Ukraine vowed to not give ground at talks with Moscow on Sunday as Ukrainian forces resisted a Russian invasion four days in and satellite imagery showed a massive military convoy approaching the capital Kyiv.
The fighting has killed hundreds, forced hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians to flee west and could, according to the EU, eventually displace up to seven million people.
Russia has become an international pariah as its forces do battle on the streets of Ukraine’s cities, facing a barrage of sanctions including a ban from Western airspace and key financial networks. Moscow put its nuclear forces on high alert in response in another dramatic escalation.
Ukraine said it had agreed to send a delegation to meet Russian representatives on the border with Belarus, which has allowed Russian troops passage to attack Ukraine. The Kyiv Independent said a Ukrainian airport was targeted by a missile fired from Belarusian territory.
Kyiv insisted there were no pre-conditions to the talks with Russia.
“We will not capitulate, we will not give up a single inch of our territory,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said ahead of the first public contact between the two sides since war erupted.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky was skeptical.
“I do not really believe in the outcome of this meeting,” he said. “But let them try, to make sure that no citizen of Ukraine has any doubt that I, as a president, have not tried to stop the war.”
Ukrainian forces said they had defeated a Russian incursion into Ukraine’s second city Kharkiv, 500 kilometers (310 miles) east of Kyiv, on day four of that invasion that has stunned the world.
But satellite imagery showed new threats to Ukraine outside its borders and near the capital.
The US satellite imagery company Maxar released photos showing a massive line of Russian vehicles on a road heading toward Kyiv, some 40 miles from the capital.
The convoy was made up of hundreds of military vehicles and stretched for 3.5 miles (5 kilometers).
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