Putin ‘set to declare all-out war in days’

RUSSIAN missiles yesterday destroyed the airport runway in the strategically key coastal city of Odesa as Vladimir Putin stepped up a fresh offensive amid speculation that he will formally declare Russia is at war next month.

Rockets believed to have been fired from a Russian warship in the Black Sea rained down on the airport. A Ukrainian military spokesman said: ‘As a result of the missile attack in the Odesa region, the runway of the airport was damaged. Its further use is impossible.’

The attack came a week after a Russian rocket tore into an apartment block in the city. Those killed included a three-month-old baby and her mother.

Ukrainian officials have warned that the Russian President is hell-bent on seizing ‘as much Ukrainian territory as possible’. Defence spokesman Oleksandr Motuzyanyk said that Russian attacks had intensified in the eastern parts of the country, providing ‘signs that the aggressor is preparing for an even bigger activation of military actions’.

Earlier, in his nightly address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia was seeking to destroy ‘any life’ in the eastern

‘It’s difficult to say how many hours we have to save lives’

Donbas region, the focus of the fighting. The barrage came after Russia’s foreign minister Sergey Lavrov claimed that what Putin has called his ‘special military operation’ was ‘developing strictly according to plan’.

But there was speculation this weekend that Putin may use Victory Day – a key date in the Russian calendar – on May 9 to redesignate the invasion as a war. Doing so, would allow him to recruit more troops to send into Ukraine after his armed forces suffered heavy losses.

Defence Secretary Ben Wallace told LBC radio: ‘He [Putin] is probably going to declare on May Day that we are now at war with the world’s Nazis and we need to mass mobilise the Russian people.’

Yesterday, the Kremlin claimed to have struck 17 Ukrainian military installations, killing more than 200 troops and destroying 23 armoured vehicles.

Those claims could not be verified but Ukrainian emergency services said a hospital and residential areas in the north-eastern city of Kharkiv had been shelled.

Fighting in the besieged southern coastal city of Mariupol continued with the Azovstal steelworks, where thousands of fighters and residents are hiding in underground tunnels, being shelled.

The city’s mayor Vadym Boychenko told the BBC that people at the site were ‘on the borderline between life and death’, adding: ‘They are waiting, they are praying for a rescue... It’s difficult to say how many days or hours we have to save their lives.’

In a rare glimpse of hope, a group of around 20 civilians, including women and children, were yesterday allowed to leave the site. However, there were concerns over two buses sent to rescue civilians from the town of Popasna in the Donbas which have since gone missing.

Despite ramping up its assault, experts say Putin’s advance continues to stutter. In its latest assessment, the British Defence Ministry said: ‘Russia has been forced to merge and redeploy depleted and disparate units from the failed advances in north-east Ukraine... and many of these units are likely suffering from weakened morale.’

Separately, Ukraine’s national guard released footage appearing to show strikes against a Russian armoured military convoy near Izyum in eastern Ukraine. The authenticity of the footage and when it was shot was unclear.

As well as hitting towns and cities, Russia has been seeking to disrupt everyday life. In his address, President Zelensky sought to reassure Ukrainians about fuel supplies after Russian forces targeted petrol stations, creating shortages and long queues at forecourts.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s deputy agriculture minister accused Russia of stealing hundreds of thousands of tons of grain.

Taras Vysotskyi said he feared much of the 1.5 million tons of grain in areas now under its control could be looted.

As Mr Lavrov revealed more than a million Ukrainians had been ‘evacuated’ to Russia – a policy branded hostage-taking by the West – officials announced the bodies of three more civilians had been found near Bucha. They had been shot in the head with their hands tied.

The town, near Kyiv, has become synonymous with Russia’s war crimes in Ukraine.

Last night, Boris Johnson told President Zelensky that he is more committed than ever to reinforcing Ukraine and ‘ensuring Putin fails’.