Paul Kirby
BBC News Online Europe editor

Image source, Getty Images

Days after Lithuania declared it had completely stopped imports of Russian gas, another Baltic state, Estonia, has decided to do the same, in principle.

The government in Tallinn says it aims to end Russian gas imports in time for the start of the "heating season" in the autumn. Ministers say they've agreed with Finland to lease a floating terminal to enable imports of liquefied natural gas (LNG).

"Today we made a decision to stop buying Russian gas. It's not possible to go ahead by feeding a Russian war machine," Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas told a press conference.

Although only 7% of Estonia's energy comes from gas, almost all of it comes from Russia.

Lithuania has called on the rest of the EU to follow its example and get rid of its dependence on Russian gas. It's spent several years investing in LNG. Latvian Prime Minister Krisjanis Karins has vowed to abandon Russian supplies too.

The head of Latvia's natural gas storage operator says Russian gas stopped flowing into the Baltics at the start of April anyway, because there are plenty of reserves stored underground. The question is whether Latvia and Estonia will be able have enough supplies by next winter.

Image source, EPA

Discussions between foreign ministers from Nato countries are getting under way in Brussels.

Opening the session of talks, Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg said the talks would cover support for the "brave Ukrainians defending their country" and "further support to other partners at risk from Russian aggression".

He said the Russian invasion, launched six weeks ago, had "profoundly changed the security environment in Europe" and the meeting would also discuss "longer-term adaptation".

Ukraine's Foreign Minister, Dmytro Kuleba, is also at the Nato gathering, and earlier said he wanted to discuss one thing: "Weapons, weapons, weapons."

Image source, .

Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych has been giving an update on the latest fighting in his country. He says:

• Russian air attacks are now concentrated in eastern areas – where Russian troops are aiming to surround the Ukrainian military
• Of the nine operational areas of the Russian army's offensive, only two and a half still remain today – which are focused on the Donbas region and the southern city of Mariupol
• But Mariupol is still holding out.

He expresses hope that Russian efforts will be in vain – and is quoted by the Reuters news agency as saying that "the situation is under control".

Image source, Getty Images

"Haunting" images of tortured bodies, apparent executions and reports of sexual violence "show the true face of Russia’s brutal war" against Ukraine, the G7 has said.

Foreign ministers for each of the G7 (Group of Seven) countries released a joint statement after meeting their Ukrainian counterpart, Dmytro Kuleba.

The group said "massacres" in the city of Bucha, and other Ukrainian areas that have been under Russian occupation, will be listed as severe violations of international law.

It warned Russia against any "further blatant abuses" of law, calling for President Vladimir Putin to allow humanitarian workers into conflict zones to deliver aid and safely evacuate civilians.

The group added it was ready to give Ukraine's armed forces more money and military equipment to defend themselves.

The G7 is an organisation of the world's seven largest so-called "advanced" economies, which dominate global trade and the international financial system. They are Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the United States.

Russia joined in 1998, creating the G8, but was excluded in 2014 after its takeover of Crimea.

It has denied that its forces have carried out atrocities in Bucha.

A Ukrainian delegation has visited the Army’s Salisbury Plain training area as part of planning for what further military support the UK is prepared to offer, the Ministry of Defence has said.

During the visit, the Ukrainians were shown “a range of equipment and options for further military support, including defensive missile systems and protected mobility vehicles”, the MoD said.

The Times reports these could include the Mastiff protected patrol vehicle and the highly-mobile Jackal - a fast, lightweight reconnaissance vehicle.

No firm arrangements have yet been made to provide either of those, according to the MoD.

It said the Ukrainians were also shown the Starstreak air defence system, which the UK has already provided and trained Ukrainian Armed Forces to use.

Watch a helicopter being shot down by Starstreak here.

Armed Forces Minister James Heappey said Ukrainian forces were putting up a "tenacious fight" against Russian forces and he was "proud" they were doing so with weapons provided through and by the UK.

The job was far from over, he said, and the prime minster has directed the UK should provide more support.

Image source, Reuters

The Ukrainian president has repeated his calls for countries in the West to "bring Russia to justice" by rejecting Russian oil and completely blocking Russian banks from the international finance system.

Volodymyr Zelensky was speaking through an interpreter to the Greek Parliament in Athens.

The EU is proposing a ban on Russian coal. But some member states are resisting going further because they rely so highly on Russian energy.

Oil and gas bans are not part of the latest sanction proposals.

"Those who blackmail Europe with economic and energy crisis always lose," Zelensky said through an interpreter, Reuters reports.

"Let us be honest, since the very beginning Russia's actions were directed not only against Ukraine but also Europe."

Russian troops used villagers in northern Ukraine as human shields to try to protect themselves from a counter-attack from Ukrainian forces, the BBC has been told.

Our correspondent Jeremy Bowen has been visiting communities north of Kyiv that have, until recently, been occupied by Russian forces.

Villagers from Obukhovychi, just south of the exclusion zone around the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, told him that on the night of 14 March Russian soldiers were losing men and armoured vehicles to a counter-attack from Ukrainian forces.

Russian troops then went door-to door to round up about 150 people at gunpoint and held them in a freezing cold school gym as protection for Russian forces, villagers said.

Using civilians to shield armed forces from attack is against international humanitarian law, external.

"They took us from the cellars where we were hiding and forced us out," local Lydmila Sutkova, one of many people interviewed, said.

"Old ladies, children, everyone. It was terrifying. They broke open the doors of anyone who wouldn’t open up."

Another woman, Maryana, said her daughter was still showing signs of anxiety since the night in the school.

"A two-year-old girl should not see this," she said.

"I was afraid that we would all be shot in that gym. I was scared for my daughter. I don't have the words."

Image source, EPA

The Ukrainian government has accused Hungary of helping Russia continue its aggression against Ukraine, amid a worsening row between the neighbouring countries.

The Ministry of Foreign affairs also accused Hungary of strengthening Russia's "sense of impunity" over alleged war crimes committed.

Oleg Nikolenko, spokesman for Ukraine's foreign ministry, tweets, external that Hungary's "reluctance to acknowledge Russia's responsibility for atrocities" also encourages them to "commit new crimes".

"A proposal to hold peace talks in Budapest seems cynical. If Hungary wants to help, it must stop damaging EU unity," he says.

Prime Minister Victor Orban - who has long been an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin despite Hungary's Nato membership - was re-elected earlier this week.

Hungary is opposed to new and many existing sanctions already placed on Russia and has refused to supply weapons to Ukraine.

On Wednesday, Orban told Putin that Hungary would be prepared to pay Russia in roubles for gas imports – a move which other European countries have ruled out.

Ukraine's foreign ministry also criticised this stated willingness to pay in the Russian currency, accusing Hungary of undermining EU unity.

Image source, Getty Images

Oil giant Shell has confirmed it will take a hit of up to $5bn (£3.8bn) from offloading its Russian assets as part of plans to withdraw from the country.

The firm has pledged to no longer buy oil, but contracts signed before the invasion of Ukraine will be fulfilled.

The costs of Shell no longer doing business in Russia include quitting joint ventures with Gazprom.

Shell was criticised when it bought Russian crude oil at a cheap price shortly after the war began.

In response to the outrage, the company apologised and pledged to stop buying oil from Russia.

Read our full story here

What Russian citizens have heard about Buchapublished at 10:14 British Summer Time 7 April 2022

10:14 BST 7 April 2022

Jenny Hill
BBC News, Moscow

Image source, Reuters

The Kremlin denies it all: the footage of bodies lying in the streets in Bucha, the mass graves and the terrible testimony of witnesses. And state TV parrots the narrative.

Since evidence of apparent Russian atrocities emerged from the settlements around Kyiv, programme editors have gone to extraordinary lengths to discredit the reports as a fabrication, a lie concocted by Ukraine and the West.

To switch on Russian TV has, for weeks now, been to step into a weird parallel universe where glossy presenters and well-dressed pundits chronicle a successful "special military operation" in Ukraine. There is no war, just heroic Russian soldiers defending the motherland while taking care to avoid targeting civilians.

The horrific images from Bucha have been broadcast, but viewers are told that the gruesome scenes were staged by Ukrainian officials, with help from the West.

"This was done by professionals, probably British. They're the best in the area of information operations," said commentator Gevorg Mirzaryan. "[They know how] to place the bodies correctly, do everything correctly, create a nice picture for the necrophilic Western consciousness."

Talk show host Olesya Loseva even suggested that the town of Bucha had deliberately been chosen because President Joe Biden had recently used the word butcher to describe Vladimir Putin, so "for Americans this word should be clear".

It is a classic Kremlin tactic in the face of such accusations - deny, dismiss as fake and, if possible, blame someone else.

Read more:

Russians fed twisted picture and one voice - that of Putin

Image source, Alamy

Russian President Vladimir Putin has always been guarded over his family's identity. He has not named his daughters publicly.

But Katerina Tikhonova, 35 and Maria Vorontsova, 36 have now been named, external in the latest round of US sanctions on Russia. The two are the daughters of President Putin and his ex-wife Lyudmila.

Their eldest, Maria Vorontsova, was born in 1985. She studied biology at St Petersburg University and medicine at Moscow State University.

Vorontsova is now an academic, specialising in the endocrine system. She's also a businesswoman. BBC Russia identified her as co-owner of a company planning to build a massive medical centre

Her sister, Katerina Tikhonova, has been much more in the public eye. She is a rock 'n' roll dancer - she and her partner came fifth at an international event in 2013.

Tikhonova is now in academia and business. She made a brief appearance on Russian state media in 2018 to talk about neurotechnology and also at a business forum in 2021.

Read more on what we know about President Putin's family.

The UK’s Ministry of Defence has just tweeted its latest intelligence update, external on the fighting in Ukraine. Here are the key takeaways:

• Progressing military operations in eastern Ukraine is the main focus of Russian forces
• Artillery and air strikes are continuing in the Donbas region - with infrastructure targeted in an apparent Russian effort to hinder the ability of the Ukrainian army to resupply
• But the update also asserts that the Kremlin's troops are still facing “morale issues and shortages of supplies and personnel”

Image source, Getty Images

Ministers from Nato's member states are holding a second day of talks in Brussels to decide how best to continue to help Ukraine defend itself from Russia's invasion.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is a military alliance formed in 1949 by 12 countries, including the US and the UK. It was set up to counter the threat of post-war Russian expansion in Europe.

Members agree to come to one another's aid in the event of an armed attack against any individual member state.

Ukraine wants Nato countries - of which there are now 30 - to send troops to help fight Russia, but Ukraine is not a Nato member so there's no obligation for this to happen.

Nato has so far resisted Ukraine's calls to help in this way, as it fears doing so could lead to an all-out conflict between Russia and the West.

Nato members have helped Ukraine in other ways though - such as by sending weapons and money to fund Ukraine's armed forces.

Ukraine's foreign minister is joining the talks in Brussels to urge Nato to help Ukraine with the "three most important things" it needs to win the war - "weapons, weapons, and weapons".

Image source, Ukranian Military

The Ukrainian military has shared a drone video which appears to show trenches and tank tracks in the Red Forest, one of the most radioactive locations on Earth, in the Chernobyl exclusion zone.

"Video proof - Russian command did order its soldiers to dig fortifications near the Chornobyl nuclear power plant in the radioactive Red Forest in March 2022," the Ukrainian military tweeted, with a post of the video., external

The Red Forest is just 500m from the Chernobyl nuclear complex. It was hit by the immediate fallout from the 1986 explosion and fire in the nuclear plant's number-4 reactor.

Russian troops seized Chernobyl at the beginning of their invasion of Ukraine on 24 February.

Last week, Russian forces occupying the site left, Ukraine's state nuclear company Energoatom, said.

The company also confirmed reports that Russian troops had dug trenches in the most contaminated part of the Chernobyl exclusion zone, receiving "significant doses" of radiation.

The BBC could not immediately verify the date and origin of the video.

Pictures of military equipment on trains at a station in the Czech town of Jihlava - reportedly heading to Ukraine - have been reported in local media.

On Tuesday the Defence Minister Jana Cernochova said that the Czech Republic was sending "essential military equipment" to Ukraine.

Speaking as Nato foreign ministers gathered in Brussels for talks on the conflict, the security alliance's secretary general Jens Stoltenberg declined go into details of what kind of weapons allies were providing to Ukraine.

However, Stoltenberg said what Nato countries are doing is "significant" and also includes the provision of "some heavier systems combined with lighter system".

The Czech Republic - which as part of Czechoslovakia was in the Warsaw Pact and allied with the Soviet Union - joined Nato in 1999.

The tanks are reportedly Soviet or Russian-made.

Image source, Alamy

The US has trained a small number of Ukrainians to use advanced anti-tank drones, a senior US defence official said on Wednesday.

The Switchblade, which can easily be carried by one person, has the ability to hover over a target miles away from the operator.

They weapons are often called "kamikaze" drones, because of the way they smash into their target, carrying a warhead at their tip, to destroy it.

Switchblade drones are new to the Ukrainian military, but the White House announced on 16 March it would supply 100 of them.

The Ukrainians being trained were already in the US as part of professional military education programmes, and may receive more training on other systems before returning to Ukraine in the near future, the official said.

Kyiv's successes do not mean imminent victorypublished at 08:07 British Summer Time 7 April 2022

08:07 BST 7 April 2022

John Simpson
World Affairs Editor, in Lviv

Some commentators in the West seem to think the Ukrainian war is pretty much won.

One American military historian says he knows of no parallel to a major power like Russia invading a country at the time of its choosing and failing so utterly.

Here in Ukraine, though, people aren't nearly so confident.

They think they're in for a long slog, which will end either with a clear defeat for Russia, or - alternatively - when President Vladimir Putin feels he has gained enough Ukrainian territory to be able to claim victory.

Image source, EPA

Precisely because they believe they are in for a long and difficult war, Ukrainian politicians from President Volodymyr Zelensky down are getting angry with what Ukraine sees as Nato's pathetically slow delivery of weapons supplies.

The governor of Lviv Maksym Kozytsky, a close ally of the president, says: "In my opinion, from the West there is a policy of double standards and cowardice.

"It's cowardice not to call a spade a spade. And cowardice not to take any position. And cowardice leads to tragedies."

Read more from John Simpson here

There is one thing foremost in the mind of Dmytro Kuleba at the moment, more military aid to support Ukraine's fight against Russia.

The Ukrainian politician's singular focus for his meeting with fellow foreign ministers from Nato countries in Belgium is reflected in his three-word agenda: "weapons, weapons and weapons".

Kuleba emphasises Ukraine's priorities in a tweet from the Nato headquarters in Brussels, where representatives from the military alliance are meeting to discuss how best to provide military support.

Image source, EPA

Ukraine's foreign minister has issued a "very simple" call for more weapons from Nato countries to help saves lives.

Ahead of meeting with his Nato counterparts in person, Dmytro Kuleba says his agenda is "simple" and Ukraine is confident the best way to defeat Russia is with more military support.

Kuleba is meeting with his Nato counterparts at a summit in Brussels, as part of their discussions of how best to arm Ukraine against renewed Russian military attacks expected in the east of the country.

Speaking with reporters before the meeting, he says without "sustainable and sufficient supplies" of weapons Ukrainian victories will be accompanied by "enormous sacrifices".

Kuleba adds the sooner more supplies arrive, the more human lives, towns and cities will be saved from destruction the world saw in Bucha.

Image source, Getty Images

Here is a round-up of the latest developments in the war in Ukraine.

In eastern Ukraine:

• Thousands of people are trying to escape the Donbas region ahead of Russia's expected offensive in the east

• Ukrainian officials are appealing to people in the area to "take this opportunity" to flee "while it is safe"
• Russian troops are "regrouping and conducting reconnaissance" for an offensive in Donbas - which is made up of the regions of Donetsk and Luhansk
• The US says that Russia's withdrawal from the regions outside Kyiv and Chernihiv is now complete, as the war shifts focus to eastern Ukraine
• Chernihiv residents tell the BBC they barely had any food or water, and lived without electricity, under a Russian siege

Elsewhere in Ukraine:

• More than 400 people are missing from the town of Hostomel, a local official says. The town bore the brunt of Russian advances on Ukraine's capital, Kyiv, along with Bucha and Irpin
• Survivor accounts are still trickling out from Bucha, where hundreds of people are reported to have been killed by Russian soldiers
• President Zelensky on Thursday morning welcomed sanctions imposed on Russia but also described them as insufficient. He urged the west to boycott the use of Russian oil.

Global developments:

• The US has aimed new sanctions at Russia and Putin's inner circle - including the president's two adult daughters
• The UK and US both issued an asset freeze against Sberbank, Russia's largest bank
• European Union leaders are discussing what further measures they could impose on Russia to damage its war effort. Proposals include a ban on importing Russian coal - but some senior leaders say oil and gas also need to be banned
• The UN will hold a vote on Thursday on expelling Russia from the UN Human Rights Council over its invasion of Ukraine
• Russia has warned countries at the UN that any such attempts will be viewed as an "unfriendly gesture"

• The US treasury secretary warned that a blanket ban on Russian oil imports would trigger "skyrocketing" energy prices in Europe
• Canada will summon Russia's Ambassador to the country over the reported killings of civilians in Bucha and Irpin, and will "present him images" of what happened in the Kyiv suburbs
• The US has warned India against partnering too closely with Russia saying that "the costs and consequences for them" will be "significant and long-term"

Thank you for joining our live coverage of the war in Ukraine on Thursday.

This is Andrew Clarance and Vikas Pandey in Delhi handing off to our colleagues Nathan Williams and Adam Durbin in London.