Russia-Ukraine live updates: Invasion escalates as convoy threatens Kyiv and Kharkiv is ‘surrounded’

Street battles broke out Tuesday in the city of Kherson, according to Oleksiy Arestovych, a Ukrainian presidential adviser. Arestovych said on Ukrainian TV that the city is “now the hottest point” for units of the Russian armed forces.

In a video verified by The Washington Post, more than a dozen Russian troops and tanks are seen moving through a residential intersection in the southern city.

In another video recorded a few blocks north, a resident captures a fire at a neighboring apartment. Seconds later, the building is hit. The woman behind the camera jumps away from the window and screams profanities.

Four people were injured and multiple floors were destroyed in the shelling of the nine-story apartment building, according to a Facebook post by the State Emergency Services of Ukraine.

In a Facebook post on Tuesday, Kherson Mayor Ihor Kolykhaiev said the city is under shelling and pleaded with Russian leadership to get out. He ended his post saying that the city will remain Ukrainian.

Former national security adviser John Bolton refuted a claim from a Newsmax host who asserted that the behavior of President Donald Trump deterred the Russians from invading Ukraine. Bolton emphasized that Trump “barely knew where Ukraine was.”

Speaking with the conservative network Monday night, Bolton sat back as host Rob Schmitt listed off accomplishments the broadcaster claimed helped stall Russia from attacking Ukraine. All the while, the pro-Trump network displayed a chyron that read, “Trump was tough on Russia.”

But Bolton, who has since become a vocal critic of Trump, said his former boss was not tough on Russia, claiming that Trump complained about any sanctions on Russian oligarchs in the United States. Then Bolton went one step further about Trump’s knowledge of Ukraine.

“The fact is he barely knew where Ukraine was,” he said.

Bolton also claimed that Trump once asked then-White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly whether Finland was part of Russia. The former national security adviser emphasized that the narrative on Newsmax regarding the Ukraine invasion was a departure from reality.

“It’s just not accurate to say that Trump’s behavior somehow deterred the Russians,” he said. As Schmitt tried to interrupt him, Bolton continued, “I think the evidence is that Russia didn’t feel their military was ready.”

LVIV, Ukraine — At the main train station in this western Ukrainian city, where the internally displaced jostle to get on trains to Poland or change for other destinations in Europe, few among the heaving crowd wore masks. As night fell, hundreds bedded down across crowded stone floors or curled up on the stairs, inhaling thick, muggy air.

For these Ukrainians, the focus is escaping the Russian invasion bearing down on their country — not on dodging diseases like the coronavirus.

But as more than a half-million people have fled Ukraine to neighboring countries, global health officials fear that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine will be the latest reminder of a grim lesson — that war and disease are close companions, and the humanitarian and refugee crises now unfolding in Eastern Europe will lead to long-lasting health consequences, exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic.

Televangelist Pat Robertson said Monday that Russian President Vladimir Putin was “compelled by God” in his decision to invade Ukraine, suggesting that Russia’s attacks are a precursor to an end-times battle in Israel.

The Christian media mogul returned to “The 700 Club” a few months after he retired from the show he hosted for 55 years on the Christian Broadcasting Network. In his return, Robertson claimed that Putin was simply following God’s wishes when Russia invaded Ukraine — to fulfill a biblical prophecy.

“I think you can say, well, Putin’s out of his mind. Yes, maybe so,” said Robertson, 91. “But at the same time, he’s being compelled by God. He went into the Ukraine, but that wasn’t his goal. His goal was to move against Israel, ultimately.”

Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) called on Republicans to support Biden and Democrats in providing more aid to Ukraine as the country battles Russia’s invading forces.

“In the weeks to come, the Senate must work on a bipartisan basis and in lockstep with the Biden administration to pass a strong aid package providing both humanitarian and security assistance to Ukraine,” Schumer said Tuesday in remarks on the Senate floor. “The strongest signal we can send Vladimir Putin right now is that the United States stands together, together with the people of Ukraine.”

Russia-Ukraine live updates

Schumer said on Sunday that the administration would ask Congress for $6.4 billion in economic and military aid.

Biden authorized a $350 million defense aid package for Ukraine last week that included anti-armor missiles, small arms, body armor and various other munitions. The Post previously reported that the administration has committed to providing support as long as there is a viable Ukrainian government fighting off Russian forces.

“I hope our Republican colleagues in this chamber will work with us and the administration to stay unified with a strong aid package,” Schumer said. “We don’t know how this crisis will evolve, but one thing that will not change is the need to maintain a united front, so long as Vladimir Putin continues down his path of violence.”

Dozens of diplomats from the United States, United Kingdom and the European Union staged a walkout Tuesday during Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s address to the U.N. Human Rights Council and Conference on Disarmament in Geneva.

“U.N. has to take a very strong stance in defense of its own principles of the U.N. charter,” said Yevheniia Filipenko, Ukraine’s ambassador to the United Nations. “Because what Russia did to Ukraine is an attack on the U.N., the U.N. foundations, on the foundations of our cooperation.”

Videos posted online and verified by The Washington Post show Russian military trucks damaged and abandoned Tuesday in Borodyanka, a village about 30 miles northwest of Kyiv. One of the trucks in the video has a “V” on the side, a marker used by a branch of the Russian military. The Post confirmed the location of the video by comparing it with satellite images and older photos of the area.

The video shows streets empty of people, with debris littering the ground. A nearby building is engulfed in flames and smoke is streaming from the windows. At least five trucks can be seen as the camera pans.

Satellite images showed a 40-mile convoy of Russian forces heading toward Kyiv as of Monday morning local time, drawing within 20 miles of the city’s center. Kyiv residents are stocking up on gas and food as they brace for an all-out assault on the capital.

In the days leading up to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Russian state media unleashed a flurry of articles online baselessly or misleadingly casting Ukrainians as aggressors and their government as a nuclear threat, according to an analysis shared with The Technology 202.

The findings shed light on the narratives Russian outfits sought to spread in the crucial days before the invasion — and before major platforms announced new measures intended to limit misinformation and disinformation by state-funded outlets.

According to researchers at Oxford University’s Programme on Democracy and Technology, state-funded and state-run Russian news outlets including RT and Sputnik peppered the web with articles portraying Ukraine as instigators in the conflict the week before the invasion, echoing a consistent theme of Russian information operations.

But while certain narratives had long been a fixture of the messaging by Russian state media, others gained prominence during that pivotal stretch. That included postings raising the specter of the Ukrainian government reviving its nuclear arsenal.