Ukraine ruled out a ceasefire or any territorial concessions to Moscow while Russia intensified its attack in the east and south and stopped sending gas to Finland in its latest response to Western sanctions.

Ukraine ruled out a ceasefire or concessions to Moscow while Russia intensified an offensive in the eastern Donbas region and stopped providing gas to Finland, as Polish President Andrzej Duda prepared to address the Ukrainian parliament on Sunday.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky yesterday warned that only a diplomatic breakthrough rather than an outright military victory could end Russia’s war on his country, as Moscow cut gas supplies to Finland.

Russia stopped providing gas to Finland in an escalation of a row over energy payments with the West on Saturday, and intensified an offensive in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine.

Russia has declared victory in its months-long operation to capture the strategic port of Mariupol after Ukraine ordered the last of its troops holed up in the city’s Azovstal steelworks to lay down their arms.

Russia said on Saturday it had so far banned 963 Americans from entering the country - including previously announced moves against President Joe Biden and other top officials - and would continue to retaliate against what it called hostile US actions.

President Biden on Saturday signed legislation to support Ukraine with another $40 billion in US assistance as the Russian invasion approaches its fourth month.

Russian forces bombarded areas of Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region from land and air yesterday, destroying houses in residential districts and killing a number of civilians, Ukrainian officials said.

Russia's Gazprom (GAZP.MM) has informed Finland it will halt flows of natural gas from Saturday morning, Gasum said on Friday, after the Finnish state-owned gas wholesaler refused to pay its Russian supplier in roubles.

Finland and Sweden formally applied to join the NATO alliance on Wednesday, a decision spurred by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, but face objections from Turkey to an accession process that is expected to take only a few weeks.

The first Russian soldier on trial in Ukraine for war crimes during Moscow's invasion pleaded guilty on Wednesday, facing possible life imprisonment in Kyiv.

French President Emmanuel Macron told his Ukrainian counterpart on Tuesday that French arms deliveries to Ukraine would intensify in coming days and said France was ready to respond to additional demands for help, the Elysee said.

More than 250 Ukrainian fighters surrendered to Russian forces at the Azovstal steelworks in Mariupol and Kyiv said yesterday it had ordered its full garrison to evacuate, bringing an apparent end to the bloodiest battle in Europe for decades.

Western countries have been ramping up weapons and ammunition shipments to Ukraine as Kyiv fights off a Russian invasion, but arms trade experts warn some of the lethal assistance could end up falling into the wrong hands.

Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday warned Finland and Sweden to expect a “response” for applying to join Nato as Ukrainian troops reached border after pushing Russian forces back from the northeastern city of Kharkiv.

Russia has lost around a third of the ground forces it deployed to Ukraine and its offensive in the Donbas region “has lost momentum and fallen significantly behind schedule”, British military intelligence said yesterday.

The war in Ukraine could reach a “breaking point” by August and end in defeat for Russia before the end of the year, Kyiv’s head of military intelligence said yesterday, as fierce fighting raged in Ukraine’s east, slowing down a hoped-for Russian advance.

The Group of Seven leading economies warned Saturday that the war in Ukraine is stoking a global food and energy crisis that threatens poor countries, and urgent measures are needed to unblock stores of grain that Russia is preventing from leaving Ukraine.

Russian President Vladimir Putin told his Finnish counterpart Sauli Niinisto on Saturday that ditching neutrality and joining NATO would be a mistake that could damage relations between their two countries, the Kremlin said.

Journalists packed a small courtroom in Kyiv for the trial of a captured Russian soldier accused of killing a Ukrainian civilian in the early days of the war — the first of dozens of war crimes cases that Ukraine’s top prosecutor said her office is pursuing.