Pictures from the main railway station in the Ukrainian capital today show that people were still trying to leave the city ahead of an expected Russian attempted advance.

Image source, EPA

Image source, EPA

Some may end up adding to the more than a million who have already left the country.

The total figure is expected to top 1.5 million by the end of the weekend, the head of the UN's refugee agency, Filippo Grandi, told the Reuters news agency.

He called it "the fastest moving refugee crisis... in Europe since the end of World War Two".

According to the latest UN figures, external there are now 1.36m Ukrainian refugees - more than half of them, some 760,000, have travelled to Poland. Hungary has taken 157,000.

Fergal Keane
BBC News, Lviv

Eighty-year-old Halyna is fleeing on her own to Poland. She is a homeless woman who has lived around Lviv station until now.

“There’s nothing for me now,” she said. “Anywhere would be better than Ukraine.”

She was among thousands of people boarding trains and buses from Lviv to the border with Poland.

Local volunteers have organised queues to avoid the crushing that took place earlier in the week.

Vasyl Bilogrud, aged 54, is heading in the other direction, to defend Kyiv.

He fought previously in the war in the east and has now joined up again.

His grandfather fought against the Soviets as a partisan after World War Two.

“I am not afraid to die,” he said. “I would tear Putin apart if I could.”

As bombardments in the Ukrainian capital continue, more and more people pay the price of the war.

Max and his family were in their flat high up in a tower block in Kyiv when it was bombed.

He told the BBC's Ukrainecast he did not know how they had managed to survive.

"It's completely insane, it's completely impossible," he said.

Their flat was indeed destroyed, as shown in this video.

Max's eldest son broke his spine during the attack - his prognosis is good, doctors say - while his wife was also taken to hospital with injuries.

Image source, Reuters

There have been reports of shelling in a number of Ukrainian cities.

Let's look at what we know has been happening in the past 24 hours:

• Heavy bombardments have been reported in Irpin - a town on the north-western outskirts of Kyiv
• Shelling also continues in the southern city of Mariupol, where a planned ceasefire to enable residents to leave was aborted shortly after it began
• Heavy shelling hit Kharkiv and Sumy in the east overnight
• Heavy fighting to the north-west of the capital Kyiv around the key Hostomel airport continued on Saturday
• Russian forces continue attempts to encircle Kyiv, which, along with Kharkiv, remains under Ukrainian control despite heavy bombardment

BBC correspondent Sarah Rainsford has just sent us these pictures from inside the state circus in Zaporizhzhia. The building had been readied to receive some of the thousands of people who were expected to be leaving Mariupol and Volnovakha - around 200km (125 miles) away from the city.

Mattresses had been laid out on the floor of the circus ring where those fleeing would have rested before moving on to other accommodation.

There were also piles of clothes and blankets.

Jars of food had been prepared as well.

But the mass evacuation never happened. A planned ceasefire that would have created a safe corridor lasted just minutes as Russia continued shelling Mariupol, the city's deputy mayor said.

Lyse Doucet
Chief International Correspondent

Kyiv remains eerily quiet, shattered at intervals by the wail of air raid sirens and the thud of explosions on the city’s rim; occasionally they strike closer to the heart of this city. There’s a palpable sense of foreboding about what could lie ahead.

Residents of this beleaguered capital are in constant touch with friends and relatives as Russian forces pound residential areas with ferocious firepower in cities to the north, south and east.

A few days ago, we brought you the story of Liana, our neighbour in our basement shelter, who started this war with the kind of patriotic optimism that's surging across a nation fighting Russia’s invasion with firepower and flags.

But she anguished about her elderly father in a village further north, close to Chernobyl, as Russian troops moved into his area, then barged into his home, looking for cigarettes. They never left.

That news, which left Liana in floods of tears, just got worse. Confined to his basement as fighting raged across his village, her father eventually came up for air, after days of thunderous clatter above ground.

“He only saw the sky,” Liana told me, sobbing uncontrollably. His house was gone; everything he built in his life lost. “How can he begin again?” she asked of her father, now retired, in his sixties.

Next to his flattened home, the houses next door were in flames.

With nowhere to go, he and another family member drank some vodka – their only defence against sub-zero temperatures and this merciless war.

Heavy bombardments have been reported in Irpin - a town on the north-western outskirts of Kyiv where the Russian army has been trying to break through.

Large numbers of civilians have been fleeing across a makeshift foot bridge spanning a river, as the road bridge has been destroyed

Irpin lies near the airport of Hostomel, which the Russians attacked several days ago, and also near the head of the Russian convoy of armoured vehicles which has been making slow progress towards the Ukrainian capital.

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

Many of the 70,000 foreign students who were in Ukraine when the invasion began have now made it out of the country, but there are still some stranded.

In Sumy - near the frontline and close to the Russian border in the north-east of the country - a group of Nigerian students have been appealing for help.

Zimbabwean student Korrine Sky, who is now in Romania after leaving Ukraine, is sharing their videos on social media.

In this video one unnamed student recounts what happened to her as Sumy came under Russian bombardment.

"The last explosion took place close to my home... at every sound I quiver, at every noise I quake.

"All we are asking is: Can we cease fire and let the students of Sumy move?

"We are many here and we are stranded and we are stuck."

For more:

• Why so many foreign students were in Ukraine
• Korrine Sky: Africans in Ukraine are crying out for help

All UK citizens in Russia who don't have an essential reason to be there have been advised by the British government to consider leaving, external.

Direct flights are not available but travel is still possible via Istanbul and Doha, among other places.

To make it easier for people to leave Russia the UK government has removed the need to fill out a passenger locator form, normally required to comply with coronavirus measures, for those starting their journeys there, Transport Minister Grant Shapps has tweeted, external.

A video has emerged showing people helping themselves inside a shopping centre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol.

People can be seen walking around with trollies and bags full of goods, as the city remains under siege by Russian forces.

Officials say residents are in dire need of food, water and medicine due to Russia's blockade of the city.

Simon Browning
Business Reporter

Image source, Getty Images

Russia is aiming to stop many of its international flights that operate with leased aircraft.

The move is to prevent them being seized when arriving in a country that has sanctions in place.

Russia's state aviation authority has recommended that Russian airlines with foreign-leased aircraft suspend flights of passengers and cargo travelling outside Russia from 6 March and from foreign countries to Russia from 8 March.

There are billions of pounds worth of leased aircraft in Russia.

Planes are leased into Russia for tax purposes due to high import taxes when buying the aircraft.

As we have reported, Russia's national airline Aeroflot has cancelled nearly all international flights from 8 March, because of what it called "additional circumstances" impeding its operations.

Nomia Iqbal
BBC News, Poland-Ukraine border

It is the closest America will physically get to being in Ukraine - US Secretary of State Antony Blinken stood at the Polish-Ukrainian border to meet Ukraine's FM Dmytro Kuleba earlier today.

Kuleba thanked the US for its help - but also reiterated his hope for more military support, specifically a no-fly zone.

Blinken's response to the latter has always been no. He says forces in the sky could put Nato into direct confrontation with Russia.

"Ukraine will win this war, and we will be a greater country than the one Russia destroyed," says Kuleba solemnly.

As he talked the constant rhythmic sound of luggage wheels are heard in the background.

It's been a long, cold journey for the mostly women and children who have spent days getting here, to the Korczowa crossing. Some of the children are carrying pets who peek out from inside their jackets.

What was once a shopping mall is now ground zero for the frightened people of Ukraine. About 3,000 people are resting in makeshift beds.

As Blinken entered, he asked a soldier how long people stay. He was told that some have friends and relatives in Poland but "half don't know where to go".

Poland has taken in the majority of refuges and now says it will have taken in one million from Ukraine by the end of the weekend.

The deputy mayor of Mariupol, Sergei Orlov, told BBC Radio 4's PM programme earlier that the ceasefire agreed in order to evacuate civilians from the city lasted "not more than 30 minutes".

A five-hour pause, overseen by the Red Cross, was due to be held today to allow civilians to leave Mariupol and Volnovakha, a smaller city to the north.

However, Orlov said his city had been under "continuous shelling" since shortly after the ceasefire was due to start, and schools, kindergartens and buses meant to be used to evacuate civilians had been attacked.

Orlov accused the Russian forces of "genocide" and said he was "afraid" to think about what would happen to residents now, as the city had no water, heating or sanitation.

He called for more military help, including a no-fly zone.

Russia has not commented on the renewed shelling but its defence ministry said civilians had not used the escape routes from Mariupol, and accused Ukrainian authorities of preventing people from leaving.

You can listen to the interview with Orlov via BBC Sounds here.

If you are just joining us, here are the main developments so far today:

• A ceasefire agreed between Russia and Ukraine - to allow civilians to leave the Ukrainian cities of Mariupol and Volnovakha - has fallen apart, just hours after it was announced

• Vladimir Putin has warned the West that any country imposing a no-fly zone over Ukraine will be considered to have joined the war
• The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) has warned that the number of Ukrainian refugees could soon exceed 1.5m people
• Zara is closing all 500 of its stores in Russia, while Samsung and PayPal are suspending activities in the country
• More than £85m has been raised in the UK in just two days to provide help for Ukraine

• Russia's national airline Aeroflot has cancelled nearly all international flights from 8 March, because of "additional circumstances" impeding its operations
• Anti-war protests are taking place across the world including in London, Bangkok, Switzerland and Kherson - the only Ukrainian city occupied by Russia so far

At least six people - including a child - were killed in a Russian air strike on a rural village in the Kyiv region on Friday, according to Ukrainian officials.

Writing on Facebook yesterday, police said two more adults and two more children were also hospitalised in the shelling on the village of Markhalivka, around 10 km (6 miles) from the outskirts of the capital Kyiv.

These pictures show the devastation at the scene today as residents started to clear up the rubble.

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Tom Bateman
BBC Middle East correspondent

Israeli PM Naftali Bennett has met Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin, his office has confirmed. The talks lasted about two and a half hours.

Bennett's office says it told the US in advance of the Kremlin meeting.

There’s been plenty of debate about whether the Israeli government could or should realistically mediate in the crisis - it variously wasn’t taken that seriously at the start.

But Bennett flying to Moscow in the middle of Russia’s global isolation seems to take the idea to another level.

Oleksandra Arkhrery, who's based in Kyiv, can't make contact with her family in the southern city of Mariupol, which has been cut off by Russian shelling.

She tells the BBC she's concerned her relatives are not only in danger from bombing, but also from other people desperate for food and water.

"Every time I close my eyes I see and hear my Mum. I hear the voice of my Dad. And I don't know if I'll hear them again."

This morning Russian forces broke a ceasefire in the city, which was meant to allow people trapped there to be evacuated.

There are reports coming in that a psychiatric hospital in a town 60km (37 miles) north-west of Kyiv has been captured by Russian forces, trapping some 670 patients inside.

Ukrainian news platform Hromadske says Kyiv's regional governor confirmed the hospital in Borodyanka had been captured.

"Today we do not understand how to evacuate these people, how to help them," Oleksiy Kuleba said.

"They are running out of water and medicines.

"These are people with certain special needs, they need constant help... many of them have been bedridden for years."

He added that there was a chance the building could be mined, according to Hromadske.

The Russian authorities have restricted access to BBC websites in Russian and English, as well as other international and independent media, accusing them of circulating "false information" about what is happening in Ukraine.

In response, the BBC said "access to accurate, independent information is a fundamental human right which should not be denied to the people of Russia, millions of whom rely on BBC News every week".

Record numbers of people have read the BBC's Russian language news website since the invasion.

To get around the BBC ban in Russia:

• Download the Psiphon app from the AppStore or Google Play Store
• Look for the dedicated BBC site on the Tor Browser , externalwhich can be found using this URL, external. Note that this URL only works using the Tor Browser or the Onion Browser (on iPhones)
• If access to the apps is restricted then send a blank email to get@psiphon3.com or gettor@torproject.org. An email will be sent in response with a direct and safe download link

The BBC has also launched two new shortwave frequencies broadcasting World Service English news for four hours a day to Ukraine and parts of Russia:

• 15735 kHz from 14:00 GMT to 16:00 GMT
• 5875 kHz from 20:00 GMT to 22:00 GMT

Lyse Doucet
Chief International Correspondent, Kyiv

Image source, Getty Images

On the ground in Kyiv, war has pulled life and light from the streets and sent it underground into dark bunkers, basements and bomb shelters.

Cosy coffee kiosks are now shut, shops with the latest fashions are shuttered, supermarket shelves are emptying.

The city’s cobbled lanes are now strewn with ugly anti-tank barricades, known as hedgehogs, to stop the Russian army’s advance.

But in this beleaguered capital, the bells still ring out, reassuringly on the hour, in the magnificent golden-domed St Michael’s Cathedral.

It knows a thing or two about war.

Sacked down through the centuries, demolished by the Soviet authorities in the 1930s during Stalin’s rule.

But it rose again.

And now in 2022 Ukrainians draw strength from this history, their faith in themselves and their future.

Around the world many now ask how high a price will Ukraine have to pay: Why not give up now to avoid this searing pain as the Russian vice squeezes ever tighter?

And that may seem from afar to be a sensible solution.

But Ukraine’s writer Andrey Kurkov reminds us that as Russia’s troops move into Ukrainian cities they are being met, not by white flags of surrender, but by the yellow and blue standard of Ukraine – still standing, for now, in this second week of a war we’re all watching.

Listen to Lyse's full despatch from Kyiv on From Our Own Correspondent