Ukraine crisis: Western nations’ sanctions are akin to declaring a war, says Vladimir Putin

8.11 pm: Russian President Vladimir Putin says that any country that imposes a no-fly zone over Ukraine will be considered by Moscow to have entered the armed conflict, reports AFP

8.05 pm: Prime Minister Narendra Modi to chair a high-level meeting on Ukraine crisis, reports ANI.

7.25 pm: Thousands of people protest against in Kherson – a city that Russia claims to have occupied.

7 pm: Only 400 people have been evacuated from Volnovakha, where ceasefire was supposed to be observed, reports BBC. The humanitarian corridor did not last long and process had to be stopped as Russian forces continued shelling.

6.18 pm: Ceasefire talks with Russia are in progress to create a humanitarian corridor out of Mariupol and Volnovackha cities, says Kyrylo Tymoshenko, the deputy head of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office, according to The Associated Press.

“The Russian side is not holding to the cease-fire and has continued firing on Mariupol itself and on its surrounding area,” he says. “Talks with the Russian Federation are ongoing regarding setting up a cease-fire and ensuring a safe humanitarian corridor.”

5.28 pm: The number of refugees leaving because of the Russian invasion could potentially reach 1.5 million by Sunday, the head of the UN refugee agency has said. The figure is currently above 1.3 million.

4.51 pm: Officials from Mariupol city say that evacuation of civilians that was planned on Saturday has been postponed as Russia forces are not observing ceasefire, The Guardian reports.

Mariupol Deputy Mayor Serhiy Orlov told the BBC that there is continuous shelling along evacuation route.

4.30 pm: United Kingdom asks its citizens to leave Russia, The Guardian reports.

“If your presence in Russia is not essential, we strongly advise that you consider leaving by remaining commercial routes,” the British government said in a statement

4.27 pm: Mariupol Deputy Mayor Serhiy Orlov says that Russians continue to bomb and use artillery, despite ceasefire, reports BBC. “There is no ceasefire in Mariupol and there is no ceasefire all along the route,” he says. “Our civilians are ready to escape but they cannot escape under shelling.”

3.49 pm: India says it is exploring all options to evacuate its citizens from eastern Ukranian cities of Sumy and Pisochyn, reports PTI. The Indian embassy says it is reaching out to 298 Indian students in Pisochyn and buses are on their way to evacuate them.

“Please follow all safety instructions and precautions,” the embassy says. “Be safe be strong.”

3.13 pm: Ukraine plans to evacuate 2,00,000 people from Mariupol and 15,000 from Volnovakha, after Russian forces temporarily halted the attack on the cities to allow citizens to safely leave, reports Reuters. It quoted a Russian news agency as saying that the broad offensive in Ukraine would continue.

2.34 pm: Almost 90% of the Volnovakha city is damaged by bombing, says local MP Dmytro Lubinets, according to The Guardian. He adds that streets are strewn with bodies and people at shelters are running out of food.

2.10 pm: Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov says that 66,224 Ukrainian men have returned from abroad to help fight against Russia’s invasion, reports The Guardian.

2.02 pm: The British defence ministry says in its intelligence update that the rate of Russian air and artillery strikes in the last 24 hours are lower than previous days.

It says that the Ukrainian forces were holding the cities of Kharkiv, Chernihiv and Mariupol and that there were reports of fighting in Sumy.

The update adds that the Russian forces were “possibly” advancing towards the southern city of Mykolaiv.

2 pm: Vadym Boichenko, the mayor of Mariupol, says that under the constant shelling by Russia, the residents have no other option than to leace the city.

“Mariupol is not streets and houses,” he says. “It is its residents.”

1.56 pm: The office of President Emmanuel Macron says France will soon propose concrete measures to ensure safety and security of Ukraine’s five main nuclear sites, reports the Associated Press.

It adds that the safeguards will be based on criteria of the International Atomic Energy Agency criteria.

12.41 pm: A group of eminent writers appeal to Russian speakers around the world to convey the truth about the war in Ukraine by directly contacting Russian citizens using “all possible means of communication”, reports The Guardian.

The writers include Nobel laureates Svetlana Alexievich and JM Coetzee.

12.36 pm: The two places for which the temporary ceasefire has been announced are southeastern city of Mariupol and Volnovakha in the Donetsk region, reports BBC.

12.17 pm: Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai says that efforts were under way to bring back the body of Naveen Shekarappa Gyanagoudar, a medical student who died in shelling in Ukraine, reports ANI.

Bommai says his government is in touch with the Indian embassy and has also spoken to Union External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on the matter.

12.14 pm: Russia declares a temporary ceasefire in Ukraine from 6 am Greenwich Mean Time (11.30 am Indian Standard Time) to open humanitarian corridors for civilians, reports Russian state-run news channel RT.

Ukraine has not confirmed this yet.

10.50 am: Chinese state-run broadcaster CCTV censors the opening comments by Andrew Parsons, the chief of the International Paralympics Committee, at the opening ceremony of the event taking place in Beijing, reports BBC. Parsons was making a peace statement in view of the war in Ukraine.

“Tonight, I want to begin with a message of peace,” he says in English. “As the leader of an organisation with inclusion at its core, where diversity is celebrated and differences embraced, I am horrified at what is taking place in the world right now.”

However, in the telecast, his voice appears to be muffled and the sign language interpreter stops the translation of his speech.

10.47 am: A Washington Post reporter says that the newspaper will not print the names of the people who file reports on Russia to ensure their safety. The decision was taken in response to Russia’s new law that imposes jail term for spreading “fake news” about the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

10.45 am: Singapore gives details of the financial measures it will impose on Russia, reports The Guardian.

“We will impose financial measures targeted at designated Russian banks, entities and activities in Russia, and fund-raising activities benefiting the Russian government,” the country’s foreign ministry says. “Digital payment token service providers are specifically prohibited from facilitating transactions that could help to circumvent these financial measures.”

10.42 am: The United Nations Security Council will hold an open meeting on Monday on the worsening humanitarian situation in Ukraine, reports the Associated Press. UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths and Catherine Russell, the executive director of the agency’s children’s agency will brief the countries, say diplomats.

10.38 am: Amid the Ukraine crisis due to which several Indian medical students have been evacuated from the European country, the National Medical Commission allows foreign students with incomplete internships to finish them in India if they clear the national qualifiers, the Foreign Medical Graduates Examination, reports ANI.

10.32 am: Casual wear designer and retailer Uniqlo’s parent company Fast Retailing says it will will donate $10 million, or around Rs 76.42 crore, and 2 lakh clothing items to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in order to aid people forced to flee the Russian invasion of Ukraine, reports The Kyiv Independent.

10.30 am: Air raid alerts have been sounded in Ukraine’s capital Kyiv and its northern city of Chernihiv, reports The Kyiv Independent.

9.22 am: According to The Guardian, Mariupol Mayor Vadym Boychenko says on his Telegram account: “Our priority is the establishment of a ceasefire so that we can restore vital infrastructure and set up a humanitarian corridor to bring food and medicine into the city.”

9.15 am: Port city of Mariupol has been “blockaded” by Russian forces, AFP quotes its mayor as saying.

8.25 am: CBS News and ABC News suspend their work in Russia, reports BBC.

The decision comes after Russia passed a new law imposing prison terms of up to 15 years on people charged with spreading “fake news” about the war in Ukraine.

Earlier, BBC, CNN and Bloomberg also suspended their operations in Russia.

8.24 am: Electronics and information technology company Samsung suspends sales to Russia “due to current geopolitical developments”, reported BBC.

The company says it will “continue to actively monitor this complex situation to determine our next steps”.

8.19 am: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy condemns the North Atlantic Treaty Organization for refusing to implement a no-fly zone over Ukraine, saying the decision has given “the green light for further bombing of Ukrainian towns and villages”, reported The Guardian.

“All the people who die from this day forward will also die because of you, because of your weakness, because of your lack of unity,” the Ukrainian president said in an emotional nighttime address.

On Friday, NATO had said that enforcing a no-fly zone could result in a full-fledged war in Europe with Russia.

“The only way to implement a no-fly zone is to send NATO fighter planes into Ukraine’s airspace, and then impose that no-fly zone by shooting down Russian planes,” Jens Stoltenberg, the alliance’s chief, said.

8.14 am: Facebook, which has been rebranded as Meta, condemns Russia’s decision to ban the social media platform in the country.

In a statement, Nick Clegg, the chief of global operations at Meta, says that due to Russia’s decisions millions of people will be cut off “reliable information”, deprived from contacting their friends and family and silenced from speaking out.

“We will continue to do everything we can to restore our services so they remain available to people to safely and securely express themselves and organize for action,” Clegg adds.

8.10 am: Oleksiy Danilov, the head of Ukraine’s security council, asks Russia to create humanitarian corridors to allow children, women and the elderly to escape the fighting. Danilov says over 840 children have been wounded in the war.

“The question of humanitarian corridors is question No 1.,” he says. “Children, women, elderly people – what are they doing here?”

Also read:

‘I do not know how today will end’: A letter from a Ukrainian in Moscow

8.05 am: Bloomberg news channel suspends work of its journalists in Russia, reports AFP.

8.03 am: The United States Embassy in Ukraine calls Russia’s attack on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant a war crime, reports the Associated Press.

“It is a war crime to attack a nuclear power plant,” the embassy says in a statement. “[Vladimir] Putin’s shelling of Europe’s largest nuclear plant takes his reign of terror one step further.”

8 am: Here are the top updates of the Ukrainian crisis from Friday:

• Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday told neighbouring countries not to “escalate tensions”, as the invasion of Ukraine entered its ninth day. Putin said that Russia has no bad intentions towards its neighbours. 
• Europe’s biggest nuclear power plant in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia was captured in an attack by Russian forces that led to a fire on the facility on Friday. The Russian defence ministry said the plant was under its control and functioning normally, but said Ukrainian “saboteurs” are responsible for the blaze.
• With the return of thousands of Indian students, most of whom were studying medicine in Ukraine, the Indian Medical Association has asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to consider accommodating them in different institutes in the country. The association said that as a “one-time measure”, these students could be allowed to join colleges in India for the remainder of their degrees.
• Russian air strikes in a rural residential area in the Kyiv region killed seven people, two of them children. According to the police, air strikes hit Markhalivka, a village around 10 km from the capital Kyiv.
• The besieged port city of Mariupol in Ukraine has no water, heat or electricity while food is set to run out. The city has been under attack for five days now. The mayor, Vadym Boychenko, appealed for a humanitarian corridor to be set up so that civilians could be evacuated from the city. According an American official, the city remains under the control of Ukraine but has faced heavy attack from Russian forces.