Ukraine's defence intelligence directorate has said five Ukrainian civilians have been returned in a prisoner swap with Russia.

It did not say whether the exchanged Russians were combatants, Reuters news agency reports.

Four of the five Ukrainian civilians had been taken prisoner during Russia's occupation of parts of the Kyiv region, which Russian forces withdrew from at the end of March, the directorate said.

It also said the dead body of a Ukrainian civilian was recovered in the exchange.

Nick Beake
Reporting from Kyiv

The Mayor of Kyiv, Vitali Klitschko, has told the BBC his country will only enter peace talks after the “last Russian soldier has left Ukraine”.

The former world heavyweight boxing champion was attending the funeral of a well known 24- year-old anti-corruption activist turned volunteer fighter, Roman Ratushnyi, who was killed in Izyum, in the Kharkiv region, earlier this month.

Some Ukrainian officials have expressed private concerns that Western allies may push their country towards a peace deal with Russia in light of the ongoing fallout from the war on food and energy supplies and the global economy.

When I asked Mayor Klitschko if he was concerned Ukraine could be pressured to making concessions to the Russians, he replied:

“The Russians talked about 'Let’s find a compromise. Let's find a solution'. What are they talking about? Which compromise? To give parts of Ukrainian territory to the Russians is not a compromise.

“I'm more than sure we will be ready to talk with the Russians about some compromise. If the last Russian soldier left Ukraine, it will be time to talk but not yet. Russians have to go from our homeland.”

Ukrainian commanders on the front line in Donbas in the east of the country say they are heavily outgunned by the Russians and losing hundreds of troops every day.

Klitschko, who won legions of global fans during his long record-breaking boxing career, told the BBC that the Russian people would eventually realise their own soldiers were dying for nothing more than President Vladimir Putin’s ambition.

He told me, “This is also a tragedy for Russians and for the Russian Federation. The people do not understand that right now, but I am sure they will realise very soon the reality. The Russians die - for what? The ambition of Putin? That's why the unity around Ukraine and all democratic countries is key for peace and freedom in Europe.”

As one of the most recognisable Ukrainians in the world, Klitschko’s voice carries weight but the ultimate decision on if and when to enter peace talks will be down to President Volodymyr Zelensky and his government.

Image source, .

Image source, Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust

New Ukrainian mum Lesia Husar, who fled the south-western city of Chernivtsi just weeks ago, has thanked staff at a hospital in Nottingham after they arranged a WhatsApp call so her husband could meet their new child.

She gave birth to baby Richard on Sunday with husband Taras 1,200 miles (2,000km) away.

Mrs Husar said it was a "big relief" to be at City Hospital in Nottingham and that her husband, who is still in Ukraine, could share in the birth.

Staff at the hospital said Mrs Husar, who travelled with her 14-year-old daughter Renatta, did not want to leave her home when pregnant, but she was constantly living in fear of air raids.

Read more of Lesia's story here.

Joel Gunter
Reporting from Kyiv

Hundreds of mourners gathered at a Kyiv monastery on Saturday to pay tribute to Roman Ratushnyi, a 24-year-old Ukrainian activist and soldier who died in battle in the east.

Ratushnyi was already a seasoned activist by the time Russia attacked Ukraine in February. Aged just 16, he was among the first students beaten by police in the Maidan protests against then president Viktor Yanukovytch in 2013 - protests that led to Yanukovytch’s overthrow.

“Now I feel completely free in this country. And I feel this country is my own,” Ratushnyi wrote in 2018.

He went on to lead a legal battle against the construction of an apartment tower in a woodland area near Kyiv, and lived to see victory in the courts in January.

When Russia launched its full-scale invasion the following month, Ratushnyi signed up, and he died on 9 June near the town of Izyum, a few weeks short of his 25th birthday.

His coffin was carried by a hearse from the monastery to the Maidan (square), as mourners chanted "Glory to Ukraine!" and "Glory to the heroes!".

Ratushnyi’s father, Taras, stood in the square where his 16-year-old son took a stand eight years beforehand: “Thank you my son for everything you did in such a short time,” he said.

Chris Partridge
BBC News

Russia says it used what it called high-precision air and ground weapons to destroy oil refinery and fuel storage depot targets in Ukraine.

Moscow’s ministry of defence said technological facilities intended to supply Ukraine’s military in the eastern Donbas region were hit in Kremenchuk and Lysychansk.

And the Russians have also been targeting Ukraine's military hardware, they say.

In the Donetsk part of Donbas. missiles are said to have hit 155mm M777 howitzers.

Russian surface-to-air missiles have claimed a Ukrainian Su-25 air-to-ground attack aircraft - along with an Mi-24 attack helicopter in approximately the same area, Moscow says.

And other attacks are said to have destroyed a Ukrainian Buk-M1 (SA-11) medium-range surface-to-air missile site in Luhansk province.

Ukraine’s Buk-M1 and long-range S-300 units, while effective, are old Soviet-era systems.

Kyiv has made numerous appeals to the West for advanced air defences to shoot down Russian aircraft and cruise missiles.

However, no Western air defence systems were announced in the $1bn (£818m) military package from the United States earlier this week.

Wyre Davies
Reporting from Kharkiv

Renowned British war surgeon David Nott has been in Ukraine, treating victims of the Russian invasion and training Ukrainian surgeons in the finer details of conflict-related surgery.

At a hospital in the east of the country, well within range of Russian rockets, he calmly carries out a complicated skin graft, helping to save the leg of a woman who suffered catastrophic injuries in a Russian shelling attack. Midway through the procedure, he turns to his assistant - a Ukrainian surgeon called Ivan and says: "Here, you do it."

For Prof Nott, one of the world's most experienced trauma surgeons, this is the culmination of a week-long trip to Ukraine, during which he and his team will have trained dozens of local doctors.

He has operated under fire in front-line situations around the world - from Syria to Yemen, Gaza to South Sudan and now in Ukraine.

This is his second trip to the country since the Russian invasion at the end of February. This time he is not just operating on victims of war, but aiming to pass on some of his immense depth of knowledge and surgical experience.

"I know what it's like to be under fire. I know what it's like to be in an operating theatre which is being shelled," he says.

"You're trying to do your best to try and save the life of the patient in front of you. But what we can do here is train people and I think we will have trained 70 surgeons in six days."

Read more about Prof Nott's story here.

Image source, Reuters

More now on the situation in the Donetsk region, where much of the territory, including the regional capital of the same name, is controlled by Russian-backed separatists.

The separatist mayor of Donetsk, Alexei Kulemzin, says several districts of the city were shelled by Ukrainian government forces early on Saturday, with an unspecified number of civilians killed or injured.

A building of Donetsk National University, a school, shops, housing and administrative buildings were damaged, Kulemzin writes on Telegram, external.

The report could not be verified independently, but a Reuters news agency crew in the city reported heavy bombardment on Friday, filming firefighters tackling a blaze and civilians sheltering in a basement.

One Donetsk resident, who gave her name as Larissa, described how a drone had appeared over the city and a man had tried to shoot it down with a rifle.

"We were coming to the corner of the building and people started firing upward, a drone was flying there and we were told to get inside the building," she said from the safety of a shelter.

"We came here... It [shelling] started again and it still continues, intensifying."

Image source, Reuters

On Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced that prominent paramedic Yuliya Payevska, aka Tayra, had been freed from Russian captivity.

In a video posted on Telegram, he said: "I can announce today that we managed to free from captivity Tayra - Ukrainian paramedic Yuliya Payevska. I am grateful to all who worked to achieve this result. Tayra is already home. We will go on working to bring everybody back."

Payevska was captured by Russian forces together with her driver in Mariupol in mid-March, where she'd been working as a paramedic, helping to evacuate injured soldiers and civilians.

Her husband believes she was taken to Russia. A propaganda video featuring her was carried by some pro-Kremlin Russian TV channels.

News of her release was welcomed by many Ukrainian commentators:

"It's hard to imagine what Tayra has been through, but it's so great that she is alive and home!" film director Iryna Tsilyk said.

Image source, Facebook

As we've been reporting, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has been visiting the southern port city of Mykolaiv in a rare trip outside the capital, Kyiv.

In a video published by his office, external, he could be seen looking at a badly damaged residential building in the city, holding a meeting with regional officials - including the head of the Mykolaiv regional administration, Vitaliy Kim - and giving out state awards to some of them.

His office said they discussed the state of the economy, the restoration of water supplies and the agricultural situation.

"Special attention was paid to threats from land and sea. We do not stop working for victory," the statement read.

His visit comes a day after a Russian strike killed two people and wounded another 20 in the city.

The city is regularly targeted by Russian artillery and missile strikes, officials say.

Now is crucial time for weapons supplypublished at 12:24 British Summer Time 18 June 2022

12:24 BST 18 June 2022

Nick Beake
Reporting from Kyiv

Image source, Reuters

We're just hearing that overnight, there have been some missile strikes in the centre of Ukraine, one of them hitting an oil refinery, and of course that's a reminder of the Russian attack that continues. The fighting is focused on the east of the country in the Donbas region.

But UK PM Boris Johnson, here on Friday following in the footsteps of other European leaders earlier in the week, said he was here to underline the strength of British support for Ukraine. President Zelensky said his support was "unparalleled", and [he] got this offer from the British to train up 10,000 Ukrainian soldiers every four months, talking about things like medical expertise, dealing with cyber-attacks, counter-explosives training.

We'll have to see if the Ukrainians are able to accept this, whether they want to, but I guess we need to stress that it won't make an impact immediately.

The Ukrainians say they are really grateful for all these visitors coming here, showing this political solidarity, at a time of course when they want to get into the European Union. But they say what will really help them is an increase in the amount of heavy weapons coming from their Western allies.

We know the Americans and British are sending these longer-range missiles, but the Ukrainians say they're not arriving soon enough, and that they're not arriving in big enough numbers, and they remain vastly outnumbered by the Russians on the battlefield.

It's only when they're level with them in terms of their hardware and capability that they will be able to really make an effort to push the Russians back, so they say it's a crucial time and they're desperate for all the support they can get.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has visited the Black Sea port city of Mykolaiv during a working trip to the region, his office has said in a statement.

"The President inspected the building of the Mykolaiv regional state administration which was destroyed as a result of a missile strike by Russian forces," it added.

The statement didn't specify when the president's visit took place.

Image source, Reuters

More now from Boris Johnson.

The UK prime minister has reacted to news that the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) said the UK would host the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest in the UK after the show's organisers said the event could not be held in the winning country, Ukraine.

"The Ukrainians won the Eurovision Song Contest... they deserve to have it and I believe that they can have it and I believe that they should have it," Johnson says.

"I believe that Kyiv or any other safe Ukrainian city would be a fantastic place to have it and I very much hope that the European Broadcast Union will recognise that," he adds.

The prime minister says the Ukrainian capital is "far more lively" than it was a few weeks ago, and with the annual competition a year away, "it's going to be fine by the time it comes around. They should be given a chance to host it".

Read more here.

Ukrainian shelling has trapped 77 miners in a coal mine in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine after power to the mine was cut off, Reuters reports, citing Russia's state RIA news agency.

"As a result of shelling by (Ukrainian forces), power to the Zasyadko mine in Donetsk was cut off, 77 miners remain underground," the separatist region's territorial defence is reported as saying.

The BBC is unable to verify this report and there has been no reaction from Ukrainian authorities.

Image source, PA Media

We've just heard from UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson who has been speaking after returning from a surprise visit to Kyiv on Friday.

He says it is important Britain continues to show it is supporting Ukraine, while warning of a risk of "Ukraine fatigue" setting in around the world as the war drags on.

"The Russians are grinding forward inch by inch and it's vital for us to show what we know to be true which is that Ukraine can win and will win," Johnson tells reporters.

"When Ukraine fatigue is setting in, it's very important to show that we are with them for the long haul and we are giving them the strategic resilience that they need," Johnson says.

It would be a "catastrophe" if Russian President Vladimir Putin was able to secure cities in the south of Ukraine and the Donbas, he adds.

The prime minister also says he wants to make it clear that the UK is supporting the Ukrainians in their ambition to expel the Russians from everything that Putin has obtained since 24 February.

Russia has probably renewed its efforts to advance south of the eastern city of Izyum in the last 48 hours, the UK's Ministry of Defence (MoD) says.

Its goal is to penetrate deeper into the Donetsk region and to surround the embattled city of Severodonetsk from the north, it says in its latest Twitter update, external.

It adds that Ukrainian civilians trapped in the city are likely to be suspicious of using humanitarian corridors that have been proposed by separatists and Russian officials, as Russia has precedent of using these corridors to impose the forced transfer of populations.

If trapped Ukrainian civilians do not take up an offer of leaving via a corridor, Russia is likely to claim justification in making less of a distinction between them and any Ukrainian military targets in the area, the MoD says.

Image source, .

Good morning and welcome as we resume our live coverage of the war in Ukraine. Here are some of the latest updates:

• Russia is likely to be renewing its efforts to advance into the Donetsk region, the UK's Ministry of Defence says
• Heavy Russian shelling of the city of Lysychansk has left a key route out of the eastern city impassable, Luhansk Governor Serhiy Haidai says

• British Prime Minister Boris Johnson offered military training for Ukrainian forces as he met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in a surprise visit to the capital, Kyiv, on Friday - his second visit of the war

• During his nightly address, Zelensky said paramedic Yuliya Payevska, aka Tayra, had been freed from Russian captivity
• The Ukrainian president welcomed positive steps being taken as the European Commission recommended Ukraine for official candidate status in its bid to join the EU
• Russian President Vladimir Putin accused the West of colonial arrogance and trying to crush his country with "stupid" sanctions during a speech in St Petersburg on Friday

Image source, Reuters

Thanks for following our live coverage of the war in Ukraine - which we'll be pausing in a short while.

But before we go, here's a summary of some of the key developments on what proved to be a busy day.

• UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson paid a second surprise visit to President Zelensky in Kyiv, offering to launch a major training operation for Ukrainian soldiers
• Russia's President Putin blasted Western countries during a speech at an economic conference in St Petersburg, saying their sanctions on Moscow had backfired
• The European Commission recommended Ukraine for official candidate status in its bid to join the EU
• Fighting continues to rage in the east; some 568 people are said to be sheltering in a chemicals plant in the embattled city of Severodonetsk
• Russian media have shown images purporting to show two missing Americans said to have been captured while fighting for Ukraine - who Washington has been trying to track down
• Ukraine has appealed for a rethink after organisers of the Eurovision Song Contest said the country could not host the 2023 event as hoped

Today's live page was brought to you by Nathan Williams, Gareth Evans, Chris Giles, Holly Wallis, Jo Couzens, Andrew Humphrey, Yaroslav Lukov, Catherine Evans, Alex Kleiderman and James FitzGerald.

Chris Partridge
BBC News

New research has shed more light on the impact of the war on grain production in Ukraine – and where some of it appears to be taken by the Russians.

The satellite imagery company Maxar has released this map graphic showing the change in area given to growing crops compared to last year. The figures are in hectares.

Image source, Maxar Technologies

In addition, the areas with the biggest percentage yearly differences include the Chernihiv region (down nearly 70%) and Zhytomyr (down 67%).

Maxar also talks about how Russia takes grain from Ukraine and moves it to other parts of the world.

Satellite imagery shows two Russian-flagged bulk carrier ships docked in the Russian-controlled Crimean port of Sevastopol last month and loaded up with grain.

In later pictures, Maxar says the same ships docked in Syria, with their hatches open.

Image source, Maxar Technologies

There remain huge problems trying to get Ukrainian grain out to the world. Silos are said to be still full of last year’s crop.

Ukraine blames a Russian blockade, Moscow blames Ukrainian mines preventing ships from leaving, along with international sanctions.

Next, an update on a pair of Americans who are said to have disappeared after volunteering to fight in a mission in eastern Ukraine earlier this month.

Russian media have broadcast images purporting to show the missing pair, Andy Huynh and Alexander Drueke.

Earlier, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he was "not aware" of the reported transfer to Russia of two US nationals who were captured while fighting in Ukraine.

And a short while ago, US President Biden said he did not know of the two men's whereabouts, nor that of a third US citizen said to have gone missing in Ukraine in April.

A key highway out of the bombarded Ukrainian city of Lysychansk is now impassable due to Russian shelling, according to Luhansk's regional governor.

The road links Lysychansk and the town of Bakhmut some 55 km to the south west, Serhiy Haidai said in an online post.

Haidai also said Lysychansk was still completely under Ukrainian control.

Image source, .