An attack on a frontline civilian convoy killed at least 25 people in southern Ukraine yesterday, just hours before Moscow was due to annex four occupied Ukrainian regions.

Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday directly accused the United States and its allies of blowing up the Nord Stream pipelines.

The United States condemns Russia’s fraudulent attempt today to annex sovereign Ukrainian territory. Russia is violating international law, trampling on the United Nations Charter, and showing its contempt for peaceful nations everywhere.

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed treaties Friday to annex parts of Ukraine in defiance of international law, vowing to protect the newly incorporated regions by “all available means” in another escalation of his seven-month invasion of the country.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday presided over a ceremony to annex four Ukrainian regions partly occupied by his forces, escalating his seven-month war and taking it into an unpredictable new phase.

Dozens of civilians were killed or wounded in what Kyiv said was a cynical Russian missile strike on a convoy of civilian cars in southern Ukraine on Friday, leaving bodies strewn across the ground.

President Vladimir Putin will sign documents today proclaiming Russia’s annexation of four Ukrainian regions, as Moscow rushes to lock in territorial claims that the Ukrainian army is threatening to reverse on the battlefield.

Moscow was poised to annex a swath of Ukraine yesterday, releasing what it called vote tallies showing support in four partially occupied provinces to join Russia, after what Kyiv and the West denounced as illegal sham referendums held at gunpoint.

An ally of President Vladimir Putin yesterday issued a stark new nuclear warning to Ukraine and the West as Russia began releasing results of referendums it bills as a prelude to it annexing four Ukrainian regions.

European countries on Tuesday raced to investigate unexplained leaks in two Russian gas pipelines running under the Baltic Sea near Sweden and Denmark, infrastructure at the heart of an energy crisis since Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

The Kremlin yesterday refused to deny that Russia might close its borders to prevent an exodus of military-age men after President Vladimir Putin declared a partial mobilisation in an effort to regain the upper hand in the war in Ukraine.

Ukraine has discovered two more mass burial sites containing the bodies of hundreds of people in the northeastern town of Izium, which Kyiv recaptured from Russia this month, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said.

China and India called at the United Nations for a negotiated end to the Ukraine war, stopping short of robust support for traditional ally Russia.

Russia has sought to defend its seven-month old war, with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov telling the United Nations that regions of Ukraine where widely-criticised referendums are being held would get Russia's "full protection" if annexed by Moscow.

Moscow replaced its top logistics general yesterday after a series of setbacks as Kremlin-held regions of eastern and southern Ukraine voted for a second day on becoming part of Russia. 

Ukraine will never forgive Russia for a shameful conflict which has thrown back Russia's development by half a century to Soviet times predating Mikhail Gorbachev, journalist and Nobel Peace laureate Dmitry Muratov told Reuters.

Voting on whether Russia should annex Kremlin-controlled regions of Ukraine opened yesterday as the West denounced the referendum that has dramatically raised the stakes of Moscow’s seven-month invasion.

A team of experts commissioned by the U.N.’s top human rights body to look into rights violations in Ukraine said Friday its initial investigation turned up evidence of war crimes in the country following Russia’s invasion nearly seven months ago.

Annexation vote begins in occupied Ukrainian territories to join Russia, West terms "sham"

Some draft-age Russians rushed to the borders on Thursday to escape their country's biggest conscription drive since World War Two, as world powers rounded on Moscow at the United Nations, accusing it of escalating the conflict in Ukraine.