A Holocaust survivor has been killed as his home burned down during an attack by Russian forces on the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, according to a memorial for one of the concentration camps in which he was held.
Boris Romanchenko, who survived camps at Buchenwald, Peenemuende, Dora and Bergen-Belsen during World War II, was 96 when he died on Friday, Germany's Buchenwald concentration camp memorial said.
"A bullet hit the multi-storey building in which he lived. His apartment burned down," the memorial said.
Mr Romanchenko was born in Ukraine in 1926 and was deported to Dortmund in Germany in 1942, where he was forced to work underground.
"He tried to escape but was caught and sent to the Buchenwald concentration camp in January 1943," the memorial said.
At Peenemuende, he was made to help build the V-2 rocket that the Nazis used to bombard cities such as Antwerp, London, Paris and Norwich, leaving thousands of civilians dead.
Later in his life, became vice-president of the International Buchenwald-Dora Committee.
"We mourn the loss of a close friend. We wish his son and granddaughter, who brought us the sad news, a lot of strength in these difficult times," the memorial said.
Shells hit homes in Odesa
Russian forces have stuck residential buildings in Odesa, the first such attack on the Black Sea port city.
Odesa city council said there were no casualties but the attacks, on the outskirts of the city early on Monday local time, caused a fire.
"These are residential buildings where peaceful people live," Mayor Gennadiy Trukhanov said.
Odesa is in south-western Ukraine and has largely avoided the fighting so far.
Russia has increased naval activity in the northern Black Sea, but there are no indications at this point of an amphibious assault on Odesa.
Russia's main intelligence agency said several hundred mines had drifted into the Black Sea after breaking off from cables near Ukrainian ports, a claim dismissed by Ukraine, which said it was disinformation and an attempt to close off parts of the sea.
The Black Sea is a major shipping artery for grain, oil and oil products.
In the Zaporizhzhia region, four children were wounded when buses evacuating civilians were shelled the local governor said.
Russia's Defence Ministry said earlier on Monday that its air forces hit a Ukrainian army military facility in the Rivne region with cruise missiles.
"High-precision air-launched cruise missiles have struck a training centre for foreign mercenaries and Ukrainian nationalist formations," Defence Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said.
But Russia's assault on Ukraine, now in its fourth week, has stalled along most fronts, failing to seize a single major Ukrainian city much less capture the capital Kyiv or swiftly topple the government of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Nevertheless, Russian shelling and missiles have caused devastation in built-up residential areas.
Russia denies targeting civilians.
Zelenskyy hails protesters confronting troops
Mr Zelenskyy praised protesters in an occupied city for their courage in confronting Russian soldiers who fired shots to disperse the demonstration.
Russian forces used stun grenades and fired in the air to break up demonstrators in the southern city of Kherson.
Speaking in a video address, Mr Zelenskyy said: "We saw slaves shooting at free people, slaves of propaganda that replaced their conscience".
Ukrainian armed forces' press service said at least one person was wounded but it was unclear how they received their injuries.
"Russian security forces ran up, started throwing stun grenades into the crowd and shooting," it said.
The city of Kherson, a regional capital of about 250,000 people, was the first big urban centre to fall into the hands of Russian forces.
Kyiv back under curfew
In the capital, a shopping centre in the densely populated Podil district near the city centre was a smoking ruin after being hit by shelling that killed eight people, according to emergency officials.
Russia said Ukrainian forces had been using the shopping centre to store rockets and reload launchers. That claim could not be independently verified.
Kyiv has announced a "reinforced curfew" in the Ukrainian capital from 8pm on Monday (5am Tuesday AEDT) until 7am on Wednesday (4pm Wednesday AEDT).
Parts of the city have repeatedly come under fire from Russian forces.
A total of 8,057 people were safely evacuated on Monday through seven humanitarian corridors from Ukrainian towns and cities under fire, Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.
Thousands flee besieged Mariupol
Among those brought to safety were 3,007 residents of Mariupol, which has been under siege from Russian troops.
In Mariupol, Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksiy Reznikov accused Russia of "committing a real act of genocide" in the city.
Mr Reznikov said Russia was "afraid" of the Ukrainian army, "so they are fighting civilians".
Ukrainian authorities described the situation in Mariupol as "very difficult" and said they had been unable to establish a new safe corridor to evacuate civilians from the besieged city after they defied a Russian ultimatum to surrender.
Russia's military had ordered Ukrainians inside the south-eastern city to surrender by 5am on Monday (2pm AEDT), saying that those who did so would be permitted to leave through safe corridors.
"Of course we rejected these proposals," Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.
Mariupol has been under siege and bombardment, with no food, medicine, power or fresh water, since the early days of Russia's invasion on February 24.
Perched on the Sea of Azov, Mariupol has been a key target that has been relentlessly pounded for more than three weeks and has seen some of the worst suffering of the war.
The fall of the southern port city would help Russia establish a land bridge to Crimea, seized from Ukraine in 2014.
But no clear picture has emerged of how close its capture might be.
"Nobody can tell from the outside if it really is on the verge of being taken," Keir Giles, a Russia expert at the British think tank Chatham House, said.
Mariupol officials said at least 2,300 people had died in the siege, with some buried in mass graves, but fears are growing the number could be far higher.
Diplomacy at a standstill
The Kremlin said on Monday that peace talks between Russia and Ukraine had not yet made any significant progress.
Moscow has accused Kyiv of stalling the talks by making proposals unacceptable for Russia.
Ukraine has said it is willing to negotiate but will not surrender or accept Russian ultimatums, which have included conditions such as recognising Crimea as part of Russia, and the separatist-controlled regions of Donetsk and Luhansk as independent states.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said significant progress in the talks still had to be made for there to be a basis for a possible meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart.
"For us to speak of a meeting between the two presidents, homework has to be done. Talks have to be held and their results agreed upon," Mr Peskov said.
US ties close to rupture after Biden's 'war criminal' remarks
Russia's foreign ministry said on Monday it had summoned US ambassador John Sullivan to tell him that President Joe Biden description of Mr Putin as a "war criminal" had pushed bilateral ties to the brink of collapse.
Mr Biden last week said Mr Putin was a "war criminal" for sending tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine.
"Such statements from the American President, unworthy of a statesman of such high rank, put Russian-American relations on the verge of rupture," the ministry said in a statement.
The Kremlin earlier described the comments as "personal insults" against Mr Putin.
The ministry also told Mr Sullivan that hostile actions against Russia would receive a "decisive and firm response".
In another worrying development, Ukraine's nuclear regulatory agency said radiation monitors around the decommissioned Chernobyl power plant, the site of the world's worst nuclear meltdown, had stopped working.
The agency said that problem, and a lack of firefighters to protect the area's radiation-tainted forests as the weather warmed, could mean a "significant deterioration" in the ability to control the spread of radiation in Ukraine and beyond.
Russia's invasion has driven nearly 3.5 million people from Ukraine, according to the United Nations.
The UN has confirmed over 900 civilian deaths but it says the real toll is probably much higher.
Estimates of Russian deaths vary, but even conservative figures are in the low thousands.
ABC/wires
