COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — Finland's state-owned energy company says Russia will cut off natural gas to Finland after the Nordic country that applied for NATO membership this week refused President Vladimir Putin’s demand to pay in rubles. It's the latest escalation over European energy amid the war in Ukraine and the latest country to be cut off after refusing Russia’s decree.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Tesla and SpaceX chief executive officer Elon Musk has met with Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro to discuss connectivity and other projects in the Amazon rainforest.

MILAN (AP) — Russia's war in Ukraine has accelerated inflation across Europe, with prices for energy, materials and food surging at rates not seen for decades. It’s causing sticker shock at the grocery store, gas pumps, electricity bills and construction sites.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian authorities say their troops repelled a Russian attack in the east, as Moscow struggled to gain ground in the region that is now the focus of the war even as it intensified its campaign there.

STOCKHOLM (AP) — Sweden and Finland have pushed ahead with their bids to join NATO even as Turkey insists it won’t let the previously nonaligned Nordic countries into the alliance because of their alleged support for Kurdish militants.

TOKYO (AP) — The money was supposed to be COVID-19 assistance for low-income households in a small Japanese town, but police say it was mistakenly wired to a bank account of a resident who refused to return it and spent most of it on online gambling.

PRAGUE (AP) — Prague’s zoo has introduced to the public a pair of critically endangered Chinese pangolins. It is only the second animal park on the European continent to have them. The arrival of the rare acquisition from Taiwan is the result of a political fallout with China.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — On May 5, five U.S. federal agents boarded the massive Russian-owned superyacht Amadea that was berthed in Lautoka harbor in Fiji. The ship’s captain wrote in a frantic WhatsApp message to lawyer Feizal Haniff, who represents the company that legally owns the yacht that “They want to take 20 crew and sail east!”

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia says hundreds more fighters have emerged from the Mariupol stronghold and surrendered. The Red Cross is working to register the fighters as prisoners of war, as the end of a key battle in the conflict draws closer.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A Russian soldier facing the first war crimes trial since the start of the war in Ukraine has testified that he shot a civilian on orders from two officers. On Thursday, he pleaded for his victim's widow to forgive him.

Russia says it will be up to the residents of the areas in Ukraine controlled by Russian troops to determine their future status. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday that people living in such places must “determine how and with whom they want to live.”

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korean propaganda describes an all-out effort to fight a suspected COVID-19 outbreak that has sickened nearly 2 million people. But defectors say fear is palpable among North Korean citizens who lack access to hospital care and struggle to afford even basic medicine.

BRUSSELS (AP) — NATO diplomats say national envoys have failed to reach a consensus about whether to start membership talks with Finland and Sweden. Wednesday's development comes just as Turkey renewed its objections to the two Nordic countries joining.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A 21-year-old Russian soldier facing the first war crimes trial since Moscow invaded Ukraine has pleaded guilty to killing an unarmed civilian. Sgt. Vadim Shishimarin could get life in prison for shooting a a 62-year-old Ukrainian man in the head through an open car window on Feb. 28.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea on Wednesday added hundreds of thousands of infections to its growing pandemic caseload. It also said that a million people have already recovered from suspected COVID-19 just a week after disclosing an outbreak, a public health crisis it appears to be trying to manage in isolation.

Europeans are basking in the warmth of spring, but their governments are in a race against winter. Europe is trying to cut use of Russian natural gas because of the war in Ukraine but still find enough fuel to keep the lights on and homes warm before it gets cold again. It’s a big job because there’s little or no spare gas available in a tight global market.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia says that nearly 1,000 Ukrainian troops who doggedly defended a giant steelworks in Mariupol have surrendered. The plant became a symbol of their country’s resistance. The announcement Wednesday comes as the battle for the strategic port city appeared all but over.

BRUSSELS (AP) — NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg says that Finland and Sweden have applied for membership amid concerns over Russia’s war on Ukraine. Stoltenberg says NATO allies agree "that this is an historic moment which we must seize.”

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The fall of Mariupol appears at hand as Ukraine is moving to abandon a sprawling steel plant where its soldiers had held out under relentless bombardment for months, which would make it the biggest city to fall into Russian hands.

ZORYA TRUDA, Ukraine (AP) — Iuliia Loseva buried her husband in the village cemetery near her home. There was a military band, and a six-gun salute. His teenage sons, pale and stunned, walked behind their father’s coffin holding framed photographs of him in his camouflage uniform. But this was not a military funeral for a career soldier.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has made “self-reliance” his governing lynchpin during his decade in power and shunned international help for his people. But a massive outbreak of suspected COVID-19 has left Kim at a critical crossroads. Does he swallow his pride and accept help or does he go it alone even though a huge number of fatalities could undermine his leadership?

STOCKHOLM (AP) — Turkey's president is objecting to Sweden and Finland's historic bid to join NATO. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says he cannot allow them to become members of the alliance because of their perceived inaction against exiled Kurdish militants.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian officials say the regiment that doggedly defended a steel mill as Ukraine’s last stronghold in the port city of Mariupol has completed its mission. The declaration came Monday after more than 260 fighters, including some badly wounded, were evacuated and taken to areas under Russia’s control.

MADRID (AP) — A cargo train smashed into a rush-hour passenger train in Catalonia, killing an engineer and injuring 85 people.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden on Monday signed an order to deploy U.S. troops to Somalia amid heightened concerns about the country’s Islamic extremist rebels, known as al-Shabab.