Russia Ukraine Conflict | Ukraine’s Kherson Under Russian Military Control: Reports

Earlier, the military said the Russian forces landed in Ukraine’s second biggest city on Wednesday and triggered immediate clashes in the streets of Kharkiv.

Ukrainian service members are seen outside the damaged local city hall of Kharkiv on March 1, 2022, destroyed as a result of Russian troop shelling. (AFP)

New Delhi: The crisis in Ukraine has aggravated with the Russian military taking control of Kherson. As per news agency Reuters, Governor of Ukraine’s Kherson has said the city is completely surrounded by the Russians.

Earlier, the military said the Russian forces landed in Ukraine’s second biggest city on Wednesday and triggered immediate clashes in the streets of Kharkiv.

This followed Russia’s relentless air assault across Ukraine.

The airborne operation came as US President Joe Biden branded his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin a “dictator”.

“A Russian dictator, invading a foreign country, has costs around the world,” Biden told lawmakers in his annual State of the Union address, The Moscow Times reported.

Biden promised “robust action to make sure the pain of our sanctions is targeted at Russia's economy”.

The US President in his address hailed the resolve of the Western alliance and voiced solidarity with Ukraine.

Biden announced that the US is joining its allies and blocking American airspace to Russia.

“Tonight I'm announcing that we will join our allies in closing off American air space to all Russian flights, further isolating Russia and adding additional squeeze on their economy,” he said in his address.

The US President emphasised that American forces are not engaged and “will not engage in fighting Russian armies” in Ukraine, but they will defend every single inch of NATO allies.

"For that purpose, we have mobilized American ground forces, air squadrons, ship deployments to protect NATO countries including Poland, Romania, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia,” he added.

The US President said that when the history of this era is written, Putin's war on Ukraine will have left Russia weaker and the rest of the world stronger.

Talking about the Russian invasion, he said that it was “premeditated and totally unprovoked”.

“We countered Russia's lies with the truth, and now, now that he's acted, the free world is holding him accountable. Putin is now isolated from the world more than he has ever been,” Biden said.

Scores of civilians have been reported killed since the Russian troops rolled into Ukraine last week.

The Russian forces have carried out a massive bombing campaign and encircled urban centres.