Russia Ukraine war live updates: Ukraine rules out ceasefire as fighting intensifies in Donbas

With Russia claiming to have taken prisoner nearly 2,500 Ukrainian fighters from the besieged Mariupol steel plant, concerns grew about their fate as a Moscow-backed separatist leader vowed they would face tribunals. Russia has declared its full control of the Azovstal steel plant, which for weeks was the last holdout in Mariupol and a symbol of Ukrainian tenacity in the strategic port city, now in ruins with more than 20,000 residents feared dead. The seizure gives Russian President Vladimir Putin a badly wanted victory in the war he began nearly three months ago.

Belarusians are among those who have answered a call by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for foreign fighters to go to Ukraine and join the International Legion for the Territorial Defence of Ukraine.And volunteers have answered that call, given the high stakes in a conflict which many people see as a civilisational battle pitting dictatorship against freedom. Weakening Putin, the Belarusian volunteers believe, would also weaken Lukashenko, who has held power since 1994, and create a window of opportunity to topple his oppressive government and bring democratic change to the nation of nearly 10 million people.For many of the Belarusians, their base is Poland, a country along NATO's eastern flank that borders Belarus and Ukraine and which became a haven for pro-democracy Belarusian dissidents before becoming one for war refugees from Ukraine

Ukraine ruled out a ceasefire or concessions to Moscow while Russia intensified an offensive in the eastern Donbas region. Russian-backed separatists already controlled swathes of territory in Luhansk and the neighbouring Donetsk province before the Feb. 24 invasion, but Moscow wants to seize the last remaining Ukrainian-held territory in Donbas.

Russia heads into the fourth month of its invasion of Ukraine on Tuesday with no end in sight to the fighting that has killed thousands, uprooted millions and reduced cities to rubble.After abandoning its assault on the capital, Kyiv, Russia is pressing on in the east and south in the face of mounting sanctions and a fierce Ukrainian counter-offensive bolstered by Western arms.

With Russia claiming to have taken prisoner nearly 2,500 Ukrainian fighters from the besieged Mariupol steel plant, concerns grew about their fate as a Moscow-backed separatist leader vowed they would face tribunals. The Russian Defence Ministry released video of Ukrainian soldiers being detained after announcing that its forces had removed the last holdouts from the Mariupol plant's extensive underground tunnels. It said a total of 2,439 had surrendered.Family members of the fighters, who came from a variety of military and law enforcement units, have pleaded for them to be given rights as prisoners of war and eventually returned to Ukraine. Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said Saturday that Ukraine “will fight for the return" of every one of them.

Moscow will consider exchanging prisoners from Ukraine's Azov battalion for Viktor Medvedchuk, a wealthy Ukrainian businessman close to President Vladimir Putin, a Russian negotiator said on Saturday. "We are going to study the possibility," said Leonid Slutsky, a senior member of Russia's negotiating team on Ukraine, speaking from the separatist city of Donetsk in southeastern Ukraine, as per reports. (AFP)

The Ukraine war can only be resolved through "diplomacy", Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Saturday amid a deadlock in negotiations between Kyiv and Moscow. "The end will be through diplomacy," he told a Ukrainian television channel. The war "will be bloody, there will be fighting but will only definitively end through diplomacy". (AFP)

Russia claimed on Friday to have complete control of the port city of Mariupol, in what would be its most significant symbolic gain since the war started. Moscow said that its defence minister had informed President Putin of the “complete liberation” of the Mariupol steel plant where Ukrainian fighters made their last stand in the city before surrendering in recent days. The Ukrainian authorities said Russia was demining the port at Mariupol in an attempt to get it functioning again. At the same time, Russia said it had destroyed a large consignment of weapons and military equipment near Kyiv and hit a special operations training base outside the Black Sea city of Odesa.

Ukraine on Saturday ruled out agreeing to a ceasefire with Russia and said Kyiv would not accept any deal with Moscow that involved ceding territory. Acknowledging that Kyiv's stance on the war was becoming more uncompromising, presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said making concessions would backfire on Ukraine because Russia would hit back harder after any break in fighting. (Reuters)

Ukraine needs to become a full candidate to join the EU, rather than signing up to the kind of broader "European political community" antechamber proposed by France, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Saturday. "We don't need any alternatives to the application of Ukraine to join the European Union, we don't need such compromises," Zelenskyy told reporters in Kyiv during a joint press conference with visiting Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa.

The ripple effects of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have been devastating for families of all kinds — including those who have seen their prospective adoptions put on hold. Ukraine was once one of the US’s most frequent partners on international adoptions, but the war changed all that: The embattled country has halted all international adoptions as the country copes with the turmoil unleashed on its courts and social services. Many children, including orphans, have also fled or been displaced.

Turkey's President Tayyip Erdogan told NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg that Ankara will not look positively on Sweden and Finland's membership of the alliance unless they clearly show cooperation on the fight against terrorism and other issues. In a statement by the presidency on Saturday, Erdogan said he supported NATO's open door policy.

Russia’s claimed seizure of a Mariupol steel plant that became a symbol of Ukrainian tenacity gives Russian President Vladimir Putin a sorely needed victory in the war he began, capping a nearly three-month siege that left a city in ruins and more than 20,000 residents feared dead. After the Russian Defense Ministry announced late Friday that its forces had removed the last Ukrainian fighters from the plant's miles of underground tunnels, concern mounted for the Ukrainian defenders who now are prisoners in Russian hands.

Russia halted gas exports to neighbouring Finland on Saturday, a highly symbolic move that came just days after the Nordic country announced it wanted to join NATO and marked a likely end to Finland's nearly 50 years of importing natural gas from Russia

Russia stopped delivering gas to Finland in an escalation of a dispute over energy payments with Western nations, and claimed victory in a weeks-long battle for Mariupol's devastated Azovstal steel plant as it presses for control of the Donbas. Russia also launched what appeared to be a major assault to seize the last remaining Ukrainian-held territory in Luhansk, one of two provinces that make up the southeastern Donbas region: where Russian-backed separatists already controlled swathes of territory before the Feb. 24 invasion.