Ukraine and Russia: What you need to know right now

Artillery pounded key cities in Ukraine on Wednesday, as its president urged the West to act decisively in imposing new and tougher sanctions being readied against Russia in response to civilian killings widely condemned as war crimes.

Artillery pounded key cities in Ukraine on Wednesday, as its president urged the West to act decisively in imposing new and tougher sanctions being readied against Russia in response to civilian killings widely condemned as war crimes. ECONOMY

* Sanctions to be announced by the United States and its allies on Wednesday will target Russian banks and officials and ban investment in Russia. * European Commission head Ursula von der Leyen said there were more EU sanctions to come. "These sanctions (announced on Tuesday) will not be our last," she said. "Now we have to look into oil and revenues Russia gets from fossil fuels."

FIGHTING * Heavy fighting and Russian air strikes continue in the encircled Ukrainian city of Mariupol, British military intelligence said.

* Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said authorities would try to evacuate trapped civilians through 11 humanitarian corridors, though people trying to leave the besieged Mariupol would have to use their own vehicles. BUCHA DEATHS

* The Ukrainian human rights ombudswoman said between 150 and 300 bodies may be in a mass grave by a church in the northern town of Bucha, where Ukraine accuses Russian troops of killing civilians. * Russia called the evidence out of Bucha a "monstrous forgery".

QUOTES * "When we are hearing new rhetoric about sanctions... I can't tolerate any (Western) indecisiveness after everything that Russian troops have done," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said.

"Recent news from the war in Ukraine, instead of bringing relief and hope, brought new atrocities, such as the massacre of Bucha," Pope Francis said. "Stop this war! Let the weapons fall silent. Stop sowing death and destruction."