- 40 nations contributing to UN Lebanon peacekeeping force condemn 'attacks'
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- Morocco crush Central African Republic, Guirassy scores hat-trick
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- Mets hurler Senga ready to take on Dodgers in game one of NL Championship Series
- Ronaldo on target again as Portugal defeat Poland in Nations League
- Guardians rip Tigers 7-3 to advance in MLB playoffs
- AFP, BBC win top French war reporting awards
- Carsley goes back to basics as humbled England face Finland
- Alex Salmond: the man who took Scotland to the brink of independence
- Scotland's former leader Alex Salmond dies aged 69: party
- UN warns of catastrophe as Israel fights a two-front war
- Croatia extend Scotland's losing streak
- South Africa, New Zealand boost T20 World Cup semi-final hopes
- 'Very challenging': Israel faces Hezbollah in tricky terrain
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- South Africa boost T20 World Cup semi-final hopes with Bangladesh win
- Samson ton powers India to T20 series sweep after record total
- Djokovic to face Sinner in Shanghai final with 100th title in sight
- UN peacekeepers to remain in Lebanon: spokesman
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- Samson ton powers India to record 297-6 in Bangladesh T20
- New Zealand enjoy perfect start to America's Cup defence over Britain
- Pogacar emulates icon Coppi with fourth straight Il Lombardia triumph
- UN warns against 'catastrophic' regional conflict
- New Zealand crush Ineos Britannia in America's Cup opener
- Djokovic to face Sinner in blockbuster Shanghai Masters final
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- Sri Lanka seeks to match success in W.Indies T20s
- Sinner reaches Shanghai final, will end year number one
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- Israel warns south Lebanon residents to 'not return'
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- Hezbollah fires at Israel as wars rage on Yom Kippur
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- China tees up fresh spending to boost ailing economy
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Ukraine slams Russian attacks on Donbas 'hell'
Incessant bombardment has turned Ukraine's Donbas region into "hell", President Volodymyr Zelensky said, as the first post-invasion trial of a Russian soldier for war crimes neared its closely watched climax Friday.
Zelensky's government received a fresh boost as the US Congress approved a $40 billion aid package, including funds to enhance Ukraine's armoured vehicle fleet and air defence system.
Ukraine sorely needs enhanced capability to fend off the kind of onslaught Russia is waging in the eastern region of Donbas, a Russian-speaking area that has been partially controlled by pro-Kremlin separatists since 2014.
"In Donbas, the occupiers are trying to increase pressure," Zelensky said in his nightly video address late Thursday. "There's hell, and that's not an exaggeration."
In the eastern city of Severodonetsk, 12 people were killed and another 40 wounded by Russian shelling, the regional governor said.
Zelensky described the bombardment of Severodonetsk as "brutal and absolutely pointless", as residents cowering in basements described an unending ordeal of terror.
The city forms part of the last pocket of Ukrainian resistance in Lugansk, the smaller of two regions comprising the Donbas war zone.
Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said his forces' campaign in Lugansk was "nearing completion".
Indiscriminate bombardment and cold-blooded targeting of civilians feature heavily in a growing charge-sheet of alleged war crimes conducted by Russians in Ukraine.
- 'Truly sorry' -
Vadim Shishimarin, the first Russian soldier to face trial in Kyiv, has admitted to killing an unarmed civilian and told the court on Friday that he was "truly sorry".
But Shishimarin's lawyer Viktor Ovsyannikov said in closing arguments that the 21-year-old sergeant was "not guilty" of premeditated murder and war crimes.
"I ask you to acquit my client," Ovsyannikov told the judges, who are expected to deliver their verdict on Monday. Shishimarin faces a possible life sentence.
The Russian shot dead Oleksandr Shelipov, 62, four days into the invasion, purportedly to avoid the civilian giving away his unit's position after they had stolen a car.
In Donetsk, the pro-Kremlin authorities are in turn threatening to put on trial some of the Ukrainian soldiers who held out for weeks in dire conditions at the Azovstal steel plant in the southern port city of Mariupol.
Ukraine is hoping instead to exchange the Azovstal soldiers for Russian prisoners.
A total of 1,908 Ukrainian troops have surrendered this week at the steelworks, according to Moscow, signalling the effective end of what Kyiv had called a "heroic" resistance.
Russia released a video appearing to show exhausted Ukrainian soldiers trudging out of the sprawling plant, after a siege forced the defenders and civilians to huddle in tunnels, enduring shortages of food, water and medicine.
"Our expectation is... that all prisoners of war will be treated in accordance with the Geneva Convention and the law of war," Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said in Washington.
US President Joe Biden has cast the Ukraine war as part of a great US-led struggle of democracy against authoritarianism.
Biden offered "full, total, complete backing" to Finland and Sweden in their bid to join NATO, as he gave their leaders a red-carpet welcome at the White House on Thursday.
- 'We're not idiots' -
But all 30 existing NATO members need to agree on any new entrants, and Turkey has condemned the historically non-aligned Nordic neighbours' alleged toleration of Kurdish militants.
The United States and NATO's chief expressed confidence of overcoming Turkish objections. And in Finland, one brewery has already crafted a special NATO beer.
It tastes of "security, with a hint of freedom", brewer Petteri Vanttinen said.
Shoigu said the Kremlin would respond to any NATO expansion by creating more military bases in western Russia.
As well as redrawing the security map of Europe, the conflict has sent shockwaves through the global economy, especially in energy and food markets.
Russia and Ukraine produce 30 percent of the world's wheat supply and the war has sent food prices surging. Russia is also a major exporter of fertiliser.
Washington called on Russia to allow exports of Ukrainian grain held up at Black Sea ports.
But Russia's former president Dmitry Medvedev blamed the West.
"On the one hand, insane sanctions are being imposed against us, on the other hand, they are demanding food supplies," he said. "Things don't work like that, we're not idiots."
burs-jit/ach
L.Davis--AMWN