Kyiv, Moscow hold talks amid conflict, casualties

Ukrainian and Russian delegates sat down Monday for the first direct negotiations between the two countries since Russia launched its invasion five days earlier. While the talks brought tentative hope for an end to the war, Ukraine’s president made it clear before the discussion began that he wasn’t expecting any breakthrough, and even as the meeting took place there were reports of intensified Russian shelling in eastern Ukrainian cities. 

Russia would not clarify its aims for the talks, but CBS News’ Haley Ott reported that Ukraine’s key demands were an immediate ceasefire and the withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukraine.

Ukraine’s capital city of Kyiv was still on edge Monday morning, but residents were allowed out of their houses and shelters for the first time since Saturday night when the local government — bracing for an escalation of Russia’s siege on the city — said anyone out on the streets would be treated as an enemy.

Russia has been cagier, with the Kremlin declining to comment on Moscow’s aim in negotiations. It was not clear whether any progress could be achieved after President Vladimir Putin on Thursday launched the assault and put Russia’s nuclear deterrent on high alert on Sunday.

Russian forces seized two small cities in southeastern Ukraine and the area around a nuclear power plant, the Interfax news agency said on Monday. The talks are being held on the border with strong Russian ally Belarus, where a referendum on Sunday approved a new constitution ditching the country’s non-nuclear status at a time when the former Soviet republic has become a launchpad for Russian troops invading Ukraine.

The Western-led response to the invasion has been sweeping, with sanctions that effectively cut off Moscow’s major financial institutions from successive Western markets, sending Russia’s rouble currency down 30 per cent against the dollar on Monday.

Countries also stepped up weapons supplies to Ukraine. On Monday, blasts were heard before dawn in the capital Kyiv and the major eastern city of Kharkiv, Ukrainian authorities said. But Russian ground forces’ attempts to capture key urban centres had been repelled, they added.

Russia’s defence ministry, however, said its forces had taken over the towns of Berdyansk and Enerhodar in Ukraine’s southeastern Zaporizhzhya region as well as the area around the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant, Interfax reported.

The plant’s operations continued normally, it said. Ukraine denied that the nuclear plant had fallen into Russian hands, according to the news agency.