Zelensky warns of 'powerful response' amid threat of strikes

KYIV • As Ukraine prepared to mark both its independence from Soviet rule in 1991 and the six months since Russian troops invaded, President Volodymyr Zelensky pledged that any Russian attacks in or around the date would provoke a powerful response.

Mr Zelensky, who has led the Ukrainian resistance since Russian troops poured over the border on Feb 24, also said yesterday that Kyiv would restore its rule over the Crimea region - annexed by Russia in 2014.

Despite his defiance, there was concern among Ukrainian and allied Western officials that Russia was preparing to attack the capital Kyiv once again.

The United States urged its citizens to leave Ukraine, saying it believed Russia would target civilian and government infrastructure in the next few days.

US citizens should leave Ukraine "now" by their own means if it was safe to do so, the US Embassy said.

On the battlefields away from Kyiv, Russian forces carried out artillery and air strikes in the Zaporizhzhia region in south-eastern Ukraine, where fighting has taken place near Europe's largest nuclear power plant, Ukraine's military said.

Meanwhile, leaders of dozens of countries and international organisations were taking part in the so-called Crimea Platform initiative - most of them by video link - in solidarity with Ukraine on the six-month anniversary of the invasion.

In his opening remarks at the forum, Mr Zelensky, dressed in his customary military gear, said: "To overcome terror, it is necessary to gain victory in the fight against Russian aggression.

"It is necessary to liberate Crimea. This will be the resuscitation of world law and order."

Earlier, Mr Zelensky had warned that Moscow might try "something particularly ugly" in the run-up to independence day today.

Asked at a news conference with visiting Polish President Andrzej Duda about the possibility of a Russian missile strike on Kyiv, Mr Zelensky said there was a daily threat of attacks, although the number of them could increase. Ukraine's response, he said, would be the same for any city that comes under attack from Russia.

"They will receive a response, a powerful response," Mr Zelensky said. "I want to say that each day... this response will grow, it will get stronger and stronger."

Fears of intensified Russian attacks followed the killing of Ms Darya Dugina, the daughter of a prominent Russian ultra-nationalist, in a car bombing near Moscow last Saturday.

Moscow has blamed the killing on Ukrainian agents, a charge that Kyiv denies.

Ukraine's capital has only rarely been hit by Russian missiles since the country repelled a ground offensive in March to seize the city.

The mood in Kyiv was calm yesterday, with many people still wandering the streets, but signs of the increased threat could be felt.

The authorities have told Ukrainians to work from home where possible, from yesterday to tomorrow, and urged people to take air raid warnings seriously and seek shelter when sirens sound.

Russian shelling hit eastern Kharkiv - Ukraine's second-largest city - around dawn yesterday, regional governor Oleh Synehubov said. A house had been hit but no one was hurt, he said.

In the south, Ukraine said Russia fired artillery and mounted air strikes in several towns in the Zaporizhzhia region, where Russian forces captured the nuclear power plant shortly after the start of the invasion.

In other action, Ukrainian forces shelled a building housing the local administration headquarters in the centre of separatist-controlled Donetsk city yesterday. Three people were killed, it said.

Separately, Russia's Defence Ministry said its forces had downed a Ukrainian Su-27 warplane over the Kharkiv region.

REUTERS