Earlier today, the Azov Regiment of Ukraine’s National Guard, which has members trapped inside the Azovstal factory, released footage of around two dozen women and children, some of whom have been in the underground tunnels for two months.

The footage of Azovstal showed soldiers giving sweets to children who respond with fist-bumps. One young girl says she and her relatives “haven’t seen neither the sky, nor the sun” since they left home on 27 February.

“We want to see peaceful skies, we want to breathe in fresh air,” one woman in the video said. “You have simply no idea what it means for us to simply eat, drink some sweetened tea. For us, it is already happiness.”

The regiment’s deputy commander, Sviatoslav Palamar, told The Associated Press the video was shot Thursday, the same day Russia declared victory over the rest of Mariupol. The contents could not be independently verified.

Russian forces are attacking a steel plant that is the last Ukrainian stronghold in the city of Mariupol, a Ukrainian official said

Fiona Hill, a British-born Russia expert and former White House intelligence adviser, said Vladimir Putin’s “nuclear blackmail” during the conflict in Ukraine was likely to increase the international demand for nuclear arms.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, the former deputy assistant to the president when Donald Trump was in office said: “The nuclear issue is something that everybody should be concerned about on a global basis because he [Mr Putin] is basically telling every country: You need a nuclear weapon.

“So the whole idea of non-proliferation is basically out the window because it is basically very clear that the reason we are not going after Russia with everything that we’ve got is because they’ve got a nuclear weapon and he is saying he’s prepared to use one.

“And everyone is looking at this now and thinking, ‘Right, well if I want to have my way with my neighbour, I need a nuclear weapon’ – that’s basically what Putin is telling us.

“And conversely, everyone is thinking, ‘If I’m going to have a good defensive posture, I can’t rely on someone else coming to my assistance, I need a nuclear weapon’.

“So we are in a whole new territory that we haven’t even been in during the Cold War, and so this requires really robust diplomacy.”

She continued: “If you’re Japan and South Korea, for example, you’re really rethinking your non-nuclear posture and your reliance on the United States. Putin has put everything in jeopardy.”

Russia will deploy its first military unit armed with nuclear-capable ballistic Sarmat missiles this year, the head of the country’s space agency has said.

Dmitry Rogozin, who runs the Roscosmos agency, said the until will be based in Uzhur, just under 2,000 miles from Moscow, according to the Tasss news agency.

British supermarkets have limited the amount of cooking oil customers can buy due to supply-chain problems caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has warned that Vladimir Putin’s ambitions do end with Ukraine.

My colleague Namita Singh takes a look at other countries Russia might have its eye on:

Russia’s constant shelling of Ukrainian-controlled cities in Luhansk province is intensifying, the region’s governor said.

Speaking on television, Serhiy Haidai confirmed that some Ukrainian forces were leaving settlements to regroup, adding that this was not a critical setback.

Russia continues to deny targeting civilians in its war in Ukraine, despite evidence to the contrary.

Russian troops downed a Ukrainian Su-25 fighter jet and destroyed three MI-8 helicopters at an airbase in the Kharkiv region, the Kremlin has claimed.

Ukraine is yet to respond to the Russian reports.

The Ukrainian army estimates that 21,600 Russian soldiers have been killed since Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine on 24 February.

In total, 854 Russian tanks and 177 Russian planes have been destroyed, it claimed.

Here are the latest Ukrainian estimates:

Evacuations from the besieged city of Mariupol were due to start at midday local time (9am GMT), the Ukrainian deputy prime minister has indicated.

“Today, we again will be trying to evacuate women, children and the elderly,” Iryna Vereshchuk said in an online post.