Defence minister says Moscow aims to cut off communications to ‘break the resistance of the people’
Russia is planning a major psychological operation to try to persuade Ukrainians to capitulate, and is targeting civilians with missile strikes in an attempt to demoralise the population, the government in Kyiv, Ukraine, has said.
Two Russian missiles struck the TV tower in the Ukrainian capital, knocking out some access to news and broadcasts. Late in the evening more explosions were reported in residential neighbourhoods in Kyiv and Kharkiv.
Ukraine was expected to be a focus of Tuesday night’s state of the union presidential address in the United States, where Joe Biden will condemn “Putin’s war” as “premeditated and unprovoked” and tout the importance of Nato and American diplomacy.
Biden was set to vow that Vladimir Putin would “pay a price” for his invasion of Ukraine, according to excerpts of his address. “He rejected efforts at diplomacy. He thought the west and Nato wouldn’t respond. And he thought he could divide us here at home … Putin was wrong. We were ready.”
In Ukraine, at least two people were reported dead and three injured in a strike on a military base in Zhytomyr in the north-west, which also reportedly affected nearby homes, with 10 damaged and some of them on fire.
The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund released a joint statement saying that they “stand with the Ukrainian people” and condemning the “horrifying” attacks they have endured. They promised hundreds of millions of dollars in rapid support to Ukraine, and billions over the next months.
The list of American companies announcing they were suspending sales of their products or other operations in Russia grew to include Apple, Nike, Ford Motor Company, and Boeing.