wonder why ukrainians don t trust skepticism puts it too lightly just don t trust russia in the negotiations as they re sitting down in turkey. it s a beginning, a start, but everything they talked about is very hypothetical. everything is sort of pie in the sky. when you look at what s happening on the ground, why would ukraine trust russia at this point? hi, yeah. from the beginning of this conflict, vladimir putin has shown us that he that you really cannot believe anything that russian diplomats or russian envoys or what he says. it is clear that this whole idea of russia drastically reducing its strikes in chernihiv or its troop presence on chernihiv or kyiv is actually basically a front for the fact that they re losing there.
of the buildings in mariupol have either been damaged or destroyed. now, willie, over the past several hours, the governor of chernihiv, the city northeast of kyiv that the russians conceded that they would be they claim that they re pulling back some of their forces from there, the governor of that region says that shelling continued in that city overnight. that shelling continued in the outskirts of kyiv. of course, president zelenskyy saying that the fighting continues in other parts of the country. the shelling continues in kharkiv in the northeast and, as i mentioned, in mariupol. that feeds into the skepticism that, you know, many ukrainians feel that this is just a repositioning of russian forces. the british ministry of defense also saying that some russian forces have gone back to russia and also to belarus, being forced to resupply. so, certainly, a lot of questions about where this is going from here. all this, willie, as the
chernihiv show exactly why nato countries are approaching russia s claim that it is drawing down troops with skepticism. russia says it wants to increase trust at the negotiating table, but officials believe it may be repositioning its forces to stage a larger assault on the east. nbc news chief foreign correspondent richard engel has more from ukraine. reporter: the new talks between russia and ukraine began with deep mistrust. no handshake. but after 4 hours, the most significant progress so far. russia s deputy defense minister announcing russian troops would drastically reduce activity in central ukraine around kyiv and the city of chernihiv. ukrainian officials saying no foreign troops. all have to leave ukraine. but that ukraine would negotiate on the future status of russian-backed separatist ars
they re not drastically reducing anything. all through the night, they were striking these cities. but what is at play on the ground is the fact that the russian military, both in kyiv and in chernihiv, very largely stalled. for weeks, they ve been beaten back by the ukrainian military. so it is a little bit sort of ironic in the extreme, that vladimir putin would then turn around and say that he s going to calm down there. he is calming down there because, in many ways, he s been beat back. his troops haven t been able to move at all. i think that s very much the pentagon seems to think it was a disguise in an unusually, sharply worded press conference yesterday. the pentagon press secretary john kirby said beware, we are not going to believe this. we expect this is more repositioning. russia is pivoting towards the
no wayyyy. no waaayyy! no way! [phone ringing] hm. no way! no way! priceline. every trip is a big deal. it is the top of the hour, and we have breaking news from ukraine. russia pledged about 24 hours ago to let up on the northern city of chernihiv, but according to the governor there, russian forces spent the whole night shelling the region. proving once again that vladimir putin cannot be trusted. the overnight developments show