Image source, Getty Images

More than five million refugees have now fled Ukraine since Russia invaded in February, according to the latest figures released by the UN.

The UN's High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) says over 4.7 million refugees have crossed Ukraine's borders.

In addition, the UN's International Organization for Migration (IOM), cited by AFP, says nearly 215,000 third-country nationals - people who are neither citizens of Ukraine nor the country they entered - have also escaped to neighbouring countries.

The highest proportion of refugees - 2.7 million - have fled to Poland. However, official figures suggest some people are now choosing to return to Ukraine.

Image source, Getty Images

Russia’s media regulator Roskomnadzor has blocked access to the Russian-language edition of the Moscow Times, reacting to a story about the Ukraine conflict, the outlet says.

The block came after "what the authorities call a false report on riot police officers refusing to fight in Ukraine", the English-language edition said. The report said the 11 Omon officers had gone home after their refusal.

The Moscow Times was launched in 1992 and an online version has appeared in Russian since March 2020. The block only affects the Russian edition.

Roskomnadzor has also blocked access in Russia to Radio France Internationale’s English, French and Russian-language websites. The regulator has not explained its move.

Independent media including the BBC have been restricted in Russia under an order requiring them to rely on Russian official reports on the Ukraine war, which the Kremlin calls a “special operation”.

A new Russian law imposes prison terms of up to 15 years for publishing allegedly “fake” information about the Russian military.

Toby Luckhurst and Mariana Maglych
BBC News, Lviv

Earlier today we received unconfirmed reports that Russian forces have been digging up bodies in Mariupol, parts of which are under Russian military control.

The city’s council said on Telegram, external that the Russians were not allowing residents to bury people allegedly killed by the occupiers.

The BBC cannot independently verify these claims. But we managed to speak on the phone to Mariupol’s mayor, Vadym Boychenko, who backed up the council's statement.

Boychenko is no longer in the city - and did not tell us where he is now, for security reasons, other than saying he was close by. But he said Ukrainian intelligence agencies and Mariupol residents have said the Russians have been exhuming some of the dead.

"They are clearing up their crimes after the publicity of what happened in Bucha and Irpin. They clean up the bodies of civilians killed by enemy weapons, enemy planes,” he told us.

He also repeated claims the Russians have brought in mobile crematoria to dispose of the bodies.

The Russians have besieged and bombarded Mariupol for six weeks, and reports suggest the city could soon fall.

Boychenko said it remains in Ukrainian hands, but called for more military support.

“Today the Ukrainian flag flies over Mariupol. It's hard, but the guys hold on,” he said.

“We only need weapons, we have enough soldiers. But we must be given the opportunity and the weapons.”

He also called for more aid for those trapped in the city. Some 100,000 civilians are still within Mariupol, he said.

“Many countries and organisations like France and Turkey and the Red Cross have tried to help. But no mission has ever reached Mariupol directly."

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Getty Images

Finland's Europe minister Tytti Tuppurainen said in an interview with Sky News that a "huge majority" of people in Finland are supportive of the country's Nato membership.

She said a decision has not been made and the issue will be discussed in parliament, but it is "highly likely" that Finland will join the alliance.

Tuppurainen said Russia's actions against Ukraine have been "brutal" and the war is "a wake-up call" to the world.

Asked about the potential Nato membership of both Finland and Sweden, she said "every country has the right to do its own security arrangements".

Tuppurainen added: "So, whatever Russia is saying, we of course are hearing that, but we are doing our own decisions based on our interests, and on our conditions, our consideration of the overall situation."

On Thursday, Russia said that it will be forced to take security measures if Sweden and Finland join Nato.

The Kremlin's deputy foreign minister Alexander Grushko said to the Tass news agency that membership of the military alliance will lead to "the most undesirable consequences".

What is Nato and how has it responded to Russia's invasion?

Kyiv's mayor has announced plans to rename streets and squares in the capital which are currently associated with Russia.

Writing on Telegram, external, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said Kyiv's former Square of Friendship between Kyiv and Moscow will be renamed for "the Heroes of Mariupol".

He added that other names - such as streets and subway stations - will also be changed.

According to the BBC's Ukrainian service, the idea of renaming Kyiv's railway station had been discussed prior to Russia's invasion, against a backdrop of deteriorating relations between the two countries.

For the first time since its invasion, Russia's military has used long-range bombers to attack the besieged port city of Mariupol, according to Ukraine's defence ministry.

A spokesman for the ministry, Oleksandr Motuzyanyk, said Russia was now concentrating its efforts on seizing the eastern Ukrainian cities of Rubizhne and Popasna, and the southern city of Mariupol.

He added that street battles were ongoing in Mariupol, which Russian forces had not managed to completely capture since the war began.

He said active fighting was taking place around the city's Illich Steel and Iron Works, as well as in the port area.

Image source, .

Ukraine's Ministry of Defence has tweeted mocking the Russian navy after its flagship Moskva warship sank in the Black Sea.

"The Ministry of Defence of Ukraine reminds the Russian navy that the Black Sea straits are closed for entry only," it said in a social media post.

"The part of your fleet that remains afloat still has a way out."

Russia said a fire on board caused ammunition to explode, but Ukraine says it targeted the cruiser with recently introduced Ukrainian-made missiles.

Image source, EPA

Russian President Vladimir Putin says Europe has no alternative than to keep using Russian energy, warning of “extremely painful” economic consequences if the continent tries to replace its supply of oil and gas.

"A reasonable replacement for Europe simply does not exist," Putin told media via video link from his residence near Moscow on Thursday.

"There are simply no spare volumes in the global market, and deliveries from other countries, primarily the US, which may be sent to Europe, will cost the consumers many times more."

As we've reported in recent days, leaders in Europe are moving to reduce their reliance on Russian energy. And Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has criticised countries such as Germany that are resisting a total ban on Russian oil and gas over its huge economic cost - saying they have blood on their hands.

However, Putin also acknowledged there were "issues with payments for Russian export energy supplies", as banks from “unfriendly countries” had been “delaying the transfer of funds”.

“As we have said many times, the most urgent problem here is the disruption of export logistics,” he said.

Image source, Reuters

The sinking of Russia’s Moskva missile cruiser does have some significance for what has largely been a land war in Ukraine, according to Shashank Joshi, defence editor of The Economist.

The ship didn’t have cruise missiles that could fire onto land but it was providing air defence to other ships around it which were carrying the Kalibr cruise missile to hit targets in southern and central Ukraine, Joshi told BBC Radio 4's World At One programme.

"In a sense, it was a cog in the naval machine in terms of air defence and command and control, and in communicating with other ships facilitating direct strikes on land," he said.

He said the threat the ship presented along with that fleet as a whole, which has now moved back a bit from the coastline, was forcing Ukraine to keep more people around Odesa, the city that was under threat.

"It was also presenting an amphibious threat indirectly through the ships it was protecting."

If you're just joining us this lunchtime, here's a recap of the latest developments:

• Russia says it's carried out strikes on a weapons factory in a suburb of Kyiv - in what would be the most significant attack on the capital since Moscow pulled its land forces out of the area
• The plant is said to produce the type of Neptune missiles which Ukraine claims sank the Russian flagship Moskva in the Black Sea yesterday. Ukraine has not commented on the strike
• Russia, which says the vessel was damaged in an ammunitions fire, has warned attacks on Kyiv will intensify in retaliation for "terror attacks" and "acts of sabotage"
• Earlier Ukraine said nine safe corridors have been agreed for today to enable evacuations from occupied towns and cities in the south and east. It's unclear if those evacuations are proceeding, as routes agreed in principle aren't always sustainable on the ground
• More than five million people have fled the country since the Russian invasion on 24 February, UN figures showed on Friday
• In south-eastern Ukraine, officials in the destroyed city of Mariupol say Russians have been exhuming bodies which are buried in residential areas, in order to hide evidence of war crimes. The BBC has not been able to verify this claim

• It comes after Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky praised his people's bravery and determination in surviving 50 days of war
• And speaking to the BBC, Zelensky accused some European countries of blocking efforts to embargo Russian oil and gas

Anna Foster
Reporting from Kyiv

Image source, EPA

We were in Kyiv overnight and the explosions certainly weren't heard in the centre of the city, because none of us heard them.

It's a really beautiful day here in Kyiv, it's a glorious sunny day. It's been bitterly cold here and very windy, but today feels like a beautiful spring day.

We saw some people walking around, people were quite calm. But it's not the busy, buzzing capital city that you would normally expect to see.

There are still areas with sandbags piled up and places where they've narrowed the road because they prepared for this Russian invasion that never happened. Visually, it still looks like a city that is ready for war.

I've been talking to our local producer who lives in Kyiv, and he went to the swimming pool this morning. He said it was full of people, they were out doing their normal thing.

One thing that is stopping life coming back to normal in Kyiv is the fact that the public transport isn't running, for example, and checkpoints are in place.

Image source, EPA

While people that we're hearing from are nervous about the renewed Russian threat, and the idea that they will hit Kyiv, it doesn't seem to put people off their new routines.

We know a couple of people who have been west in the last few weeks, but have come back to Kyiv in the last week or so. They're not planning to leave again. They say they'll stay where they are and slowly get back to normal with their lives.

There are some little shops and cafes that are starting to open again, not in huge numbers just one or two. It's like little sparks of life returning.

At the moment, the spirit of the people seems to be that they'll continue with their routines, unless we see more Russian strikes.

There are further details emerging about the explosions in Kyiv, after Russia said it carried out strikes on a missile plant in the capital.

AFP is reporting that one of its journalists at the scene says a Ukrainian military factory is partly destroyed.

A workshop and an administrative building at the Vizar plant, which lies near Kyiv's international Zhuliany airport, were seriously damaged, the journalist has said.

Andrei Sizov, a 47-year-old owner of a wood workshop, told AFP that the blasts came overnight.

"Around 1:30am, my security guard called me because there was an air strike," he said.

"There were five hits. My employee was in the office and got thrown off his feet by the blast."

He also said he believed Russia was taking revenge for the sinking of the Moskva warship, which Ukraine claims it hit with Neptune missiles.

Image source, Reuters

More now on the Russian Moskva warship which has sunk in the Black Sea.

According to Professor Evan Mawdsley - a leading historian who specialises in Russian history and the history of World War Two - the last time a Russian cruiser was sunk was 81 years ago off the coast of Crimea by Germany during the Second World War.

He added that while Russia had lost other types of warships during the course of World War Two, the Chernova Ukraina was the last Russian cruiser to have been sunk in 1941.

Professor Mawdsley added that though the Moskva was nearly 40 years old, she was one of the largest ships in the Russian Navy, and that no new big surface ships have been built since the 1980s.

He added: "Assuming Moskva was actually hit and mortally damaged by a relatively small Neptune missile, the event suggests the ship had poor counter-missile defences and poor damage control."

There's more coming in from Kyiv now, where Russia says it's hit a weapons factory on the edge of the Ukrainian capital.

Kirill Kyrylo, 38, a worker at a car repair shop in the city, told Reuters he'd seen three blasts hit an industrial building across the road, causing a blaze that was eventually put out by firefighters.

“The building was on fire and I had to hide behind my car,” he said, pointing to shattered glass and shards of metal that had been scattered from the burning building across the street.

Russia's defence ministry warned on Friday that it would intensify attacks on the capital "in response to any terrorist attacks or sabotage committed by the Kyiv nationalist regime on Russian territory".

Vitaliy Shevchenko
BBC Monitoring

Image source, Vitaliy Shevchenko

It's been a long and difficult journey, and hopefully it's coming to a relatively happy end.

At five in the morning UK time on 24 February, I was woken up by a phone call from my mother. She said she could hear explosions and her house in the southeastern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia was shaking. Despite weeks of persistent denials, Russia had invaded Ukraine.

My mother is 70, and she is the carer of her severely disabled sister, who is completely bedridden after suffering two strokes. Evacuating them would be even more difficult than most refugees from Ukraine.

That is why initially - and perhaps recklessly - we decided that they would stay put for the time being. However, as the fighting drew closer it became clear that it was too big a risk to take. Seeing images of devastation in Mariupol and Kharkiv, we knew exactly what the Russian army can do to Ukrainian cities.

What followed was an unbelievable chain of events.

After seeing me on BBC Breakfast, my former student from Zaporizhzhia - where I had taught at a university - got in touch.

It turned out she knew someone with an ambulance who could take my mother and aunt from Zaporizhzhia to Lviv in western Ukraine. She also knew a private hospital in Lviv, which could accommodate my aunt.

A BBC colleague from Ukraine found a place for my mother to stay - his relatives in Lviv allowed her to stay for free.

Next, I had to find a way of transporting them from Lviv to Reading in the UK, where I live.

Somebody recommended a British volunteer called Nick Hills, who is helping Ukrainian refugees. He said his team had a suitable vehicle and they could get my mother and aunt across the border into Poland the following day!

On the same day, I received an email from Richard, also a British volunteer and a listener of the BBC podcast Ukrainecast, which I co-present and where I mentioned the plight of my mother and aunt.

He said he would be happy to take them from Poland to Reading in his motorhome, free of charge.

Richard, my mother and aunt set off on their journey across Europe this morning, and I'm hoping to see them in Reading on Sunday.

War is a horribly dark time, but I have learnt that it can also be a time of great human kindness, and I have been humbled by the generous support of complete strangers.

I will be making donations to Nick and Richard so they can continue to help refugees from the war in Ukraine.

Image source, Reuters

The war in Ukraine has been going on for more than 50 days now. We look back at the important moments of Russia's invasion of the country:

24 February: Russia announces it has started "a special military operation" in Ukraine, launching a full-scale assault on the country

• Casualties as fighting rages after Russian attack

10 March: The UK announces sanctions against seven Russian businessmen, including Roman Abramovich, followed the next day by more sanctions on 386 members of the Russian Duma (lower house of parliament)

• Oligarchs facing global sanctions

15 March: The leaders of Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovenia travel to Kyiv on an EU mission to show support for Ukraine

16 March: US President Joe Biden labels Russian leader Vladimir Putin a "war criminal"

30 March: Russia first announces it will curb its assault on Kyiv. It will later shift its focus to eastern Ukraine

• Why Russia is trying to encircle Ukraine's east

2 April: Journalists entering the Ukrainian town of Bucha find dead bodies of men in civilian clothes strewn on a street

7 April: The UN says more than 10 million people are thought to have fled their homes in Ukraine because of the invasion

• How many Ukrainians have fled their homes and where have they gone?

13 April: US President Joe Biden accuses Russian troops of committing genocide in Ukraine

Follow all our coverage of the war in Ukraine here.

More than 2.75 million refugees have fled Ukraine to Poland since the war began, the Polish Border Guard said on Friday.

The number of people crossing the border into Poland has fallen significantly in recent weeks and numbers going into Ukraine have risen.

On Thursday, 26,800 people crossed into Poland, up 8% from Wednesday, the agency wrote on Twitter. But that is well below the record of 142,300 set on 6 March.

The average daily number of people crossing the border from Ukraine into Poland before the war started was 16,800.

Some refugees have already left Poland. Warsaw University Migration Research Prof Maciej Duszczyk estimates that around 1.2 to 1.4 million remain in the country.

Jenny Hill
BBC News, Moscow

This is a significant and humiliating loss for Vladimir Putin, who has repeatedly insisted that his "special military operation" in Ukraine is going according to plan.

Unsurprisingly, perhaps, Russian state media are not dwelling on the loss of the pride of the Black Sea fleet.

Morning TV bulletins limited themselves to briefly reporting the statement issued by the authorities, who claim the ship sank in stormy seas after fire and explosions on board caused significant damage to its hull.

Some newspaper commentators appeared to support that, arguing that the fire extinguishing systems on board the 40-year-old warship were out of date and inefficient but several writers agree that the development won’t change the course of war.

Image source, Rossiya 1 TV

It is however a blow to national pride; the Moskva, once a symbol of Russian might and ambition, now lies at the bottom of the sea. While one TV talk show host didn’t speculate on Ukraine’s claims that it had struck the ship, a clearly emotional studio guest - film director and ex-MP Vladimir Bortko - said the fate of the Moskva was grounds for war.

Image source, Reuters

As we've been reporting, the Russian army is on the brink of taking the southern Ukrainian city of Mariupol - strategically important to Russia's attempts to build a southern corridor from Russia to Crimea.

Justin Crump, chief executive of intelligence consultancy Sibylline, and a British Army veteran, tells BBC Radio 4's Today programme the situation in the city is a "ghastly humanitarian tragedy" with "appalling scenes of destruction", the likes of which have not really been seen since World War Two.

There's going to be fighting for a period of time, he says, especially focused on the Azovstal steel works - to the east of the city centre.

He explains: "There's a lot of Soviet-era bunkers there, it's industrial terrain, it's been prepared for defence for a long time by Ukrainian forces, including the Azov battalion who are very focused on the defence. And they're a very important target for the Russians because they are part of the right wing in Ukraine.

"It's going to be very hard to root out people who aren't going to surrender, over a long period of time."

Crump says around half of Russia's total force originally deployed to Ukraine is now in the south-east, with much of the rest preparing to move there, and with separatists joining them.

"We do understand they're under pressure from Putin to deliver results by the first week of May, and the victory parade in Russia. And that's included an order, we understand, to destroy things that can't be taken by then. And that may extend as far as the capital city... which saw raids last night.

"So that's all linked and Russia's probably getting very frustrated about the slow tempo of operations and success."

Image source, .

We have more on the Russian missile strikes on Kyiv we reported earlier.

The strikes were carried out using sea-launched Kalibr cruise missiles and targeted the Vizar machine-building plant in the Kyiv suburb of Zhulyany, the Russian defence ministry said in a statement published on its Telegram channel.

Overnight, Kyiv residents say they did hear explosions, and social media users wrote that electricity had gone out in some places, BBC Ukrainian reports.