Russia-Ukraine War LIVE: Finland, Sweden to jointly submit NATO applications Wednesday

Following their dramatic decisions to seek NATO membership over Sunday and Monday, Sweden and Finland will submit their applications for becoming a member of the US-led military alliance on Wednesday. During a joint press briefing with Finnish President Sauli Niinisto, Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson said that she is “happy” that their countries have taken the “same path” and can do it “together”, according to AFP. Read more.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Tuesday that he had a “long and meaningful" telephonic conversation with his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron about the ongoing war in the east-European nation. “Told about the course of hostilities, the operation to rescue the military from Azovstal and the vision of the prospects of the negotiation process. Raised the issue of fuel supply to Ukraine,” Zelensky wrote on Twitter.

The Ukrainian President added that the two leaders also spoke about Ukraine's application status for EU membership.

The European Union's (EU) foreign policy chief Josep Borrel said on Tuesday that if reports and numbers are true, Russia has lost 15 per cent of its soldiers since the beginning of the war in Ukraine. “This is a world record of the losses of an army invading a country,” he told reporters in Brussels after a meeting of the bloc's defence ministers, according to Reuters.

The office of Russia's Prosecutor General has asked the Supreme Court to recognise Ukraine's Azov Regiment as a "terrorist organisation", Interfax news agency reported on Tuesday citing the Ministry of Justice website, Reuters reported.

Eight dead in Russian strike on Ukraine village housing military facility, AFP reported.

President Joe Biden Biden will host Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson of Sweden and President Sauli Niinistö of Finland at the White House for a meeting Thursday amid their push to join NATO in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, AP reported.

Russia has decided to withdraw from the Council of the Baltic Sea States (CBSS), the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday.

A Russian lawmaker taking part in peace talks with Kyiv said on Tuesday that Russia should consider the death penalty for what he called nationalist fighters from Ukraine's Azov regiment, Reuters reported.

Russia's foreign ministry said on Tuesday that it was expelling two diplomats from the Finnish embassy in Moscow in retaliation against Helsinki's decision to expel two of its diplomats, Reuters reported. 

Russia's defence ministry said Tuesday that 265 Ukrainian soldiers, including several dozen wounded, surrendered at the besieged Azovstal steel plant in Ukraine's port city of Mariupol, AFP reported. 

The Czech Republic said on Tuesday one of its citizens had died in Ukraine. Local media identified him as a volunteer shot dead and found in a roadside grave. The 49-year-old truck driver had gone to the war-torn country to help drive people to safety soon after Russia invaded, his wife told Czech media.

The UK government has said it “strongly supports” the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) as Sweden and Finland confirmed their intention to apply for membership of the military alliance, in a historic shift of foreign policy stance in the wake of the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said on Monday evening that the two Nordic countries should be integrated into NATO, which operates on a collective defence basis under which an attack against any one ally is considered as an attack against all allies.

A village in Russia's western province of Kursk bordering Ukraine came under Ukrainian fire on Tuesday, regional governor Roman Starovoit said as per news agency Reuters, but there were no injuries, although three houses and a school were hit.

Russian border guards returned fire to quell the shooting from large-calibre weapons on the border village of Alekseyevka, Starovoit wrote on messaging app Telegram.

The Ukrainian government says Russia has shelled more than 1,000 schools, destroying 95, news agency AFP reported. On May 8, a bomb flattened a school in Zaporizhzhia which, like School No. 21 in Chernihiv, was being used a shelter. As many as 60 people were feared dead.

President Vladimir Putin said on Monday Sweden and Finland joining NATO would be no threat to Russia but warned the Western alliance that moving troops or weapons into the Nordic neighbours would provoke a "response."

Turkey´s president on Monday complicated Sweden and Finland´s historic bid to join NATO, saying he cannot allow them to become members of the alliance because of their perceived inaction against exiled Kurdish militants.

The U.S. Senate voted to advance $40 billion more aid for Ukraine in its war against Russia, setting the stage for a vote on the bill possibly later this week.

Hundreds of Ukrainian soldiers have been evacuated from the besieged Azovstal steelworks -- the last holdout of troops defending the southern port city of Mariupol -- Kyiv said on Monday.

The plant had become a symbol of resistance, with around 600 soldiers holed up in underground tunnels and bunkers fighting a rear-guard battle to prevent Russian troops taking full control of the strategically located city.