Russian troops broke into Ukraine's second largest city on Wednesday (2/3) and sparked direct clashes in the streets of Kharkiv, following Moscow's relentless airstrikes on the ex-Soviet country.
At least 21 people have been killed and 112 injured in Russian military shelling in the past 24 hours, the head of the Kharkiv Region Oleg Synegubov said Wednesday, as quoted by Channel News Asia.
The airborne operation came as US President Joe Biden branded Vladimir Putin a "dictator", warning the sanctions campaign to cripple Russia's economy would escalate and its oligarchs targeted.
"While he may have an advantage on the battlefield, he will pay a high price that is sustained over the long term," Biden said in his State of the Union address. "He didn't know what was going to happen."
Since Russian troops entered Ukraine last week to accomplish Putin's mission to overthrow the pro-Western government of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, hundreds of civilians have been reported killed.
Russian troops have carried out heavy bombing and besieged urban centers, but Ukraine insists no major cities have fallen into the hands of the red bear country.
"Russian airborne forces landed in Kharkiv and attacked a local hospital," the Ukrainian military said in a statement on the Telegram messaging app, as reported by Channel News Asia. "There is an ongoing battle between the occupiers and Ukraine".
Russia attacked a residential building in Kharkiv on Tuesday (1/3) killing eight people. Ukraine drew comparisons to the massacre of civilians in Sarajevo in the 1990s and condemnation of what Zelenskyy called "war crimes".
A fire broke out Wednesday at a flight school barracks in Kharkiv after a Russian air strike, according to Anton Gerashchenko, adviser to Ukraine's interior minister.
"Practically, there are no areas left in Kharkiv where artillery shells have not been fired," he said, as quoted in a statement on Telegram. Kharkiv, a mostly Russian-speaking city near the Russian border, has a population of about 1.4 million.
