The russian dictator putin declared that, as of today, the russian army has no plans to capture Kharkiv. He made this statement to russian media on May 17.
"There are no plans to capture Kharkiv as of today. The operation of the Russian armed forces in the Kharkiv direction is the fault of the Ukrainian authorities, a response to the shelling of Russian regions", - putin said.
Putin also linked the operation of the russian armed forces in the Kharkiv direction to the "creation of a sanitary zone in response to the shelling by the Ukrainian armed forces".
It is worth recalling that the Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Oleksandr Syrskyi, stated that russian occupiers had expanded the zone of active hostilities by nearly 70 kilometers, attempting to force the Ukrainian Armed Forces to deploy additional brigades from the reserve.