Russia-Ukraine updates: US to ban Russian carriers from its airspace

Biden will announce the news in his State of the Union address, a source said.

Russian forces are continuing their attempted push through Ukraine from multiple directions, while Ukrainians, led by President Volodymr Zelenskyy, are putting up "stiff resistance," according to U.S. officials.

The attack began Feb. 24 as Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a "special military operation."

Russians moving from Belarus towards Ukraine's capital, Kyiv, don't appear to have advanced closer towards the city since coming within about 20 miles, although smaller advanced groups have been fighting gun battles with Ukrainian forces inside the capital since at least Friday.

Russia has been met by sanctions from the U.S., Canada and countries throughout Europe, targeting Russia's economy and Putin himself.

Latest headlines:

Here's how the news is developing. All times Eastern.
Feb 26, 2022, 3:26 PM EST

Russian forces: 'We don’t know who to shoot, they all look like us'

A senior U.S. official told ABC News they've heard a Russian soldier on a radio call saying, “We don’t know who to shoot -- they all look like us.”

The official also said some Russian forces are disoriented, realizing the battles against Ukrainians are harder than they thought.

Ukrainian soldiers take positions outside a military facility as two cars burn in a street in Kyiv, Ukraine, Feb. 26, 2022.
Emilio Morenatti/AP

-ABC News' Martha Raddatz

Feb 26, 2022, 3:12 PM EST

Germany drops opposition to sending lethal aid

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has announced that Germany is dropping its historic position of not providing lethal military aid to conflict zones, saying Russia's "invasion marks a turning point."

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz speaks with the media as he arrives for an extraordinary EU summit on Ukraine at the European Council building in Brussels, Feb 24, 2022.
John Thys/Pool via AP

Germany will provide 1,000 anti-tank weapons and 500 Stinger missiles, he said. 

The Netherlands is also announcing new lethal aid, according to its Defense Ministry. 

The $350 million military aid package from the U.S. will include “anti-armor, small arms and various munitions, body armor, and related equipment in support of Ukraine’s front-line defenders facing down Russia’s unprovoked attack," Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said. The U.S. package also includes portable surface-to-air missiles (MANPADS) in the Pentagon's inventory, a U.S. official told ABC News.

Ukrainian soldiers handle equipment outside Kharkiv, Ukraine, Feb. 26, 2022.
Andrew Marienko/AP

-ABC News' Conor Finnegan

Feb 26, 2022, 2:56 PM EST

Ukrainians waiting 40 hours to cross border: UN

At a border crossing near Zosin, Poland -- due west of Kyiv -- Ukrainians are waiting for 40 hours to cross into Poland in a nearly 10-mile backlog, said Chris Meltzer of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

Meltzer said one woman with her two children told him it took her 12 hours to get out of Kyiv and then they spent another 38 hours waiting in their car without heat or a bathroom.

He said the biggest needs are blankets, clothes and accommodations.

A woman walks with her dogs after arriving from Ukraine, crossing the border in Beregsurany, Hungary, Feb 26, 2022. Hungary has extended legal protection to those fleeing the Russian invasion.
Anna Szilagyi/AP

Meltzer said, once they cross, most Ukrainians are staying in the border region because they want to return home as soon as possible.

A Ukrainian woman holds her child as they wait to enter Romania after crossing the Danube river at the Isaccea-Orlivka border crossing point between Romania and Ukraine, Feb. 25, 2022.
Daniel Mihailescu/AFP via Getty Images

-ABC News' Cindy Smith

Feb 26, 2022, 2:07 PM EST

Zelenskyy says Russia will be disconnected from SWIFT

Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Saturday Western countries have agreed to disconnect Russia from the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) banking network.

A man clears debris at a damaged residential building at Koshytsa Street, a suburb of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, where a military shell allegedly hit, Feb. 25, 2022.
Daniel Leal/AFP via Getty Images

"For Russia it will mean being cut off [from] normal financial civilization. This is a big diplomatic victory," he said. "Russia will suffer billions upon billions of financial losses -- their price for invasion."

Ukraine’s foreign minister said earlier that technical preparations have begun for disconnecting Russia from SWIFT and that the last holdouts, Germany and Hungary, have signaled they're no longer opposed.

Zelenskyy also said Turkey’s president has agreed to close the straits into the Black Sea to Russia.

Zelenskyy continued, "You know, it was a beautiful sunny day in Kyiv today that occupiers tried to ruin. But today is also the first day in the life of the baby girl born in the shelter in Kyiv metro station."

"We fight back strongly … and we will do our best to liberate our country," he said. "When babies come into this world even under shelling and fire, then the enemy has no chance in this war.”

-ABC News' Patrick Reevell

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