Russia launched a wide-ranging attack on Ukraine on Thursday, hitting cities and bases with airstrikes or shelling, as civilians piled into trains and cars to flee. Ukraine's government pleaded for help as it said Russian tanks and troops rolled across the border in a “full-scale war."
President Vladimir Putin ignored global condemnation and cascading new sanctions as he unleashed Moscow’s most aggressive action since the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and chillingly referred to his country’s nuclear arsenal. He threatened any foreign country trying to interfere with “consequences you have never seen.”
Ukrainian officials said their forces were battling Russians on a series of fronts.
“Russia has embarked on a path of evil, but Ukraine is defending itself and won’t give up its freedom,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy tweeted.
Later, he offered Russia an end to the hostilities.
“It wasn’t Ukraine that chose the path of war, but Ukraine is offering to go back to the path of peace,” he said.
He said the Russian airborne unit at an airport outside the capital of Kyiv was being destroyed.
The Ukrainian leader said many Russian warplanes and armored vehicles across the country were destroyed but didn’t give numbers. He also said an unidentified number of Russian troops were taken prisoners.
Zelenskyy, who earlier cut diplomatic ties with Moscow and declared martial law, described Russian forces advancing on multiple fronts, including a “difficult situation” developing in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, just over 20 kilometers away from the eastern border with Russia, and Russian troops slowly advancing from the north on the city of Chernihiv.
He appealed to global leaders, saying that “if you don’t help us now, if you fail to offer a powerful assistance to Ukraine, tomorrow the war will knock on your door.”
The Chernobyl nuclear power plant has been captured by Russian forces, an adviser to the Ukrainian presidential office, Mykhailo Podolyak, said on Thursday.
"It is impossible to say the Chernobyl nuclear power plant is safe after a totally pointless attack by the Russians," he said.
"This is one of the most serious threats in Europe today," Podolyak said.
The chief of the NATO alliance said the “brutal act of war" shattered peace in Europe, joining a chorus of world leaders who decried the attack, which could cause massive casualties, topple Ukraine’s democratically elected government and upend the post-Cold War security order. The conflict was already shaking global financial markets: Stocks plunged and oil prices soared amid concerns that heating bills and food prices would skyrocket.
Condemnation rained down not only from the US and Europe, but from South Korea, Australia and beyond — and many governments readied new sanctions. Even friendly leaders like Hungary’s Viktor Orban sought to distance themselves from Putin.
