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Vladimir Putin's ‘dangerous’ plan to target Ukraine capital: ‘Troops already…’
Vladimir Putin said how much territory Russia could take depends "on potentials that emerge after the so-called [Ukrainian] counteroffensive".
Russian president Vladimir Putin hinted at another attempt to take the Ukrainian capital Kyiv as he threatened a new Russian offensive. Despite Russia's botched attack on Kyiv which turned a "three-day special military operation" into months of full-scale war, the Russian president suggested to military bloggers and war reporters invited to the Kremlin that he was considering a second attempt.
Russian troops "already were near Kyiv", he said. “Should we come back there or not? Only I could give an answer,” he added. Moscow could seek to carve out more Ukrainian territory to prevent shelling into Russia, after attacks on the Kursk and Belgorod regions, Putin explained.
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Calling it a "sanitary zone" at the border, Vladimir Putin said how much territory Russia could take depends "on potentials that emerge after the so-called [Ukrainian] counteroffensive".
Meanwhile, deadly Russian missile strikes hit southern and eastern Ukraine on Wednesday. Ukrainian air defences fought back as Russia fired four Kalibr missiles on port city Odesa from a ship in the Black Sea, Ukraine's air force said, adding that it shot down three of them.
One hit a food warehouse, killing three employees and wounding seven, Oleg Kiper, the head of the region's military administration, said. "There may be people under the rubble," he added.
Six other people were wounded after a business centre. Shops and a residential complex in the city centre were damaged "as a result of air combat and the blast wave", he informed.
