'Nothing to lose but freedom' – Ukraine’s President Zelensky

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky has stayed in Kyiv, releasing regular video updates to the nation. In his latest message, he said Ukrainian lines were holding.

"We have nothing to lose but our own freedom," he said.

Britain's defence ministry said the main body of the huge Russian column advancing on Kyiv was still 30km from the city centre, held up by Ukrainian resistance, mechanical breakdown and congestion.

In Borodyanka, a town 60km northwest of Kyiv where local people repelled a Russian assault, burnt-out hulks of destroyed Russian armour were scattered on a highway, surrounded by buildings blasted into ruins.

"They started shooting from their APC towards the park in front of the post office," a man recounted in the apartment where he was sheltering with his family, referring to a Russian armoured personnel carrier.

"Then those b******s started the tank and started shooting into the supermarket which was already burned. It caught fire again. An old man ran outside like crazy, with big round eyes, and said 'give me a Molotov cocktail! I just set their APC on fire!... Give me some petrol, we'll make a Molotov cocktail and burn the tank!'"

Emergency services in the eastern Chernihiv region said 22 bodies had been pulled from the rubble of a Russian airstrike. Earlier, governor Viacheslav Chaus said at least nine people had been killed in an air strike that hit homes and two schools.

Footage from a car dashboard camera, verified by Reuters, showed buildings in Chernihiv suddenly blown up by apparent missiles. The street was engulfed in a fireball and a cloud of black smoke rose into the sky.

Two cargo ships came under apparent attack at Ukrainian ports. Six crew members were rescued at sea after an Estonian-owned ship exploded and sank off Odessa, and at least one crew member was killed in a blast on a Bangladeshi ship at Olvia. Ukraine is one of the world's biggest grain and food oil exporters from its Black Sea ports.

 

 

Photo: Ukrainian State Emergency Service / EYEPRESS News / EyePress via AFP  Caption: Damaged buildings following recent shelling, during Russia's invasion of Ukraine, in the settlement of Borodyanka in the Kyiv region, Ukraine on 2 March 2022.