As Russia’s war in Ukraine enters a third week, Moscow’s military has fallen short of expectations, in large part because of the unexpected ferocity of the Ukrainian army’s resistance.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Friday that Ukraine’s military forces have reached “a strategic turning point”, even as Moscow’s forces continued their efforts to encircle Kyiv, and attacked other key cities.

Mr Zelensky said in Kyiv on Friday: “It’s impossible to say how many days we will still need to free our land, but it is possible to say that we will do it because … we have reached a strategic turning point,” without elaborating that might be..

Meanwhile in Moscow, Vladimir Putin said there had been “certain positive developments” in talks between the countries, but did not offer any details about what those developments were.

Ukraine claims ‘opponent halted’

Mr Putin hosted Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko for talks on Friday and told him that negotiations with Ukraine “are now being held almost on a daily basis”.

However, on Friday night, Ukrainian military and government officials claimed Belarus was preparing to invade the country.

Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych said Russian advances had stalled and had made no progress in the previous 24 hours.

“Our opponent has been halted in practically every direction by air strikes, rocket fire and ground attacks,” he said, adding that Ukraine’s armed forces had staged counter-attacks near Kyiv and the eastern city of Kharkiv.

However, Russian forces bearing down on Kyiv were regrouping on Friday north-west of the Ukrainian capital, satellite pictures showed, in what the UK said could be preparation for an assault on Kyiv within days.

Fighting could go on for weeks

Steven Pifer, senior fellow at American think-thank Brookings, and a former US ambassador to Ukraine, said the fighting could continue for weeks or longer.

He said that while Russian troops had made progress in southern Ukraine by occupying thecity of Kherson and surrounding Mariupol, they have experienced difficulties in the north where Ukrainian defenders have fought fiercely in defence of Kyiv, Chernihiv and Kharkiv.

“Russian military operations appear aimed at taking much or all of Ukraine east of a line running from Kyiv in the north to Odesa on the Black Sea,” Mr Pifer wrote in a blog for Brookings on Thursday.

“Russian ground forces have not yet entered the western third of the country. Russian units in the north appear to be preparing to attack Kyiv.”

Michael Kofman, director of Russian studies at the CNA think tank, said Russia’s military operation was “bizarre” and based on “terrible political assumptions, with poor relationship to their training and capabilities”.

However, Mr Pifer argued that if military mass and numbers determined who would win the war, then “Russia will prevail”.

He added: “Will Putin rethink his objectives? On his current course, a military ‘victory’ would appear to entail a years or decades-long occupation of a hostile, anti-Russian Ukraine, political isolation from most of the world, and economic sanctions that will devastate the Russian economy.

“One would think there has to be a better option.”