Europe

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — As Russian forces pull back from Ukraine’s capital region, retreating troops are creating a “catastrophic” situation for civilians by leaving mines around homes, abandoned equipment and “even the bodies of those killed,” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned Saturday.

Ukraine and its Western allies reported mounting evidence of Russia withdrawing its forces from around Kyiv and building its troop strength in eastern Ukraine. Ukrainian fighters reclaimed several areas near the capital after forcing the Russians out or moving in after them, officials said.

MOSCOW, April 1. /TASS/: Payments for export supplies of Russian gas will be made in compliance with the rules of the Russian Federation, the Gazprom holding said in a statement on Friday. The company added that it is already notifying counterparties about the procedure of paying for gas in rubles.

"Gazprom, as a Russian company, unconditionally and fully complies with the requirements of the Russian legislation. Notifications about the new procedure for settlements in Russian rubles have been officially sent to counterparties today," the statement said.

MOSCOW, April 1. /TASS/: Russia would be exposed to groundless risks, if it continued to sell gas to unfriendly countries for dollars and euros, because both currencies have lost credibility, Federation Council Speaker Valentina Matviyenko said on Friday.

MOSCOW, April 1. /TASS/: Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov lashed out at those even weighing the possibility of nationalizing the subsidiaries of Gazprom and Rosneft in Germany, branding it unacceptable, at a briefing with reporters on Friday, when responding to a question from TASS.

On Thursday, the Handelsblatt newspaper wrote, citing sources in the German government, that the country’s Economy Ministry was considering nationalizing the subsidiaries of Gazprom and Rosneft in Germany. According to sources, this refers to Gazprom Germania and Rosneft Deutschland.

MOSCOW, April 1. /TASS/: The world’s first nasal spray coronavirus vaccine has been registered in Russia, the Health Ministry said in a statement on Friday.

"The Russian Health Ministry has registered the nasal spray form of the Gam-COVID-Vac (Sputnik V) coronavirus vaccine developed by the Health Ministry’s Gamaleya Research Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology," the statement reads.

MOSCOW, April 1. /TASS/: The OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) in Ukraine has no longer been able to perform its former functions in the current political and legal circumstances, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Friday in a statement on the termination of the OSCE SMM activities.

MOSCOW, April 1. /TASS/: Russia’s decision to exit the Council of Europe was long in the making and shouldn’t be directly tied to the situation in Ukraine, Grigory Lukyantsev, the Russian Foreign Ministry’s human rights envoy told TASS.

"It wouldn’t be absolutely right to tie our decision to withdraw from the Council of Europe to what is happening in Ukraine," he said in an interview. "It's no secret that this decision had been in the making for a long time."

LONDON, April 1 (Reuters) - Ukraine, hoping to tap fresh sources of money to fund its defence efforts, is looking at ways to extend a domestic bond issuance programme to international capital markets, a source familiar with the situation said on Friday.

Kyiv launched a programme selling hryvnia-denominated bonds to raise money for its fight against Russia - dubbed "war bonds" - in late February. The government said it aimed to raise around $1.36 billion through its domestic programme.

BRUSSELS/BEIJING, April 1 (Reuters) - China offered the European Union assurances on Friday that it would seek peace in Ukraine but said this would be on its own terms, deflecting pressure for a tougher stance towards Russia.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang told EU leaders that Beijing would push for peace in "its own way", while President Xi Jinping said he hoped the EU would treat China "independently", in a nod to Europe's close ties with the United States.

BRUSSELS, April 1 (Xinhua) -- The annual inflation in the eurozone accelerated to a record 7.5 percent in March, according to a flash estimate published on Friday by Eurostat, the European Union's (EU) statistical office.

Inflation has been driven primarily by the 44.7 percent year-on-year hike in energy prices in March. The figure for February was 32 percent.

Food, alcohol and tobacco prices rose by 5  percent in March compared to the year prior. In February, the annual inflation rate in this category was 4.2 percent.