Ukrainian Forces – Not enough “serious and heavy” weapons to beat back Russian aggressors according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. “First, it involves serious and heavy weapons […] at the moment we don’t have enough of these weapons to free Mariupol. The second path is diplomatic. So far Russia hasn’t agreed to this.”
“We don’t know when we can unblock Mariupol. And I say this openly, that all the boys in Mariupol want our victory, they want a free city, none of them are going to surrender to the enemy. This is their internal feeling, this is what they are,” he added, speaking alongside European Council President Charles Michel in Kyiv.
Many civilians were evacuated through agreed humanitarian corridors, “unfortunately a few thousand civilians went to Russian occupied territories, and we don’t know the fate of these thousands of people,” he added.
Ukraine is “ready for any format of swaps of our people for the Russian troops that they left behind, the bodies and the wounded that they abandoned here,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Russian Defense Ministry announced the test launch of the Sarmat, an intercontinental ballistic missile.
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin congratulated the military on their successful missile test, saying it would “give thought to those who are trying to threaten Russia,” according to the ministry statement as quoted by the state-run TASS news agency.
An intercontinental ballistic missile is among the deadliest weapons that could carry a nuclear warhead across borders. The RS-28 Sarmat is designed to replace the Soviet-era Voevoda ICBM, known by the NATO designation SS-18 Satan.