Most governments don’t recommend that their citizens begin mixing Molotov cocktails, but NPR reported on Friday morning that the Ukrainian government has recommended that the citizens remaining in Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities under siege “fight with anything they can find to neutralize the occupiers.”
That “anything” includes Molotov cocktails.
A correspondent for NPR news said that he had heard officials telling citizens remaining in Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities to begin preparing Molotov cocktails, a homemade bomb, in an effort to fight Russian troops.
Russian forces are pressing on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital city, in an effort to reach one of their goals of the special military operation. As Russian military reached Obolon, a district inside the capital of Kyiv, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense asked residents to “not leave their house and prepare Molotov cocktails.” This was verified in a tweet from the agency.
The Ukrainian military has reported that a group of “Russian spies and saboteurs” were observed in a northern Kyiv district on Thursday. Another report stated that a group of Russian troops had obfuscated with a Ukrainian tank and some Ukrainian uniforms. They believed the soldiers would attempt to infiltrate the city in disguise.
As explosions resumed in Kyiv at daylight on Friday, the leaders of the West planned an emergency meeting. Some NATO leaders had already been informed of a meeting today with Jens Stoltenberg, Secretary General of the United Nations.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has asked for assistance from international leaders in an effort to fend off an attack from the Russian military. This attack has the potential to topple the democratically-elected government in Ukraine, and the “special military operation” under Putin could cause widespread international economic damage.
Early Friday morning, a rocket hit a multi-story apartment building in Kyiv and injured at least three tenants of the building. The rocket exploded and caused a fire. Some Ukrainian citizens had access to bomb shelters of the past, but many spent Thursday night in the subway station, which has become a makeshift bomb shelter.
Zelenskyy said that Russia’s statement in which Putin claimed the operation would not target civilians is a “lie.” He claims that both military in Ukraine as well as civilian areas are being targeted in the Russian invasion.
For weeks, American politicians and diplomats have said that Vladimir Putin planned to invade. They further warned that Putin’s goal is to install his own government, described as a “puppet-regime” in which the world would assume that the Ukraine had its own leader, but the leader was actually very “friendly” with Putin and Moscow.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said that Kyiv “could well be under siege,” while Zelenskyy confirmed that officials believed Russian “subversive groups” had been placed around the capital city in an effort to take Kyiv.
Zelenskyy order a mandatory conscription, and he told all men between the ages of eighteen and sixty that they could not leave Ukraine. For months, the Ukrainian troops have been training Ukrainian citizens with wooden guns and in tactical maneuvers in expectation of a Russian invasion. Because the Russian military outnumbers the Ukrainian troops two to one, the Ukrainian citizens will have to step up if they expect to make any kind of effort to keep the country from becoming occupied.
The Eastern side of the Ukraine is also experienced intense fighting. Regional forces fought Russians attempting to enter the area of Sumy, which lies on the Russian border. The governor of Sumy warned that Russian military vehicles are headed to Kyiv in his area, stating, “Much equipment has passed through and is heading directly to the west.”
Another northeastern Ukrainian city, Konotop, has also been heavily attacked by Russian military. Zhivitsky, the governor of Sumy, urged citizens to fight the Russian troops with everything they had.
One of the workers at a makeshift bomb shelter said, “We’re all scared and worried. We don’t know what to do then, what’s going to happen in a few days.”
