Russia edges toward a possible offensive on Kharkiv

KHARKIV, Ukraine (AP) — A 79-year-old woman makes the sign of the cross and, gripping her cane, leaves her home in a quaint village in northeast Ukraine.

Torn screens, shattered glass and scorched trees litter the yard of Olha Faichuk’s apartment building in Lukiantsi, north of the city of Kharkiv. Abandoned on a nearby bench is a shrapnel-pierced cellphone that belonged to one of two people killed when a Russian bomb struck, leaving a blackened crater in its wake.