Russia set to incorporate 18 percent of Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin was set to finalise his plan to annex four Ukrainian regions yesterday, even as his forces are being pushed back by Ukraine on two separate battlefield fronts, shrinking the amount of seized territory he controls.

Russia, which has escalated its seven-month war with its annexation drive, a mobilisation and warnings of nuclear weapons use, looks to be in a hurry to complete a process that Ukraine and the West say is illegal and won't be recognised.

The upper house of Russia's parliament earlier yesterday voted to approve the four regions' incorporation, which taken together represent around 18 percent of Ukraine. The Kremlin said that Putin's signature, the final stage in the process, was likely later in the day.

In Brussels, the European Union summoned Russia's envoy to the bloc to reject Moscow's "illegal annexation" and urge it to unconditionally withdraw all of its troops from the entire territory of Ukraine.

Russia does not completely control any of the four regions it says it is annexing -- Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson -- and the Kremlin has said it has yet to determine the final borders of the annexed territory.

Russian forces in the eastern Donetsk and southern Kherson regions have been forced to retreat in recent days and appear to be struggling to halt a well-equipped Ukrainian army.

Moscow is hoping a "partial mobilisation" it announced two weeks ago could help turn the tide.

Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu was cited by the RIA news agency yesterday as saying that Moscow had so far called up more than 200,000 reservists out of a planned 300,000 men.

In a decree yesterday, Zelensky formally declared any talks with Putin "impossible", while leaving the door open to talks with Russia if it got a new leader.

The Kremlin said what it calls its "special military operation" in Ukraine would not end if Kyiv ruled out talks, adding that it "takes two sides to negotiate".

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov also said Moscow did not want to take part in "nuclear rhetoric" spread by the West, after Britain's Times newspaper reported that Nato had warned its members that Putin might test an atomic weapon on Ukraine's border.

The newspaper said Russia had moved a train thought to be linked to a unit responsible for nuclear munitions.

In their biggest breakthrough in the south since the seven-month war began, Ukrainian forces recaptured several villages in an advance along the strategic Dnipro River on Monday, Ukrainian officials and a Russian-installed leader in the area said.

In the east, Ukrainian forces have been expanding an offensive after capturing the main Russian bastion in the north of Donetsk, the city of Lyman, hours after Putin proclaimed the annexation of the province last week.

In another development, India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi yesterday told Zelensky that his country is ready to contribute to peace efforts in the ongoing conflict with Russia that has raged for seven months.

"He expressed his firm conviction that there can be no military solution to the conflict and conveyed India's readiness to contribute to any peace efforts," the Indian prime minister's office said in a statement after a telephone conversation between Modi and Zelenskiy.

India is articulating its position against the Ukraine war more robustly to counter criticism that it is soft on Russia, but it still has neither held Moscow responsible for the invasion nor altered its policy on importing cheap Russian oil and coal. Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24.