KYIV, Ukraine — As Russian forces pressed ahead Tuesday in their drive to seize the strategic southern port of Mariupol and encircle Ukrainian defenders in the country’s east, Russian President Vladimir Putin defended his invasion as a noble cause.
Putin said there was “no doubt” Moscow would achieve its aims to protect Russian security and, blaming Ukraine, said talks between the two sides had reached a “dead end.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in turn, said the nearly 7-week-old war could be entering a “new stage of terror” for his embattled country after Russian troops’ withdrawal from the capital, Kyiv. He again accused Russia of war crimes.
