President Vladimir Putin warned Saturday that crippling economic sanctions imposed by the West were “akin to a declaration of war,” as the Russian military pummeled civilian targets and continued shelling near the first protected routes intended to allow besieged Ukrainians to flee, apparently violating a cease-fire that had been agreed to only hours earlier.
As fighting raged across Ukraine, Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on Saturday became the first international leader to meet with Putin in Moscow since the start of the fighting. No details emerged from their discussion, but a spokesperson for Bennett said that he had also spoken with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine after his meeting with Putin.
Putin, in his first extended remarks since the start of the war, threatened to fully absorb Ukraine, the former Soviet republic of nearly 44 million people that declared its independence 30 years ago.
“The current leadership needs to understand that if they continue doing what they are doing, they risk the future of Ukrainian statehood,” he said. Putin added that Moscow would view any Western attempts to impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine as “participating in the armed conflict” against Russia
As Putin doubled down on his threats against Ukraine and the West, Zelenskyy spoke with more than 300 members of the U.S. Congress on Saturday. He implored them to impose a no-fly zone and to send military jets to his country, according to lawmakers on the call.
The ongoing Russian attacks near the “humanitarian corridors,” reported by Ukrainian officials, came hours after both countries had agreed to open safe routes for residents to flee the encircled city of Mariupol, a major port on the Sea of Azov where tens of thousands of people have been without heat, electricity or water for three days, and Volnovakha, a beleaguered town 40 miles to the north.
Ten days into the Russian invasion, the shelling around the corridors made clear that Putin had settled on a plan to hammer civilian infrastructure and pulverize basic services and neighborhoods. The sustained assault has set off what the United Nations calls the fastest-moving exodus of European refugees since World War II.
In the most visible sign yet of resistance to the Russian occupation, hundreds of residents of the captured southern Ukrainian city of Kherson took to the streets to protest, chanting and waving Ukrainian flags. The demonstrations were a direct rebuke to Putin’s claim that the Russian military has been liberating Ukrainian cities.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said Saturday that it had agreed to a cease-fire and safe routes for residents of Mariupol and Volnovakha beginning at 10 a.m. Moscow time.
But Ukrainian officials said Russian troops never stopped shelling the area, and they warned residents who were planning to leave the cities to turn back and take shelter.
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