In the latest response to Western sanctions and its deepening international isolation, Ukraine ruled out a ceasefire or any territorial concessions to Moscow, while Russia stepped up its attack in the eastern Donbas region and stopped providing gas to Finland.

Andrzej Duda, the president of Poland, told parliamentarians in Kyiv that the international community must demand Russia’s complete withdrawal from Ukrainian territory, and that ceding even a fraction of it would be a “great blow” to the entire Western world.

“Worrying voices have emerged, urging that Ukraine should give in to (President Vladimir) Putin’s demands,” Duda said, speaking to Ukrainian parliamentarians for the first time since Russia’s invasion on February 24.

“Only Ukraine has the authority to determine its own destiny.” An air raid siren was heard in central Kyiv shortly after he finished speaking, a reminder that the country was still at war despite the fact that the front lines had relocated hundreds of kilometers to the south and east.

Russia is mounting a big offensive in Luhansk, one of two provinces in Donbas, after ending weeks of resistance by the last Ukrainian fighters in the vital southeastern port of Mariupol.

Before the invasion, Russian-backed separatists controlled portions of Luhansk and the neighboring Donetsk province, but Moscow now aims to take control of the region’s remaining Ukrainian-held territory.

[embedpost slug=”biden-greets-kim-of-north-korea-amid-tensions-over-nuclear-tests/”]