?Even as Moscow has put its nuclear forces on high alert while Ukrainian forces resist a Russian invasion for the past four days, stories of bravery and valour have continued to emerge from the war-hit nation.
Fighting has claimed dozens of civilian lives, forced hundreds and thousands of Ukrainians to flee west and could, according to the EU, eventually displace up to seven million people.But, many have chosen to stay back, to fight, to claim their land.
One such story comes from Berdyansk, a port city in southeast Ukraine. A video clip, still unverified, has been making the rounds online showing a Ukrainian man, with a lit cigarette still held in his mouth, carrying what is allegedly a landmine across an empty street and into a wooded area.?
In the video, he is seen removing an anti-tank mine with his bare hands while puffing a cigarette. The 38-second clip ends while the man is still walking off with the mine in hand.
It's reported the fearless man - donning a black puffer coat and jeans -found the land mine by a roadside in Berdyansk before calmly moving it into a forest.Footage shows the civilian carrying the explosive device across a road away from a bridge as he smokes a cigarette.
The clip has already been viewed over 1 million times, according to a tweet featuring the video that was posted by The New Voice of Ukraine. The mine in the clip was specifically an anti-tank variety, according to a report from the Daily Mail.
In another show of strength, hundreds of brave Ukrainians forced Russian tanks to grind to a halt by blocking a road on foot.A chilling clip, thought to have been shot in Koryukiva, just miles from Ukraine¡¯s border with Russia, shows hoards of locals standing up to a convoy of tanks.
It comes as?Russia has become an international pariah as its forces do battle on the streets of Ukraine's cities, facing a barrage of sanctions including a ban from Western airspace and key financial networks.
Ukraine said it had agreed to send a delegation to meet Russian representatives on the border with Belarus, which has allowed Russian troops passage to attack Ukraine.But Kyiv insisted there were no pre-conditions to the talks.
"We will not capitulate, we will not give up a single inch of our territory," Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said ahead of the first public contact between the two sides since war erupted.
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky was sceptical."As always: I do not really believe in the outcome of this meeting, but let them try," he said.