Is the war entering a new phase? Russian forces have killed at least six people in Ukraine, according to officials, after launching ballistic missile attacks on the capital, Kyiv, and strikes on other regions, including a supermarket in the northern city of Chernihiv. The attacks on Sunday came as Russian officials said that Moscow-occupied areas of Ukraine had also come under fire, with four people killed in a Ukrainian drone strike on the occupied city of Horlivka. Kyiv, Chernihiv, Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv cities were all hit. In northern Chernihiv, officials said a Russian drone hit a supermarket, killing two people, including a nine-year-old girl, and wounding 25 others.

The Ukrainian capital Kyiv came under ballistic missile attack from Russian forces early on Sunday, local authorities said, while other regions suffered bombardments later during the day that killed at least six people. Russia said areas of Ukraine under Moscow's control had also come under attack, with four people killed in a Ukrainian drone strike in the Russian-occupied Ukrainian city of Horlivka. In its morning note, Ukraine's air force said Russia had launched seven ballistic missiles and 136 drones at Ukraine overnight. In the northern Ukrainian city of Chernihiv, a Russian drone hit a supermarket, killing two people -- including a 9-year-old child -- and wounding 25, Ukraine's emergency services said. "This is deliberate Russian terror that has no military justification," President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram. In the eastern city of Kharkiv, one person was killed and 16 others required medical attention after a daytime drone attack, Mayor Ihor Terekhov said on Telegram.

In "Biological War," Annie Jacobsen imagines society collapsing from a man-made plague--part of a wave of such prophecies. But what do we miss when we try to predict the future? In the fall of 1989, a select group of Soviet scientists was summoned to Obolensk, a secluded municipality on Moscow's periphery, and gathered at what appeared to be an insane asylum to discuss a pioneering technique for mass murder. If someone had been observing the institutional activity from space--a distinctly non-theoretical possibility--they might have seen a shuffle of patients roaming the grounds or playing volleyball in their pajamas. These were actors, hired to play the disturbed as a cover story for something even more disturbing. The eight-story glass building at the center of the complex, which had putatively been devoted to vaccine manufacturing, was in fact a highly classified defense facility. Its remit was called, or "biological preparations"--what one participant later described as "the most ambitious Soviet arms program since the development of the hydrogen bomb." The most recent experiments there had at last demonstrated the viability of a weapon that could wipe out entire enemy populations without leaving a scratch on their infrastructure. It was a pathogen genetically engineered to spread within hours, to kill within days, and to resist all existing treatment.

At least 15 people have been killed in Russian attacks on Ukraine, with 10 dead in ballistic missile strikes just outside Kyiv, according to a national official. Writing on social media, Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed about 100 people had been injured in Kyiv, where emergency services are still at the scene, with five other people killed in the eastern city of Sloviansk. Meanwhile, an overnight Ukrainian strike killed six people and wounded 26 near the Russian city of Kirov, more than 1,000 km (600 miles) behind the front line. Ukraine also attacked the warehouses of Wildberries - Russia's biggest online retailer - in St Petersburg and the surrounding area, setting off huge fires. In the attacks near Kyiv, Russia also appeared to have targeted Defence Ministry adviser Serhiy Beskrestnov, aka Flash, and Lyuba Shypovych, who has been involved in developing technology for the Ukrainian army.

Is the war entering a new phase? At least 11 people have been killed in Russian attacks on Ukraine, while Ukrainian attacks on Russia's Kirov region killed six others, officials on both sides of the conflict said. A Russian missile attack killed six people and wounded "dozens" in the Kyiv region on Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. Earlier, Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko reported explosions in the city and called on residents to stay in shelters as air defence systems were operating. Separately, Vadym Filashkin, the governor of the city of Sloviansk, said five people were killed and nine others injured after Moscow dropped two aviation bombs on the city.

What is Iran's Pickaxe Mountain? Has Russia helped Iran target CIA sites in the Gulf? When US Secretary of State Marco Rubio met Russian Foreign Secretary Sergey Lavrov on Thursday in Manila, on the margins of a summit of Southeast Asian nations, Moscow's war on Ukraine was officially the top agenda item. But the meeting between Rubio and Lavrov was held under the shadow of fresh reports suggesting that Russia might be playing a more active role than it has publicly acknowledged in Iran's attacks on United States military sites in the Middle East. Three days into the war, on March 3, The Washington Post reported that a CIA station in the US embassy in Riyadh had been targeted, according to two people familiar with the matter.

Ukrainian drones have hit several retail warehouses belonging to Russia's biggest online retailer, Wildberries, in a matter of days, dealing a blow to a large number of small and medium-sized businesses. After months of drone attacks on oil depots and refineries, Kyiv says it is now targeting logistics hubs used by Russians to buy military equipment, and disrupting supplies to the Russian army. But it has also frustrated hundreds of Russian sellers who depend on online marketplaces for their livelihoods, making the war feel closer to home after almost four and a half years. I am a mother of a disabled child, I've built the business myself, one woman complained on an expletive-laden social media post that went viral. I've lost 1m roubles (£9,500; $12,700)... We're already getting screwed over from every direction as it is.

Ukrainian drones have hit warehouses belonging to Russia's biggest online retailer again, injuring 10 people, according to Russian media and the region's governor. Logistics hubs belonging to Wildberries in Krasnodar and Stavropol were struck during overnight strikes, forcing workers to be evacuated, the company's owner said. It is the second time Ukraine has attacked the firm's facilities in four days, with warehouses in Tambov and Elektrostal hit on Saturday, killing eight and injuring 62. Kyiv has claimed the warehouses have been used to supply components to make Russia's drones and navigation equipment. Wildberries owner Tatyana Kim said on Telegram that there are no words to describe all the feelings and emotions caused by the attacks on ordinary people, on our employees, on us, who are simply doing our jobs. But these situations demonstrate the most important thing: we must continue to do what we do for the benefit of people.

Is the war entering a new phase? A Russian strike on a ship near the southern Ukrainian port city of Odesa has killed at least 10 people, while Ukraine has launched hundreds of drones to attack Moscow, a day after Kyiv was hit by one of the heaviest barrages of ballistic missiles of the war. Russia struck a Guinea-Bissau-flagged ship carrying corn with a crew from India and Syria, Ukraine's seaports authority said on Monday. Officials said eight crew members had been rescued. "Since the beginning of July, the Odesa region was under constant daily shelling. There were days when 13 to 15 air raid alerts had been announced in the region," Kiper told Ukrainian television.

Russians are returning to cash, as mobile internet shutdowns disrupt card payments, and more businesses seek to dodge tax under mounting financial pressure more than four years into the war with Ukraine. Russia has added 1.56tn roubles (£14.8bn; The spike comes amid a wave of Ukrainian drone attacks, which have repeatedly led the Kremlin to shut down mobile internet across large swathes of the country, leaving many unable to pay by card. The government says the aim of the shutdowns is to counter the drone strikes. Having cash on hand gives you some sense of control and security, one woman in Moscow told the BBC on condition of anonymity.