Ukraine War: More than 836,000 people have fled Ukraine since the Russian invasion, according to the UN.
New Delhi:
Russia is pushing hard to seize control in major Ukrainian cities as the country puts up a defiant stand. India has stepped up evacuation of its citizens from the war zone by roping in the Air Force.
Here are the latest developments:
- Russian forces have taken over the Ukrainian city of Kherson, the first major urban centre to fall since Moscow invaded a week ago. According to news agency AFP, the Russian forces have also surrounded Mariupol, a strategic port on the Sea of Azov.
- Mariupol city council said Russia was constantly and deliberately shelling critical civilian infrastructure in the Ukrainian southern port, leaving it without water, heating or power and preventing bringing supplies or evacuating people.
- The situation in Ukraine's capital Kyiv is "difficult but under control", mayor Vitali Klitschko has said. Klitschko said there were no casualties overnight and that nighttime explosions were Ukrainian air defences striking down incoming Russian missiles.
- Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has vowed to stay in capital Kyiv, has accused Russia of trying to "erase" Ukrainians, their country and their history. Kharkiv, Ukraine's second city, continues to come under heavy Russian shelling, with police and university buildings among the latest struck.
- Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov has accused accused Western politicians of fixating on nuclear war. "I would like to point out that it's in the heads of Western politicians that the idea of a nuclear war is spinning constantly, and not in the heads of Russians," he said.