TOP HEADLINES

•Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez has urged world leaders to listen to China's voice as they try and find a resolution to end the conflict between Ukraine and Russia.

•The Kremlin said it was a positive sign that Denmark had invited the Russian-controlled operator of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline to help salvage an unidentified object found close to the Baltic Sea pipelines. READ MORE

• Overnight Russian missile strikes and shelling killed at least seven civilians in northern and eastern Ukraine, regional officials said.

• Ukraine's top military brass on Thursday withdrew a report that wrongly said Russian troops had left the town of Nova Kahkovka in southern Kherson region.

• Russian forces may have to advance as far as Kyiv or Lviv in Ukraine but Moscow is not planning direct conflict with NATO, Russian ex-President Dmitry Medvedev told Russian news agencies on Friday. He also warned that any Ukrainian attempt to take the Crimean peninsula would be grounds for Russia to use "absolutely any weapon" against Kyiv.

• U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reassured members of Congress on Thursday that the billions of dollars approved for Ukraine should last for much of the year, and said measures were in place to ensure it is well spent.

• In a sharply worded video address to European Union leaders on Thursday, delivered from a train, Ukraine's President Volodymr Zelenskyy said the war would drag on for years unless the 27-nation bloc provided weapons more quickly and imposed extra sanctions on Russia.

• EU leaders are holding talks with U.N. chief Antonio Guterres on global food security and sanctions against Russia.

• EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen pledged EU help to find Ukrainian children deported to Russia, which says it has taken them for their own protection. 

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IN DEPTH

Danish invite 'positive' says Kremlin

On Friday, the Kremlin said it was important to identify an object discovered next to one of the Nord Stream pipelines, and said the ongoing investigation into blasts that struck the pipelines last September must be conducted with full transparency.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov also told reporters it was a positive sign that Denmark had invited the Russian-controlled operator of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline to help salvage an unidentified object found close to the Baltic Sea pipelines.

"It's certainly positive news when the owner of the pipeline is invited to take part in very important phases of the investigation," Peskov said.

Last week Danish authorities said a tubular object, protruding around 40 cm (16 inches) from the seabed and 10 cm in diameter, had been found during an inspection of the last remaining intact Nord Stream pipeline by its operator, Nord Stream 2 AG.

"It is critically important to determine what kind of object it is, whether it is related to this terrorist act - apparently it is - and to continue this investigation. And this investigation must be transparent," Peskov added.

Three of the four pipelines of the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas links were hit in a still-unexplained explosion last September.

Russia has accused Britain and the United States of involvement in the blasts, while European investigators have not said who they believe was responsible.

Listen to China, please. Spanish premier

The world should listen to China's voice in order to find a way out of the Ukraine conflict, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said on Friday.

"China is a global actor, so obviously we must listen to its voice to see if between all of us, we can put an end to this war and Ukraine can recover its territorial integrity," Sanchez told a news conference in Brussels following a meeting of the European Council.

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