Staff Reporter
IMMEDIATE ceasefire and withdrawal of troops are crucial negotiation matters as Ukraine and Russia begin talks in Belarus, RT (formerly Russia Today) reported.
Delegations from Kyiv and Moscow are holding discussions at the Ukraine-Belarus border after days of war, Al Jazeera reported.
Russia started its attack on Ukraine on 24 February after the authorities claimed the country had to be “demilitarized” and “denazified” to protect the breakaway regions of Donetsk and Lugansk, as well as Russia.
The BBC reported cities across Ukraine remain on high alert on the fifth day of the country’s fight against Russia’s invasion.
Ukraine’s military said that Russian troops had made repeated attempts to storm the outskirts of the capital, Kyiv, but had failed to capture it.
Officials described Sunday’s fighting as “difficult”, as Russian troops continued shelling from “almost all directions”.
The major cities of Kharkiv and Chernihiv were also targeted overnight. They, and Kyiv, remain under Ukrainian forces’ control, but Russia made some progress in the south, taking the port town of Berdyansk.
Fighting also continues in the strategically important port city of Mariupol in the south, on the Sea of Azov near Russia-annexed Crimea.
Ukraine has denied a report that Russian troops had captured the largest nuclear power plant in Europe, in Zaporizhzhia in Ukraine’s south-east.
Last week, Russian soldiers took control of the site of the former Chernobyl nuclear plant, the BBC reported.
On Monday morning, dozens of people had been killed and hundreds more wounded in mass shelling in rocket strikes by Russian forces on Kharkiv, the Ukrainian interior ministry said in a post on Facebook.
More than 300 000 Ukrainians have left the country since the Russian invasion started.
More than half went to Poland and the majority of those passed through Medyka, a village in eastern Poland. They are mostly women, with their children or grandchildren.
Among the people fleeing Ukraine are 114 Namibians including 93 students.
