America and Europe promised to continue providing financial and military support to Ukraine, while Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said after visiting Kherson that Russia had destroyed all the infrastructure in the region.

In this context, the US National Security Council Strategic Communications Coordinator, John Kirby, told Al-Jazeera that the United States will continue to support the Ukrainian forces on the ground.

Kirby stressed that only President Volodymyr Zelensky chooses the timing of negotiations with Russia.

For his part, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valeriy Zaluzhny, spoke by phone with the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley.

The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said on his personal account in Telegram that he told Milli that the Ukrainian Armed Forces will not accept any negotiations, agreements or compromises.

He added that there is one condition for the negotiations, which is that Russia leave all the lands it has seized.


full support

In a parallel context, the European Union's foreign policy commissioner, Josep Borrell, said that the military support mission to Ukraine will be officially launched at the end of this month.

Borrell said that the meeting of European defense ministers scheduled to be held in Brussels next Tuesday will discuss more details about that.

Borrell also revealed that the Union and its member states provided weapons and military equipment worth at least 8 billion euros ($8.27 billion) to Ukraine.

He told reporters after a meeting with his counterparts in the European Union in Brussels that this amount amounts to about 45% of what the United States provided to Kyiv.

In turn, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said, in an interview with Al-Jazeera, that Europe will stand with Ukraine during the war, regardless of how long it lasts.

Von der Leyen added that Russia should negotiate with the Ukrainian government to end the war.

On the issue of sanctions, the US Treasury said it had imposed new sanctions related to Russia.

The Treasury Department indicated that the new sanctions against Russia include 14 individuals and 28 entities.


Ukrainian progress

On the ground, the spokesman for the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Alexander Shtobun, confirmed the destruction of an ammunition depot for the Russian forces on the left bank of the Dnipro River in the Kherson region.

Stopun said that the Ukrainian strikes on the positions of the Russian forces resulted in the death of 40 Russian soldiers and the destruction of two armored vehicles and 10 trucks.

For his part, the head of the military regional administration in Luhansk, Serhiy Heidi, said that the Ukrainian forces had taken control of 12 towns in the Luhansk region.

Heidi confirmed that the battles are continuing in the region, and that the Russian forces are bombing the villages that the Ukrainian army has entered.

For his part, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visited Kherson, days after Ukrainian forces regained control of it.

The Ukrainian president confirmed that Russia had destroyed "all critical infrastructure" in parts of the region.

"Before winter, all vital infrastructure was completely destroyed by the Russian occupiers," Zelensky said during his daily speech, adding that "all important facilities in the city and the region were mined."

"There is no electricity, no communications, no Internet, no television" in Kherson, adding, "the occupiers destroyed everything on purpose."

And Zelensky added, "This is what the Russian flag means - complete destruction," promising to return to normal life.