Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said he doesn't think Vladimir Putin is bluffing when he says Moscow would be ready to use nuclear weapons to defend Russia.
The Russian president said in a televised address last week that Moscow would use "all available means" to protect Russia and its people if its territorial integrity were threatened.
"Look, maybe yesterday it was bluff. Now, it could be a reality," Zelenskiy, who had previously played down such warnings as nuclear blackmail, told CBS News on Sunday.
"I don't think he's bluffing," Zelenskiy added.
The Ukrainian president said Russian strikes on or near two Ukrainian nuclear plants could be considered "contemporary use of nuclear weapons or nuclear blackmail".
Kyiv accuses Moscow of repeatedly shelling the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant during the war in Ukraine, and more recently conducting a missile strike near the Pivdennoukrainska nuclear plant.
Moscow denies shelling the Zaporizhzhia plant, accusing Kyiv of being responsible. It did not comment on the Pivdennoukrainska strike.
The World Court has unanimously ordered Israel, accused by South Africa of genocide in Gaza, to take all necessary and effective action to ensure basic food supplies to the enclave's Palestinian population and halt spreading famine.
Russian missile and drone attacks hit thermal and hydro power plants in central and western Ukraine, power grid operator Ukrenergo said on Friday, the latest assault on the already damaged power infrastructure.
A bus crash in South Africa's northern province of Limpopo resulted in 45 deaths and one serious injury, the country's Department of Transport said on Thursday.
Spanish coastguards rescued 124 migrants, including young children and a person needing a wheelchair, from two wooden boats in the seas off the Canary Islands on Thursday.
Twelve people drowned trying to reach aid dropped by plane off a Gaza beach, Palestinian health authorities said, amid growing fears of famine nearly six months into Israel's military campaign.