Russian leader Vladimir Putin threatens to stop gas supplies to "unfriendly" countries if they don't deal in the Russian currency
He's signed a decree stating buyers "must open rouble accounts in Russian banks" from Friday
Germany says it will study the details of the demand but that there can be "no political blackmail" over gas imports
Putin's demand for rouble payments is an attempt to boost the currency, which has been hit by sanctions from the West
US President Joe Biden has announced the release of an unprecedented one million barrels of oil from the country's strategic stockpiles
Ukraine's government is sending dozens of buses to Mariupol, in a fresh effort to evacuate people and deliver humanitarian aid
Russia has declared a one-day ceasefire in the heavily bombed port city, but there is scepticism if it will hold - up to 170,000 people remain trapped
The head of defence alliance Nato says Russian units are being redeployed to fight in the east
As we reported earlier, the head of the UK's cyber and security agency, GCHQ said Russia's President Vladimir Putin "has massively misjudged the situation" in Ukraine.
Here's Jeremy Fleming's assessment of Putin's invasion.
WATCH: Putin 'massively misjudged' Ukraine invasion
Image source, ReutersRussian forces have been bombarding Mariupol for weeks
As we've been reporting, the latest attempt to evacuate civilians from Mariupol is due to start today after Russia agreed to open a humanitarian corridor.
We've spoken to people who have managed to leave the besieged port city in the last few weeks.
All of them described a city in ruins, with entire neighbourhoods completely flattened.
Andrei Marusov, a 50-year-old journalist, says: “[When I left] the city was completely destroyed… the street where I live doesn’t exist any more.
“The city, how it looks like, it’s Stalingrad. It’s just ruins. It’s a pity, because in the last years the city managed to become more or less modern.
"Modern infrastructure, the cultural life was flourishing, the roads, hospitals were all renovated... And when I was leaving I was crying. What have you done? It’s a horrible crime.”
Image source, Alamy/Sergei OrlovAbout 300 people were killed in an attack earlier this month on a theatre sheltering civilians in Mariupol, an official said.
Diana Yalovets, a 23-year-old student, says: "As we tried to get out, we needed to cross the city centre. It was scary to see destroyed streets and buildings.
“My school was destroyed. It’s painful to see your once beautiful city this way.
“Mariupol was a safe city...We loved to walk near the sea. There was a park, and it was an amazing place just to sit and talk. I just can’t believe we lost everything we had.”
Retired doctor Vadym Zabolotnyi, 59, says: “My wife and I didn’t expect… how cruel this war would be. We couldn’t explain why they [Russians] bomb some places, we just couldn’t find any explanation for that.
"They destroyed the city infrastructure on purpose."
Hugo Bachega
BBC News, Lviv
Image source, MaxarWe're just hearing that Kyiv is sending buses to the southern port city of Mariupol to try to deliver humanitarian supplies and evacuate trapped civilians.
Some 45 buses are heading to Mariupol after the International Committee of the Red Cross confirmed Russia had agreed to open a safe corridor for Thursday, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk says.
Previous attempts to establish a ceasefire in Mariupol and safely evacuate civilians have collapsed.
The city's mayor has said that up to 170,000 people are trapped in Mariupol with no power and dwindling supplies - it has suffered near-constant bombardment by Russia.
Mariupol has been a key focus of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, with Vladimir Putin saying on Tuesday that Russian shelling would only stop when Ukrainian soldiers surrendered.
Jeremy Bowen
BBC Middle East editor, in Kyiv
Image source, Getty ImagesThere's clearly a lot of military activity still going on around the city of Kyiv.
The Ukrainians say they have fully recaptured the town of Irpin, to the north-west, but they have told the residents "you can't go back, it's too dangerous".
And in the adjoining villages Hostemel and Bucha, where there has been fighting since day one, the Russians are still there.
Last night in darkness - it's about 10 miles from where I am staying - I could see rockets going up into the sky from there.
I have come to another village in the area where there has been a strike on a depot containing humanitarian aid, pharmaceuticals, second hand clothes, even foods donated from abroad.
So the tempo of things has not slackened around here.
Image source, Getty ImagesOur correspondents - Orla Guerin, in Kyiv, and Jenny Hill, in Moscow - will be answering your questions this afternoon about the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.
Five weeks after the Russian invasion - what would you like to find out or understand about the war and its implication for the rest of the world?
Send in any questions you have to Orla and Jenny and we'll ask them to answer as many as they can.
You can get in touch in the following ways:
We'll publish a selection of your comments and questions, with your name and location as you provide it unless you state otherwise. Your contact details will never be published.
Gordon Corera
Security correspondent, BBC News
The GCHQ Director’s comments that Putin’s advisers are afraid to tell him the truth align closely with those put out by US officials a little earlier.
They suggested he was being misled about both the military and economic situation Russia faces and that there was tension between the Kremlin and the Russian Defence Ministry.
The timing suggests a coordinated push by London and Washington to get this message across.
The two countries' spy agencies have so far been shown to have a good insight into what’s going on inside the Kremlin – warning that a major invasion was coming before it started and that Putin was misjudging what he might face.
They may be hoping to stoke some of the tensions inside Moscow as well as emphasise the Kremlin’s failings.
But they will also know that there are real consequences if Putin is still not getting ground truth about what is going on.
That could lead to further misjudgements including over-optimism about whether Russia can still win some kind of military victory – and that in turn could prolong the war and impact on negotiations.
Image source, Getty ImagesAs we've mentioned already Sir Jeremy Fleming, head of UK intelligence agency GCHQ, has given a speech in Australia overnight - see our earlier posts for his main thoughts.
Here's a summary of the other points he covered:
Image source, ReutersA little earlier, before the UK spy chief gave his assessment of the situation in Ukraine, there were briefings in the US setting out similar thoughts.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said Russian President Vladimir Putin has not been fully informed by his Ministry of Defence on the failures of his army in Ukraine over the last month.
He called the assessments "discomforting" because an uninformed Putin could result in a "less than faithful" effort at ending the conflict through peace negotiations.
"The other thing is, you don't know how a leader like that is going to react to getting bad news," he said.
The White House said Putin's advisors are too scared to tell him how badly the war in Ukraine is going and is not hearing about the full impact of sanctions on the Russian economy.
Kate Bedingfield said the US had information that Mr Putin "felt misled by the Russian military" and this had resulted in "persistent tension between Putin and his military leadership".
More on the UK spy agency's assessment of the war, and it's head Sir Jeremy Fleming has warned China of the risks of being too closely aligned with Russia.
In a speech in Australia he said China's long-term interests are not well served by an alliance with a country that ignores the international "rules of the road".
But while he said the Kremlin views China as a market for its oil and gas and a way to circumvent sanctions, China's President Xi has a more nuanced view of the relationship.
China has not condemned the invasion of Ukraine and Sir Jeremy said that with "an eye on retaking Taiwan", Xi would not want to do anything which might constrain his actions in future.
He may calculate that it actually helps him oppose the US, and Beijing is taking the opportunity to purchase cheap Russian hydrocarbons.
"Russia understands that, long term, China will become increasingly strong militarily and economically. Some of their interests conflict; Russia could be squeezed out of the equation," he said.
Image source, reSome residents were evacuated from the town or Irpin, near Kyiv, on Wednesday
Dr Jack Watling, research fellow for land warfare at the Royal United Services Institute think tank, has been giving regular assessments on Russian manoeuvres in Ukraine.
He says it is clear that the assault on Kyiv is now a secondary axis and not the main effort for Russian troops.
After pushing forward towards the capital in a bid to gain Russian troops were left exposed, giving the Ukrainians opportunities to attack and push back those troops.
He says they are now withdrawing to positions that are more defensible, more consolidated, but they will continue to use artillery to prevent those positions being attacked.
Russian units around Kyiv are unlikely to be sent directly to the Donbas as they will be very tired, he says.
Due to a lack of logistics when they came into Ukraine the Russians "really struggled to get a grip on the campaign" but that is now shifting, Watling says.
"We are seeing a significant increase in both Russian command and control, their ability to coordinate artillery accurately with their units.
And so it seems like they are getting a grip on where their people are and how to make sure they are equipped and supplied properly."
If you are just joining us, here's a recap of the latest developments:
Western intelligence
On the ground
With that, this is Ayeshea Perera in Singapore handing over to my colleagues Emma Owen, Mary O' Connor and Doug Faulkner in London.
The head of the UK's cyber and security agency, GCHQ, believes Russia has massively misjudged the situation in Ukraine and some of Vladimir Putin’s advisers are not telling him the truth.
Sir Jeremy Fleming has given a rare speech during a visit to Australia in which he said that Russian soldiers – short of weapons and morale – had refused to carry out orders, sabotaged their own equipment and even accidentally shot down their own aircraft.
Putin's advisers are afraid to tell him the truth, he said, but what's going on and the extent of these misjudgments must be crystal clear to the regime.
"It all adds up to the strategic miscalculation that Western leaders warned Putin it would be. It's become his personal war, with the cost being paid by innocent people in Ukraine and, increasingly, by ordinary Russians too."
Sir Jeremy also said there were risks for China in being too closely aligned with Russia.
Beijing’s aspirations to become a leading player on the global stage would not be served by being associated with a regime in Moscow that had willfully and illegally ignored global rules, he said.
Image source, EPAThe historical building of the Korolenko library in Chernihiv was damaged during shelling of the city.
The UK's Ministry of Defence (MoD) has released its latest intelligence update, external on Russia's assault on Ukraine.
The MoD says despite Moscow saying it plans to scale back its military activity around the Ukrainian city of Chernihiv, "significant Russian shelling and missile strikes have continued".
The update warns there is likely to be "heavy fighting" in the suburbs of the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, in the coming days as Russian troops maintain positions to the east and west of the city - although a limited number of units have withdrawn.
Heavy fighting is continuing in Mariupol, but Ukrainian forces are still in control of the city, the update added.
Lucy Williamson
BBC News, Lviv
Natalia and Yevgen escaped Mariupol with their son Alexander, fleeing to Lviv in western Ukraine
There is no humanitarian corridor now out of Mariupol.
Just a trickle of people gambling on Russian military checkpoints - and Russian political whim.
But getting out of the besieged southern city is only the first challenge; the other is leaving it behind when you do.
Alexander was brought to an Israeli field hospital near Lviv last week, catatonic.
His 24-year-old brain was stuck on the horror he'd lived through: on the Russian rockets that hit the apartment block where he was staying with his parents; on the rubble and dead bodies they ran through, without even putting on their shoes.
"It was constant bombing," says his father, Yevgen. "Planes went past every 10 minutes and dropped bombs on Mariupol. People were falling and dying in front of my eyes. We buried people in gardens."
Some 160,000 people are thought to still be trapped inside the city.
France, Greece and Turkey have all tried to push for a pause in the attacks to get aid in and allow civilians to leave.
But Russia's President Putin has said Mariupol must surrender in order for the bombardment to stop.
You can read more here.
Image source, Луганська ОВАThese pictures show the destruction at an oil depot in the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk.
They were published by the head of the Luhansk Regional State Administration and claim to show the consequences of the shelling of the site in Lysychansk. The BBC has not been able to independently verify these pictures:
Image source, Луганська ОВА
Image source, Луганська ОВА
Image source, Луганська ОВА
BBC Monitoring
The world through its media
Ukraine and the "special military operation", as it must be called in Russia, remained the focus of the main evening TV news bulletins in the country on Wednesday.
Restrictions on reporting in the country are increasingly severe, and access to almost all independent outlets is blocked or limited - or they censor themselves.
Official state TV Rossiya 1, state-controlled Channel One and Gazprom Media's NTV carried lengthy and similar segments, with reports that reiterated long-running state narratives
Here's a roundup of their coverage:
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky cast doubt on Russia's claims it is de-escalating fighting in his country, calling it the precursor to "new strikes" in the eastern breakaway region of Donbas.
Five days earlier, Russia said that it had achieved the main objectives of its first stage of the invasion and would concentrate its main efforts on achieving its main goal: the liberation of Donbas.
The BBC's Diplomatic correspondent Paul Adams said at the time that the announcement was likely to mean a more concerted effort to push beyond the "line of contact" that separates Ukrainian government-held territory in the east of the country from the Russian backed separatist "people's republics" of Donetsk and Luhansk.
Moscow claims 93% of the Donbas region of Luhansk is under the control of Russian-backed separatists now, with 54% of the other part of Donbas, Donetsk, in their hands. More than a third of the entire area was under separatist control before the war began.
As many as 10 new battalion tactical groups are being generated and put into Russia's operations, especially in the Donbas, our correspondent said.
Image source, .If you're just joining us this Thursday, welcome. Here is a quick recap of the latest:
The Director of French military intelligence, General Éric Vidaud, will be dismissed from his post for discounting the possibility of Russia invading Ukraine, French media reported on Thursday.
Quoting an internal source at the Ministry of the Armed Forces, local media outlet l'Opinion, external said General Vidaud was dismissed on grounds of "insufficient briefings" and a "lack of mastery of subjects".
France's Chief of Defense Staff, Thierry Burkhard, acknowledged in an interview with Le Monde that the dismissal came when French intelligence services - including Vidaud - realised it had made an erroneous analysis of the Russian threat in Ukraine, which ran counter to the US assessment.
Image source, Ukraine Presidential OfficeUkrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has said Ukraine is bracing for a new Russian offensive in eastern Ukraine, in a statement released late on Thursday.
"There is an accumulation of Russian troops for new strikes in Donbas. And we are preparing for this," he said in the statement.
He expressed skepticism at Russia’s statement in negotiations to scale down military operations around the capital, Kyiv, and another main city Chernihiv.
"We do not believe anyone - we do not trust any beautiful verbal constructions," Zelensky said.
He said there was no reason to believe Russia’s announcement that it would reduce military activity near those cities, given Russian forces had continued to pummel Kyiv and Chernihiv with strikes a day after making those pledges.
Deadly shelling was also reported in Irpin, along with intensified attacks in the Donbas region.
Zelensky also reaffirmed Ukraine's commitment to protecting their territory, saying "We will not give up anything. And we will fight for every metre of our land, for every person."