Biden ‘determined’ not to deploy U.S. troops to Ukraine; Chinese delegation meets in Kyiv

In his State of the Union speech, U.S. President Joe Biden vowed not to send American troops to Ukraine, saying that with U.S. military and financial support, Kyiv can defeat Moscow on its own. He once again implored members of Congress to support a new aid package for the embattled country.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will visit Turkey today for talks with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Ukraine faced a deadly Russian attack on the southern port city of Odesa on Thursday, which killed 12 people, five of them children. The strikes took place while Zelenskyy and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis were meeting there. EU leaders called the attack “vile” and “reckless.”

On the same day, Sweden officially joined the NATO alliance, a triumph for the transatlantic organization in its push against Russia two years after the Nordic country first applied to join, ending its historic position of nonalignment.

Elsewhere, Lithuanian intelligence agencies warned that Russia has sufficient resources to keep fighting “at a similar intensity,” at least in the near term. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine entered its third year in late February.