The Ukrainian president has signed an application for the country's membership in European Union, tweeted the handle of the country's parliament, with the move coming in the midst of an invasion by Russian forces.
Earlier in the day, talks were held between Ukraine and Russian representatives at the Belarussian border.
Ukraine has vowed not to give ground at talks with Moscow and said their goal for the talks was an immediate ceasefire and the withdrawal of Russian forces from Ukraine.
Fighting has claimed dozens of civilian lives, forced hundreds and thousands of Ukrainians to flee west and could, according to the EU, eventually displace up to seven million people.
Russia has become an international pariah as its forces do battle on the streets of Ukraine's cities, facing a barrage of sanctions including a ban from Western airspace and key financial networks.
Here are the LIVE updates on Russia-Ukraine War:
The UK government has ordered all assets of President Vladimir Putin and his Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov frozen over Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The Treasury issued a financial sanctions notice against the two men, adding them to a list of Russian oligarchs who have already had their property and bank accounts in the UK frozen. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson earlier told his NATO partners he was planning "imminent" sanctions against Putin and Lavrov. (AFP)
"We expect that they're going to want to continue to move forward and try to encircle the city in the coming days," a US official said. Russian troops were about 25 km from Kyiv's city center, he added.
The United States said the Russian president was escalating the war with "dangerous rhetoric." White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Putin has displayed a pattern of "manufacturing threats" that don't exist in order to justify further aggression, reported news agency Reuters.
Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said the freeze would take effect "in days", as part of new legislation to squeeze Russia's economy for its "unjustified aggression".
"The Ukrainian government has today requested that the Russian government be suspended from its membership of Interpol and we will be leading all international efforts to that effect," interior minister Priti Patel said.
British Transport Secretary Grant Shapps on Monday ordered all UK seaports to turn away Russian vessels, in response to the country's invasion of Ukraine. The banning order applied to "any ship which they have reason to believe is owned, controlled or operated by any person connected with Russia" or on a sanctions list, "flying the Russian flag; registered in Russia", he tweeted. (AFP)
The United States sees "no reason to change" its nuclear alert levels at this time, the White House said on Monday after Russian President Vladimir Putin put Russia's nuclear deterrent on high alert amid a barrage of Western reprisals over Moscow's invasion of Ukraine, reports Reuters.
The Russian owner of one of Britain's leading newspapers on Monday urged President Vladimir Putin to withdraw from Ukraine, to prevent further bloodshed and war with Europe.
Russia bans all residents from transferring money abroad: Kremlin
All Russian banks will have their assets frozen within days, UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said Monday, as part of plans to ramp up economic sanctions. "We will bring in a full asset freeze on all Russian banks in days, looking to coordinate with our allies," Truss told parliament, saying it was designed to prevent the Kremlin funding its invasion of Ukraine. (AFP)
The US shuttered its embassy in Minsk (in Belarus which is a Russian ally) and allowed non-emergency employees and family members to leave its embassy in Moscow on Monday as Russia pushed on with its invasion of Ukraine for a fifth day. "We took these steps due to security and safety issues stemming from the unprovoked and unjustified attack by Russian military forces in Ukraine," Secretary of State Antony Blinken said. (Reuters)
Eight students from Karnataka, including a native of Udupi, have sent a moving video in which they urged the Union government to rescue them from the war zone in Ukraine as they have run out of food and water. In the video, the youth are seen appealing for help. They said, "We are badly stuck in Kharkiv city. Our situation is extremely critical. For the past two days, we have not eaten anything. We are having only bread and chocolates. There is no proper light, water and air in the area where we are stuck. We are drinking recycled water." (PTI)
Western sanctions in retaliation for the invasion of Ukraine are designed to topple Russian President Vladimir Putin, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's spokesman said Monday.
A group of Ukrainian troops, who were believed to have been killed in action after defying the Russian Navy's warning to surrender, are alive after they were taken prisoners, the news website Spectator Index claimed in a tweet.
US recommends Americans in Russia leave "immediately": State Department
Russian Foreign Minster Sergei Lavrov has cancelled a trip to Geneva for disarmament talks because his plane would not be able to pass through airspace that the European Union has closed to Russian aviation as part of sanctions against Moscow, RIA news agency quoted a diplomatic source as saying on Monday. (Reuters)
Russia's defence ministry on Monday said its strategic missile forces and Northern and Pacific fleets had been placed on enhanced combat duty, the Interfax news agency reported, in line with an order from President Vladimir Putin.
Rights groups have called on Russia to stop using cluster munitions in Ukraine, saying fatal strikes using the indiscriminate weapons on a hospital and a school could constitute war crimes.
The ruble collapsed against the dollar and the euro on the Moscow Stock Exchange on Monday as the West punished Moscow with harsh new sanctions over the Kremlin's invasion of Ukraine.
The European Union is planning to impose new sanctions on Belarus this week for helping the Russian invasion of Ukraine, hitting exports, oligarchs, central bank and cutting Belarusian banks off from SWIFT, a senior EU official said on Monday. "In terms of the economic sanctions package, it's imminent, it'll probably be proposed either today or tomorrow," the official, who asked not to be named, said. (Reuters)
Over 8,000 Indians have left Ukraine since the initial advisory was issued, the foreign ministry announced today. Six evacuation flights have landed in India carrying evacuated 1,396 citizens. Four of these came from Bucharest and two from Budapest, it said.
An Air India flight from Romania carrying 240 Indian citizens evacuated from Ukraine has landed in New Delhi at 4:54 PM today.
The Indian Embassy in Ukraine has issued a second advisory for the Indian nationals stranded in Ukraine on Monday and advised them to reach the railway station as the weekend curfew in Kyiv has been lifted. "Weekend curfew lifted in Kyiv. All students are advised to make their way to the railway station for onward journey to the western parts," said the advisory. It added that Ukraine Railways is putting special trains for evacuations. (ANI)
Japan is to join the international sanction on Russian central bank by limiting transactions, prime minister Fumio Kishida said on Monday after speaking with Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy by telephone. Kishida also said Japan will put sanctions on Belarusian individuals and organisations including President Alexander Lukashenko, as well as limit exports given the country's "evident involvement in the invasion" of Ukraine. (Reuters)
A top EU official said Monday there were disagreements among the 27 member states on enlarging the bloc, as Kyiv appealed for membership in the face of a Russian invasion. "There are different opinions and sensitivities within the EU on enlargement," European Council chief Charles Michel said. He said that Kyiv would have to submit an official request to join, then member states would have to come up with a unanimous position. (AFP)
Talks between Ukraine and Russia have started at Belarussian border, Ukrainian presidential advisor Mykhailo Podolyak told news agency Reuters via text message today. Earlier, the Ukrainian president's office said Ukraine's goal for the talks was an immediate ceasefire and the withdrawal of Russian forces from Ukraine. (Reuters)
The Ukrainian Ambassador to India Dr Igor Polikha on Monday said that the country has suffered many civilian casualties due to Russian invasion. Speaking at a press conference in New Delhi, Dr Polikha said, "We're suffering a lot of civilian casualties. According to official information of our ministry, already 16 children were killed from bombings, shellings and so on as a result of Russian peace-fighting operation." (ANI)
Amid the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia will be overseeing evacuation operations of stranded Indians in Romania and Moldova, while Law Minister Kiren Rijiju will be visiting Slovakia. Meanwhile, Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas Hardeep Singh Puri will be overlooking operations in Hungary, and Minister of State in the Ministry of Road Transport Gen (Retd) VK Singh will manage evacuations in Poland. (ANI)
The Russian army said Monday that Ukrainian civilians could "freely" leave the country's capital Kyiv and stressed it had air superiority over Ukraine as its invasion went into its fifth day.
"All civilians in the city can freely leave the Ukrainian capital along the Kyiv-Vasylkiv highway. This direction is open and safe," Russian defence ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said in televised remarks.
"Russian aviation has gained air superiority over the entire territory of Ukraine," he added, accusing Ukrainian troops of using civilians as human shields.
The United States on Sunday asked its citizens in Russia to "consider" leaving immediately, as commercial airlines cancelled flights and nations shut airspace in efforts to tighten the screws on Moscow for invading Ukraine.
"An increasing number of airlines are cancelling flights into and out of Russia, and numerous countries have closed their airspace to Russian airlines," said the US embassy in Moscow in a statement.
It called on its citizens to "consider departing Russia immediately via commercial options still available."
But the US embassy said that Washington was not changing its travel advisory to Russia.
Amid ongoing tensions between Moscow and Kyiv, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Sunday (local time) spoke with UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Polish President Andrzej Duda and agreed on further joint steps to counter the "aggressor".