'I don't bite', Zelenskyy asks Russia's Putin to meet

KYIV, Ukraine: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has called for Russian President Vladimir Putin to meet him, salting the proposal with sarcasm.

“Sit down with me to negotiate, just not at 30 meters,” he said Thursday, apparently referring to recent photos of Putin sitting at one end of an extremely long table when he met with French President Emmanuel Macron.

“I don’t bite. What are you afraid of?” Zelenskyy said at a Thursday news conference.

Zelenskyy said it was sensible to have talks: “Any words are more important than shots.”

-- Russian forces seize key Ukrainian port, pressure others-- 

Russian forces battled for control of a vital energy-producing city in Ukraine’s south on Thursday and also gained ground in their bid to cut off the country from the sea, as Ukrainian leaders called on citizens to wage guerrilla war against the invaders.

The fighting at Enerhodar, a city on the Dnieper River that accounts for about one-quarter of the country’s power generation, came as the two sides met for another round of talks aimed at stopping the bloodshed that has set off an exodus of over 1 million refugees.

The mayor of Enerhodar, the site of the biggest nuclear plant in Europe, said Ukrainian forces were battling Russian troops on the city’s outskirts. Dmytro Orlov urged residents not to leave their homes.

Moscow’s advance on Ukraine’s capital in the north has apparently stalled over the past few days, with a huge armored column outside Kyiv at a standstill. And stiffer than expected resistance from the outmanned, outgunned Ukrainians has staved off the swift victory that Russia may have expected.

A top Russian officer, Maj. Gen. Andrei Sukhovetsky, commander of an airborne division, was killed in the fighting earlier this week, an officers organization in Russia reported.

But the Russian forces have brought their superior firepower to bear in the past few days, launching missile and artillery attacks on civilian areas and making significant gains in the south as part of an effort to sever the country’s connection to the Black and Azov seas.

Cutting Ukraine’s access to the coastline would deal a crippling blow to the country’s economy and allow Russia to build a land corridor stretching from its border, across Crimea, which has been occupied by Russia since 2014, and all the way west to Romania.

The Russians announced the capture of Kherson, and local Ukrainian officials confirmed that forces have taken over local government headquarters in the vital Black Sea port of 280,000, making it the first major city to fall since the invasion began a week ago.

Heavy fighting continued on the outskirts of another strategic port, Mariupol, on the Azov Sea, plunging it into darkness, isolation and fear. Electricity and phone service were largely down, and homes and shops faced food and water shortages.

Without phone connections, medics did not know where to take the wounded.

A second round of talks between Ukrainian and Russian delegations began in neighboring Belarus.

But the two sides appeared to have little common ground going into the meeting, and Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Ukraine that it must quickly accept the Kremlin’s demand for its “demilitarization” and declare itself neutral, formally renouncing its bid to join NATO.

Putin has long contended that Ukraine’s turn toward the West is a threat to Moscow, an argument he used to justify the invasion.

SOURCE: AP NEWS