Ukraine Russia war latest news: Putin replaces top commander

If Finland applies to join Nato, the leader of Sweden’s second-largest opposition party has said that he will suggest that his party change its stance on Swedish membership – which would mean a swing to a parliamentary majority in favour of the long-neutral nation joining the alliance.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has prompted the two countries to consider joining, although Sweden is more hesitant than Finland – which has a 1,300 km border with Russia – despite pro-Putin politician Vladimir Dzhabarov claiming such a move by Helsinki would result in “the destruction of their country”.

Sweden Democrats party leader Jimmie Akesson told the Svenska Dagbladet newspaper on Saturday that, if Finland applies, “my ambition is to go to the party council with a request that we change our mind”.

He added: “What’s changed now is that Finland is very clearly moving towards a Nato membership and there are many indications this may happen in the near future. That, and the fact Ukraine, which is not a Nato member, is completely alone, has made me turn.”

In its latest intelligence update, the UK’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) has warned that Russia “continues to hit Ukrainian non-combatants, such as those killed in yesterday’s rocket strike on Kramatorsk railway station”.

Russian operations continue to focus on the Donbas region, Mariupol and Mykolaiv, supported by continued cruise missile launches into Ukraine by Russian naval forces, the MoD said.

While Russian air activity is expected to increase in the south and east of Ukraine in support of these efforts, Moscow’s ambitions to establish a land corridor between Crimea and the Donbas continue to be thwarted by Ukrainian resistance, the ministry said.

More people need to evacuate from Luhansk as shelling has increased in recent days and more Russian forces have been arriving, the eastern Ukrainian region’s governor has warned.

Some 30 per cent of residents still remain in cities and villages across the region and have been asked to evacuate, Serhiy Gaidai said on Saturday, warning that Russia is “amassing forces for an offensive and we see the number of shelling has increased”.

Ukraine has increasingly been warning that Russia plans intensified attacks in the country’s east and south after withdrawing its troops from areas to the north of the capital, Kyiv.

The US said this week that Moscow probably plans to deploy tens of thousands of soldiers in eastern Ukraine.

Ten humanitarian corridors to evacuate people today from Ukraine’s besieged regions have been agreed, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister has said.

The planned corridors include one for people evacuating by private transport from the city of Mariupol, Iryna Vereshchuk said.

Multiple attempts to agree safe passage for buses to take supplies to Mariupol and bring out civilians have failed, with each side blaming the other.

Ukraine has imprisoned pilots who “had maps with civilian targets to bomb”, Volodymyr Zelensky has alleged.

The Ukrainian president made the claim when asked to detail what evidence Kyiv has of war crimes, also claiming that Ukraine has intercepted communications showing “Russian soldiers talking to their parents about what they stole and who they abducted”.

“There are also investigations being conducted based on the remains of the dead,” Mr Zelensky told CBS’s 60 Minutes show.

Asked whether Vladimir Putin should be prosecuted for war crimes, Mr Zelensky said: “I think everyone who made a decision, who issued an order, who fulfilled an order, everyone who is relevant to this, I believe they are guilty.”

Russia is reorganising its senior military leadership in Ukraine, BBC News has reported.

General Alexander Dvornikov, who led Russia’s invasion in Syria, is now expected to lead the Ukrainian invasion.

“That particular commander has a lot of experience of Russian operations in Syria. So we would expect the overall command and control to improve,” a source said.

The change in military leadership, the report said, is in an attempt to improve coordination between various military units in Ukraine.

Senior officials have said that Finland and Sweden could join the Nato in a move that is bound to irk Russia.

Nato officials were quoted as saying by CNN that discussions about Sweden and Finland joining the Nato alliance have gotten “extremely serious since Russia’s invasion”.

A former Finnish prime minister said the move to join “was pretty much a done deal on the 24th of February when Russia invaded”.

“If you look at public opinion in Finland and Sweden, and how their views have changed dramatically over the past six weeks, I think it’s another example of how this has been a strategic failure,” one senior US State Department official said this week.

On Friday, Russian forces attacked the Kramatorsk train station, in which more than 50 people — including five children — were killed. The Ukrainian president said that the Russian forces shall be held accountable for this “war crime.”

Several world leaders also condemned the “deliberate slaughter” of civilians in Ukraine.

See photos of the Kramatorsk train station here:

S&P lowered Russia’s foreign currency ratings to “selective default” on increased risks that “Moscow will not be able and willing to honour its commitments to foreign debtholders,” Reuters reported.

On Saturday, S&P said in a statement that it understood that Russia had made coupon and principal payments on dollar-denominated Eurobonds in rubles on Monday.

“We currently don’t expect that investors will be able to convert those ruble payments into dollars equivalent to the originally due amounts, or that the government will convert those payments within a 30-day grace period,” the statement said.

Joe Biden on Friday signed into law a bill to suspend normal trade relations with Russia amid Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

This comes after the US, Japan and other G7 nations agreed to take steps to strip Russia of its “most-favoured nation” status in the World Trade Organisation.

One bill suspends normal trade relations with Russia and Belarus. The other prohibits energy imports from Russia, including oil, coal and natural gas, it was reported.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki had said on Thursday that the president would sign the bills, saying the sanctions were “something the President supports” and “had called for”.