Defiant Ukraine insisted it will never surrender after it dismissed a deadline to lay down arms in the besieged city of Mariupol.
It came after at least eight people died in a giant explosion that destroyed a shopping mall in Kyiv.
Retroville retail centre in the north- west of the capital was hit by missiles while a gym and cars were destroyed.
Ukraine ’s deputy prime minister Iryna Vereshchuk hit out at the 5am deadline given to Mariupol, which has been 90% destroyed by barrages.
She said: “There can be no question of any surrender, laying down of arms.
“We have already informed the Russian side about this.”
In a foul-mouthed blast, mayor adviser Petro Andryushchenko rapped a plan to move the city hall to Russia.
On Facebook, he wrote: “They gave us until the morning. Why wait – the answer is ready – f**** you – you won’t get Mariupol.”
Soon after yesterday’s deadline, smoke rose from several places in the southeast port amid multiple strikes.
In Kyiv, debris was scattered for hundreds of yards and windows were left smashed several blocks away from the blasts overnight on Sunday.
Last night, emergency crews tried to find survivors and establish if more people were killed in Russia’s latest barbaric attack.
Missiles sparked a mushroom cloud and fires on several storeys of the mall in the Podilsky district.
Footage showed a huge blast, followed by smaller explosions that left much of the complex in the rubble.
Firefighters pulled out at least one man, covered in dust, after the blasts.
Residents of a nearby building, whose windows were blown out, said they had spotted a mobile rocket launcher near the mall several days earlier.
Russia said it had struck the shopping centre because it was being used as a rocket store.
An apartment block in Kyiv was also hit on Sunday, leaving five people injured. But Ukraine
has beaten the bulk of Russian troops back 15 miles out of the city.
President Volodymyr Zelensky added Ukraine would never bow to Vladimir Putin ’s ultimatums and key cities would not accept occupation.
He added any deal to end the war would need a referendum.
Figures released on day 26 of the invasion show Ukraine is battering Russian forces who have lost more than 10% of their troops – 15,000.
More than a quarter of Russian warplanes (97) have been shot out of the sky and around half of their helicopters (121) have been downed.
More than 40% of Putin’s tanks (498) have also been destroyed.
Sources said Russia has lost more than half its armoured personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles.
The Ukraine military added: “The enemy continues to insidiously destroy the infrastructure of captured cities, launch missiles and bomb strikes on peaceful neighbourhoods of Ukrainian cities and villages, rob, kidnap and take hostages civilians.”
An unnamed US defence official said Ukraine is showing “no signs” of ending its resistance and is repeatedly counter-attacking.
The source added Moscow’s forces are shelling Ukraine’s cities in a “near desperate attempt to gain leverage” in talks.
Last week, Ukraine said it had lost 1,700 troops and that tally is thought to have risen in recent days.
But its strong defence has led to fears Russia is increasingly turning on civilians to force Kyiv into capitulating.
Ukraine’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has claimed the Kremlin illegally deported 2,389 children to Russia from the disputed region of Donbas.
It urged the global community to increase pressure on Russia to end the war.
Many Ukrainian officials have been kidnapped by Russians trying to force a surrender.
There have been repeated incidents caught on camera of Russian troops executing and targeting civilians.
Captured Russian gunner Valery Vasilyev, 18, told Ukraine’s SBU security agency how he was ordered to shoot civilians in Kharkiv.
According to Ukraine, Moscow’s troops have shelled 135 hospitals, nine of which have been destroyed.
Yesterday CCTV footage emerged of protestors being shot at in Kherson.
Russia has reportedly passed details of more than 500 captured Ukrainians to the Red Cross and is to be prepared to swap them for detained Russians.
Some of Ukraine’s orphans have reached a hospital in Kyiv where doctors hope to be able to provide care and perform life-saving surgeries.
The governor of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region said buses evacuating civilians from frontline areas were hit by shelling yesterday and four children were wounded in separate incidents.
Ukrainian officials say 8,057 people escaped through seven humanitarian corridors yesterday.
Ukraine said a shell hit a chemical plant outside the eastern city of Sumy just after 3am yesterday, causing a leak in a 50-ton ammonia tank that took hours to contain.
And there were reports of state-sponsored Russian looting as five ships with tens of thousands of tons of grain were taken in Berdyansk port.
