Russian troops entered the outskirts of Kyiv on Friday morning, and Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense urged citizens to make Molotov cocktails in advance of the expected battle.
The Defense Ministry told citizens to “prepare Molotov cocktails” but remain indoors in a Facebook post. Kyiv was rocked by missile strikes early on Friday morning, with one rocket striking a residential building, the New York Times confirmed.
Ukrainian and Russian troops were fighting in the streets by Friday morning, according to Agence France Presse.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said 137 Ukrainians, civilians and soldiers, have been confirmed killed since the start of the Russian invasion, in an address early on Friday morning.
“According to the available intelligence, the enemy marked me as a target No. 1 and my family as the target No. 2,” Zelensky said. “They want to destroy Ukraine politically by destroying the head of the state.”
Zelensky told Ukrainians that other countries would likely not send aid during the invasion. Even so, Zelensky called on Europeans with “combat experience” to fight with the Ukrainian military.
“We are left to our own devices in defense of our state,” he said. "Who is ready to fight together with us? Honestly, I do not see such.”
While Zelensky said his government was open to negotiations with Russia, Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said negotiations could begin only once Ukraine stops fighting.
“What we're talking about is preventing Nazis and those who push methods of genocide to rule in this country,” Lavrov told reporters at a press conference in Moscow. “Right now, the regime that is located in Kyiv is under two mechanisms of external control: first, the West, led by the United States, and secondly, neo-Nazis.”
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