KYIV, Ukraine —
On the eve of Ukraine’s independence day and the half-year mark of Russia’s invasion of its neighbor, unease grew in the country Tuesday that Moscow could target specific government and civilian targets during the holiday.
The U.S. reinforced those concerns when its embassy in Kyiv issued a security alert, saying it “has information that Russia is stepping up efforts to launch strikes against Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure and government facilities in the coming days.”
On Tuesday’s national Flag Day, President Volodymyr Zelensky stressed defiance rather than worry when he raised the flag at a memorial.
“The blue-and-yellow flag of Ukraine will again fly where it rightfully should be — in all temporarily occupied cities and villages of Ukraine,” he said, including the Crimea peninsula, which Russia annexed in 2014.
Over the weekend, Zelensky warned of a coming threat when he said in his daily address that “we should be aware that this week Russia may try to do something particularly nasty, something particularly cruel.”
The U.S. Embassy’s warning came on the heels of Russia’s claim that Ukrainian intelligence was responsible for the car bombing that killed the daughter of a leading right-wing Russian political thinker over the weekend. Ukraine denied involvement.
Hundreds of people lined up Tuesday to pay tributes to Darya Dugina, a 29-year-old commentator with a nationalist Russian TV channel who died when her SUV blew up Saturday night as she was driving on the outskirts of Moscow.
Her father, Alexander Dugin, a philosopher and political theorist who was believed to be the target, ardently supports Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to send troops into Ukraine.
“She lived for the sake of victory, and she died for the sake of victory. Our Russian victory, our truth,” Dugin said at a farewell ceremony.
Much of the sense of dread over the war centers on Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, at Zaporizhzhia in southeastern Ukraine, where continued shelling and fighting in the area has raised fears of a nuclear catastrophe.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres late Monday warned about the nuclear threat in general, particularly since Russia alluded to its massive nuclear arsenal early in the war.
Guterres demanded a halt to “nuclear saber-rattling” on Monday, saying the world was at a “maximum moment of danger” and all countries with nuclear weapons must make a commitment to “no first use.”
That didn’t prevent shelling close to Zaporizhzhia early Tuesday. Regional Gov. Valentyn Reznichenko said Russian forces fired on nearby Marhanets and Nikopol on the right bank of the Dnieper River, continuing weeks of relentless overnight shelling.