Talks between Ukraine and Russia are confrontational but moving forward, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Wednesday, as the West plans to announce more sanctions against the Kremlin amid a worsening humanitarian crisis.Hundreds of thousands are believed to be trapped inside buildings, with no access to food, water, power or heat. Both civilians and Ukrainian troops were coming under Russian fire, said regional governor Pavlo Kyrylenko.Russian forces and Russian-backed separatist units had taken about half of the port city, normally home to around 400,000 people, Russia’s RIA news agency said, citing a separatist leader. But in an early morning address, Zelenskiy held out hope for negotiations, which have yielded little since the Feb. 24 invasion began.“It’s very difficult, sometimes confrontational,” he said. “But step by step we are moving forward.”U.S. President Joe Biden and his European counterparts will announce new sanctions against Russia and new measures to tighten existing sanctions during his trip to Brussels this week, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said.Biden also will discuss longer-term adjustments to NATO force posture and contingencies in the case of nuclear weapons use, Sullivan said. Biden also will announce “joint action” on enhancing energy security in Europe, which is highly reliant on Russian gas.The United States and its allies have imposed sweeping sanctions against Russia as punishment for invading Ukraine and supplied billions of dollars in weapons and aid for Ukraine’s defense. Biden has pledged not to send U.S. soldiers into Ukraine, but promised to keep Washington’s commitment to defend NATO members if they were attacked.Biden leaves on Wednesday for Brussels, where NATO and the European Union are based, for meetings on Thursday with fellow leaders. He will attend an emergency NATO summit, meet with G7 leaders, and address European Union leaders at a meeting of the European Council, Sullivan said.cnbc.com