 05:00 CET on Friday. “The last time our capital experienced anything like this was in 1941 when it was attacked by Nazi Germany.”
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Kyiv “could well be under siege” in what US officials believe is a brazen attempt by Russian President Vladimir Putin to dismantle the government and replace it with his own regime.
The assault, which has already left more than 100 Ukrainians dead, amounts to the largest ground war in Europe since World War II.
Follow all of Friday’s developments in our live blog below
The key points to know
- Russia has launched a full military assault on Ukraine, invading from the east, north and south arguing the invasion was to protect civilians in eastern Ukraine.
- More than 100 Ukrainian people have died.
- Ukraine says Russia has seized control of the Chernobyl nuclear plant; Moscow says it has destroyed dozens of Ukrainian military facilities.
- EU leaders have agreed to impose sanctions against Russia that will have “massive and severe consequences”.
- President Biden has announced more US sanctions against Russia, designed to hit the country’s economy long-term.
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has declared martial law and cut diplomatic ties with Moscow, adding that a “new iron curtain” now separates Russia from the “civilised world”.
- Vladimir Putin has warned that any country attempting to interfere would see “consequences you have never seen in history”.
The Ukrainian army shared a video on Facebook it says shows civilians queuing to donate blood for the military.
10:22
Moscow and Kyiv give conflicting accounts of radioactivity at Chernobyl
Igor Konashenkov said in his statement that “the radioactive background in the vicinity of the nuclear power plant is normal”.
Russia troops captured the former nuclear power plant on Thursday.
Ukrainian officials however said that “control levels of gamma radiation dose rate have been exceeded at a significant number of observation points.”
“It is currently impossible to establish the reasons for the change in the radiation background in the exclusion zone because of the occupation and military fight in this territory,” the Ukrainian parliament added.
Russia claims to have disabled 118 military facilities in Ukraine
Major General Igor Konashenkov, the official spokesman of the Russian Ministry of Defence, said on Friday that the military infrastructure Russian troops have disabled across Ukraine includes 11 airfields, 36 radar stations, five warplanes, one helicopter, five drones, 18 tanks, seven multiple-launch rocket systems, five boats and air defence missile systems.
Fragments of a downed aircraft are seen in Kyiv, Ukraine, Feb. 25, 2022. It was unclear whose aircraft crashed and who brought it down amid the Russian invasion in Ukraine. AP Photo/Oleksandr Ratushniak
