Putin has criticized the West's 'cancel culture'. /Mikhail Klimentyev/Sputnik/AFP
MAIN HEADLINES
• Russian President Vladimir Putin has accused the West of trying to cancel Russia's rich musical and literary culture, in the same way he said it had canceled Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling. "Not so long ago, the children's writer J.K. Rowling was also canceled because she... did not please the fans of so-called gender freedoms," Putin told a meeting broadcast on state television.
• EU leaders have stepped back from imposing an immediate embargo on Russian crude and petroleum product imports as the impracticality of the policy has become clear.
• Russia said on Friday that the first phase of its military operation was mostly complete and it would focus on completely "liberating" Ukraine's breakaway eastern Donbas region.
• Ukrainian authorities said on Friday that Russian forces had effectively surrounded the northern city of Chernihiv and were bombarding areas where residents were stuck without electricity, heating and water.
• China's President Xi Jinping had a telephone call with the UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Friday. The two leaders discussed the situation in Ukraine. President Xi made China's principled position clear, stressing that the international community should encourage peace and promote talks, create conditions for a political settlement of the Ukrainian issue, and promote an early return to peace in Ukraine. He also said that China is willing to continue to play a constructive role in this regard.
• Ukrainian officials in the strategic port city of Mariupol said on Friday that some 300 people could have died in last week's Russian strike on a theater where hundreds were sheltering.
• Russia said on Friday it had "never" violated international legislation after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Moscow of using phosphorus bombs in his country.
• Russian stocks edged lower on Friday in a volatile second session of trading after a nearly month-long suspension, with losses led by airline Aeroflot, which has lost more than a quarter of its value over two days. But the ruble held on to recent gains, holding near 97 to the U.S. dollar.
• European shares fell for a third straight session on Friday and were set to end the week lower, as the continuing Russia-Ukraine conflict kept investors cautious heading into the weekend.
• Russian strikes have killed four civilians and wounded several others while targeting a medical facility in the Osnovyansky district of Ukraine's second city of Kharkiv on Friday, Ukrainian officials said.
• France's foreign ministry said on Friday it had summoned the Russian ambassador to protest "unacceptable" tweets issued by the embassy in Paris showing crude cartoons depicting Europe and the United States.
• Russia said on Friday it has destroyed the largest remaining military fuel storage site in Ukraine, attacking it with Kalibr cruise missiles. The ministry said the facility had been supplying to troops in the central part of the country.
• Russia has accused NATO member Poland of embarking on a "dangerous escalation" in tensions between Moscow and the West after Warsaw expelled 45 Russian diplomats for alleged espionage.
• The International Atomic Energy Agency has expressed "concern" after Ukraine warned of Russian bombardment of the town where the staff working at the Chernobyl nuclear site live.
• Turkey's President Tayyip Erdogan has confirmed that his country's position on its acquisition of Russian S-400 missile defense systems is unchanged and the matter is a "done deal".
• Finland's national railway operator will suspend services between Helsinki and Saint Petersburg in Russia on Monday, closing one of the last public transport routes to the European Union for Russians.
Authorities said some 300 civilians may have died in a Russian air strike on a theater-turned-bomb shelter in Mariupol last week, in what would be the conflict's single deadliest attack. /Pavlokyrylenko Donoda/Telegram/AFP
IN DETAIL
Single deadliest attack
Local officials, citing witness accounts, said on Friday they estimate that 300 people were killed in the bombing of a theater in the besieged southern Ukrainian city of Mariupol on March 16.
The city council had not previously provided a toll and made clear it was not possible to determine an exact figure after the incident, in which it said a Russian air strike hit the theater where hundreds of people had been sheltering.
The Ukrainian government has previously said it was impossible to tell how many were killed because Mariupol is in chaos and under almost constant bombardment from Russian forces.
Russia has denied bombing the theater. The Kremlin says Russian forces have not targeted civilians after the conflict started on February 24.
Ukrainians continue to flee to Poland as Russia's military action continues. /Angelos Tzortzinis/AFP
'A mass campaign to destroy'
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday pointed to "discrimination" against Russian culture in western countries, comparing it to Nazi supporters burning books in the 1930s.
"The last time such a mass campaign to destroy unwanted literature was carried out was by the Nazis in Germany almost 90 years ago," Putin said during a televised meeting with Russian culture figures.
Earlier the same day, his foreign minister Sergei Lavrov compared Europe's tactics to those of Nazi Germany, saying the bloc has "declared a true hybrid war".
Putin has also denounced the West's economic "blitzkrieg" and compared sanctions imposed over Moscow's military operation in Ukraine to "anti-Semitic pogroms carried out by Nazis".
At the same time, Putin says Russia is facing a threat of being eradicated by NATO, which has been gradually expanding eastwards towards Russia's borders since the end of the Cold War.