War in Ukraine: Latest developments

Here are the latest developments in the war in Ukraine:

Five “effective” Russian missiles hit the western city of Lviv, killing at least seven people and wounding eight, nearby officials say.

The attack comes as Russia hits goals across the united states ahead of an anticipated marketing campaign inside the east.

Russian kingdom tv pronounces a video of men it says are captured Britons, who ask to be exchanged for Viktor Medvedchuk, a rich Ukrainian wealthy person who has for years been near Russian President Vladimir Putin and who became captured recently.

Moments later, Ukraine’s security offerings put out a video of Medvedchuk asking to be exchanged for the Ukrainian civilians and squaddies trapped inside the strategically besieged Ukrainian port of Mariupol.

Ukraine says it is halting for a second day in a row the evacuation of civilians from the frontline towns and cities in the east of the country.

“Unfortunately, today, April 18, there will be no humanitarian corridors,” Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk says in a statement on social media. “In violation of international humanitarian law, the Russian occupiers have not stopped blocking and shelling humanitarian routes.”

Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky says Russia is seeking to destroy the region of Donbas, the country’s industrial heartland, and vows to defend it, including Mariupol where patches of Ukrainian forces are trapped in the port’s giant industrial parks.

“Russian troops are preparing for an offensive operation in the east of our country in the near future. They want to literally finish off and destroy Donbas,” Zelensky says in an evening statement.

Ukraine’s prime minister Denys Shmyhal tells ABC’s “This Week” that Mariupol “has not fallen” — adding the encircled forces defending the city from Russian attack will “fight to the end”.

Zelensky says he has invited his French counterpart to visit Ukraine to see for himself evidence that Russian forces have committed “genocide” — a term President Emmanuel Macron has avoided.

“I talked to him yesterday,” Zelensky tells CNN.

“I just told him I want him to understand that this is not war, but nothing other than genocide. I invited him to come when he will have the opportunity. He’ll come and see, and I’m sure he will understand.”

Dozens of paintings by renowned Russian artists along with Wassily Kandinsky are caught in Seoul after an exhibition because of sanctions imposed on Russia over its war in Ukraine.

The exhibition at the Sejong Museum of Art wrapped up on Sunday, however, the artwork is stuck within the South Korean capital as all available flight options were shut down by way of the sanctions.

Some 2 hundred,000 employees of overseas corporations in Moscow should lose their jobs because of sanctions over Russia’s navy marketing campaign in Ukraine, the city’s mayor says.

Sergei Sobyanin says the government had closing week permitted a $41-million program to aid employment within the Russian capital.