Kiev

Germany has delivered promised Leopard battle tanks to Ukraine, Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Monday, providing Kiev with much-needed heavy weaponry against Russia.

"Yes, we delivered Leopard tanks as we announced," Scholz told a press conference with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte in Rotterdam when asked to confirm a report in news outlet Spiegel.

Russia stepped up its missile and drone attacks against Ukraine on Wednesday, killing students and other civilians, in a violent follow-up to dueling high-level diplomatic missions aimed at bringing peace after 13 months of war.

Russian and Ukrainian officials on Tuesday gave conflicting accounts of what appeared to be a brazen attack late Monday on Russian cruise missiles being transported by train in the occupied Ukrainian Crimean Peninsula.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida made a surprise visit Tuesday to Kiev, stealing some of the global attention from Asian rival President Xi Jinping of China, who is in Moscow to show support for Russia against the West over the Kremlin's invasion of Ukraine.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida began a surprise visit to Ukraine early Tuesday, hours after Chinese President Xi Jinping arriving in neighboring Russia for a three-day visit. The dueling summits come as the longtime rivals are on diplomatic offensives.

Kishida will meet President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Ukrainian capital.

Russian President Vladimir Putin made a surprise visit to Mariupol, state media reported Sunday, his first to the city since it was captured after a lengthy siege at the start of Moscow's offensive in Ukraine.

Türkiye's President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on March 18 announced the extension of a deal that allowed exports of Ukrainian grain to resume following Russia's invasion.

Poland said Thursday it plans to give Ukraine about a dozen MiG-29 fighter jets, which would make it the first NATO member to fulfill Kiev's increasingly urgent requests for warplanes to defend itself against the Russian invasion.

Türkiye is making efforts to bring Ukraine and Russia to an agreement for the extension of the grain deal to 120 days instead of the current plan of two months, Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said on March 15.

Fierce fighting was raging Monday for control of the centre of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, the bloodiest battle of Moscow's invasion, as Russia agreed to a short extension of a crucial UN-backed grain export deal.