Zürcher Nachrichten - Ukraine says war in east at 'maximum intensity'

Moscow's troops are pushing into the industrial Donbas region after failing to take the capital Kyiv, closing in on several urban centres including the strategically located Severodonetsk and Lysychansk.

Russian forces also shelled Ukraine's second city Kharkiv, killing four people, after Moscow's efforts to capture the north-eastern hub were repelled by heavy battles early in the war.

Britain and Germany both said Thursday that Russian President Vladimir Putin must be defeated in the conflict, now in its fourth month, but Kyiv called on the West to urgently supply more heavy weapons for its outgunned forces.

"The fighting has reached its maximum intensity," Ukraine's Deputy Defence Minister Ganna Malyar told a press briefing about the battles in the east.

"Enemy forces are storming the positions of our troops simultaneously in several directions. We have an extremely difficult and long stage of fighting ahead of us."

Pro-Moscow separatist groups have controlled parts of Donbas, the industrial basin comprising Donetsk and Lugansk regions, since 2014 but Russia now appears set on taking the whole region.

Lugansk regional governor Sergiy Gaiday said that "heavy" Russian bombardments on Lysychansk had done extensive damage to civilian infrastructure, including a humanitarian aid centre.

- 'Show me one Nazi!' -

Three people died in recent Russian attacks on Severodonetsk and Lysychansk, which stand on the crucial route to Ukraine's eastern administrative centre in Kramatorsk, Gaiday said.

In Kramatorsk itself, children roamed the rubble left by Russian attacks as the sound of shellfire booms.

"That was a 22 (122-mm artillery)," said Yevgen, a sombre-looking 13-year-old who moved to Kramatorsk with his mother from the ruins of his village Galyna.

"I am not scared," he declared as he sat alone on a slab of a destroyed apartment block. "I got used to the shelling."

Four civilians were killed in shelling in the Donetsk region around Kramatorsk, the Ukrainian presidency said.

Fresh shelling around Kharkiv in the northeast killed another four people, with officials warning residents to take to air raid shelters.

"The occupiers are again shelling the regional centre," the governor of the Kharkiv region, Oleg Sinegubov, said on Telegram.

Russia's rationale of a "special military operation" to "demilitarise and de-Nazify" Ukraine draws a snort of derision in one village near Kharkiv.

"Show me one Nazi in the village! We have our nation, we are nationalists but not Nazis nor fascists," says retired nurse Larysa Kosynets.

- 'Putin must not win' -

As the toll mounted, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called on the West to add to the billions of dollars in weaponry it has already poured in, and blasted suggestions a negotiated peace could include territorial concessions.

"We need the help of our partners -- above all, weapons for Ukraine. Full help, without exceptions, without limits, enough to win," Zelensky said in his daily address to the nation.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba had earlier told Davos that his country "badly" needs multiple-launch rocket systems to match Russian firepower.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who has faced criticism over Berlin's slow response, underscored the "resolve and strength" of the West.

"Our goal is crystal clear -- Putin must not win this war. And I am convinced that he will not win it," the German chancellor told the World Economic Forum in Davos.

Scholz added that it was a "matter of making it clear to Putin that there will be no dictated peace."

British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss echoed the German chancellor's comments and warned against offering "compromise or appeasement" to Putin.

"We need to make sure that Putin loses in Ukraine and that Ukraine prevails," Truss told reporters during a visit to Sarajevo, saying that Kyiv needed to be supported without "backsliding".

- 'Illegal' sanctions -

The Ukraine conflict has sparked fears of a global food crisis, on top of the political and economic shockwaves that have already reverberated around the world since the February 24 invasion.

The Kremlin on Thursday accused Western countries of stopping grain-carrying vessels from leaving ports in Ukraine, rejecting accusations that Russia was to blame.

"We accuse Western countries of taking a number of illegal actions that have led to this blockade," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov meanwhile poured cold water on an Italian peace plan to end the war.

The Russian central bank cut its key interest rate to 11 percent from 14 percent following an emergency meeting, as authorities sought to rein in the ruble which has surged in value despite the conflict.

The Kremlin is also seeking to tighten its grip over the parts of Ukraine it occupies, including fast-tracking citizenship for residents of two southern regions that are mostly under Russian control.

The United States branded the plan an "attempt to subjugate the people of Ukraine".

burs-dk/jm

L.Zimmermann--NZN