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A powerful earthquake hit north-east Japan on Wednesday night, temporarily cutting power to two million homes.
The magnitude 7.3 tremor struck the same region where a major earthquake triggered the Fukushima nuclear disaster 11 years ago.
One person has died and dozens of people are believed to be injured.
In some areas it was too forceful for people to stand, and buildings rattled in the capital Tokyo, AFP reports.
The quake took place at 23:36 (14:36 GMT), Japanese authorities said.
Aftershocks were said to be possible in Fukushima, Miyagi and Yamagata prefectures.
Immediately after the event, Japan's meteorological agency issued an advisory for tsunami waves of one metre (3.3ft) for parts of the north-east coast, but Japanese broadcaster NHK is now reporting that it has been withdrawn.
Waves of up to 30cm (1ft) were recorded by authorities in one of the areas.
Local electricity providers said about 700,000 homes in Tokyo and 156,000 in Japan's north-east had been left without power immediately after the shock, but supplies have since been restored to many households.
A number of people across north-eastern Japan were hurt by falling objects or in falls, and in the city of Soma local media reported that one man in his sixties had died.
A bullet train north of Fukushima city was also derailed by the quake, according to its operator. There were no immediate reports of injuries from that incident.
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Japan's Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters the government was still trying to assess the extent of any damage, and authorities said emergency services had been inundated with calls.
In Ishinomaki, a city official told AFP news agency he had been woken up by "extremely violent shaking".
"I heard the ground rumpling. Rather than feeling scared, I immediately remembered the Great East Japan earthquake," he said referring to the 2011 disaster.
Thursday's earthquake was recorded 57km (35 miles) off the coast of Fukushima, not far from the epicentre of the most powerful earthquake in Japan's history, which killed 18,000 people when it struck eleven years ago.
The 2011 earthquake triggered a tsunami and destroyed the Fukushima nuclear plant, sparking a major disaster after radiation leaked from the plant.
Nuclear authorities said that no abnormalities have been detected after Wednesday night's earthquake at the damaged Fukushima site.
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Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s leader, has made an impassioned plea for the US to provide more military aid to his country in the face of Russia’s invasion, prompting President Joe Biden to approve the delivery of new weapons systems, including drones and anti-aircraft systems.
Biden’s announcement of new help for Ukraine’s military fell short of Zelensky’s request for the US and Nato to embrace a no-fly zone or directly supply fighter jets to the country, highlighting the gap that still exists between Kyiv’s demands and what Washington and other European countries are willing to provide.
But Biden said the US and its allies remained “fully committed” to increasing military support for Ukraine, whose resistance to Russian forces has exceeded expectations since the invasion began on February 24.
“I want to be honest with you. This could be a long and difficult battle but the American people will be steadfast in our support for the people of Ukraine,” Biden said. “We’re going to continue to have their backs as they fight for their freedom, their democracy, their very survival.”
A few hours earlier, speaking by video link to US lawmakers, Zelensky had personally appealed for Biden to show more leadership in handling Russia’s war with Ukraine.
“I wish you to be the leader of the world,” Zelensky said. “Being the leader of the world means to be the leader of peace.”
On Wednesday Biden labelled Russian president Vladimir Putin a “war criminal” for the first time, after Russian forces sharply ratcheted up their attacks on civilian populations.
In response to a question from a reporter about Putin at a White House event, Biden said: “Oh, I think he is a war criminal.” White House press secretary Jen Psaki later explained: “[Biden] was speaking from his heart and speaking from what he [has] seen on television.”
According to the Russian state news agency Ria Novosti, Putin’s spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Biden’s comments were “unacceptable and unforgivable rhetoric by the leader of a country from whose bombs hundreds of thousands of people have died”.
Biden has however refused to enforce a no-fly zone or send fighter jets to Ukraine’s government, in order to avoid a direct confrontation between Nato and Russia that could trigger a wider conflict. Zelensky said it was crucial for Ukraine to “protect our sky”.
Zelensky’s dramatic appeal began with a call for Americans to remember the attacks they suffered at Pearl Harbor and on September 11 2001 — saying Russia had launched a “brutal offensive against our values” and “our country is experiencing the same thing every day now”.
He also showed a video of Ukrainian cities before and after Russia’s shelling, including footage of missile attacks on civilian targets. He called on the US to impose more economic and financial sanctions on Moscow, and for corporate America to cut off ties with Russia in order to limit Vladimir Putin’s ability to fund the war.
US lawmakers greeted Zelensky with a standing ovation for his virtual address, which left many members of Congress moved to tears.
Democrats and Republicans said more needed to be done to back the Ukrainian effort, though there remained a range of suggestions about what form that support should take.
Mark Warner, the Democratic senator who chairs the Senate intelligence committee, said after Zelensky’s speech: “We should heed President Zelensky’s call for additional defensive aid including anti-tank weapons and anti-aircraft missiles, and for new sanctions on those responsible for supporting the Russian government’s barbaric invasion of a peaceful and sovereign neighbour.”
Mike Quigley, a Democratic congressman from Illinois, said: “It is time for the United States and Nato to get Ukraine the assistance they need. We must stop quibbling over logistics and get fighter jets to Ukraine and protect the skies over humanitarian corridors. If we cannot do that, we should at the very least impose the sanctions President Zelensky requested today.”
Ben Sasse, the Republican senator from Nebraska, said Zelensky had called on the White House and Congress to “answer whether we have the courage of our convictions”, and urged fellow lawmakers to authorise more military support to Ukraine.
“They need more Javelins, they need more ammo, they need more Stingers, they need more SAMs [surface-to-air missiles], they need more airplanes. They need more of everything,” he added. “We’re a superpower. We should act like it.”
In a fact sheet, the White House said the new military aid approved by Biden was worth $800mn, in addition to $200mn authorised a few days ago.
It included 800 Stinger anti-aircraft systems, 9,000 anti-tank weapons, 100 drones, and small arms such as grenade launchers, machine guns and pistols along with ammunition. In addition to short-range anti-aircraft systems, the US said it was also helping Ukraine acquire longer-range anti-aircraft systems.
The US president is also planning a trip to Europe next week to attend an extraordinary summit of Nato leaders to co-ordinate their response to Russia’s invasion, which has become increasingly brutal.
A theatre in Mariupol where hundreds of people are reported to have been sheltering has been bombed by Russian forces, local officials have said.
The city council said the number of casualties was not yet known, but Sky News has verified footage from the attack as showing the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre.
According to the RIA news agency, Russia's Defence Ministry has denied it carried out the attack, instead accusing the Azov Battalion, a far-right Ukrainian militia, of blowing it up.
It did not give evidence to back up the claim.
Image:It is not known if anyone was killed in the attack
Earlier, Russian forces shot and killed 10 people queuing for bread in Chernihiv, northern Ukraine, the US embassy in Kyiv has said.
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In a post on its Twitter account, the embassy wrote: "Such horrific attacks must stop.
"We are considering all available options to ensure accountability for any atrocity crimes in Ukraine."
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1:17
'Half of my leg was torn away'
Earlier, Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said a "radical change" had occurred between Ukrainian and Russian forces after Kyiv launched counteroffensives in "several operational areas".
It has substantially altered the "parties' dispositions", he tweeted, without elaborating further.
Another presidential adviser, Oleksiy Arestovych, said Ukrainian forces were conducting small-scale counter attacks on several fronts.
The situation in the "main hotspots has not changed", he said, and "has no chance of changing as Russia has used up its resources".
Russian troops are continuing to fire missiles at Ukrainian targets, and approximately two-thirds of rockets are hitting civilian buildings and infrastructure, Mr Arestovych claimed in a video briefing.
The UK Ministry of Defence, meanwhile, has said Ukraine is "adeptly exploiting" Russian forces' "lack of manoeuvre" and inflicting heavy losses.
Moscow is also struggling to overcome "challenges" imposed by Ukraine's terrain, it added.
High-rise buildings were again hit in Kyiv on Wednesday, however, and Russian troops are said to be shooting from inside a hospital in Mariupol, where about 500 people are being used as human shields.
In an update on Wednesday lunchtime, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russian troops "continued to shell peaceful Ukrainian cities and towns" on Tuesday night, including Kharkiv and Kharkiv Oblast (province).
They also shelled the coast outside the southern port of Odesa, he added.
And in Bucha, in Kyiv province, six people from the town council were taken hostage, he said.
"The Russian state has turned into a real terrorist and it has no shame," Mr Zelenskyy said.
Around Kyiv, though, Russia is still struggling to gather forces and is having problems with its people and logistics, General Sir Richard Barrons told Sky News.
Russian forces "doubt their ability to successfully fight for Kyiv other than demolishing it", the retired British Army officer added - explaining why Moscow has stepped up its shelling of the capital.
But while Ukrainian forces are doing "really well", they still do not have the capability to remove the Russians completely, he said.
General Sir Richard expects to see a "bigger attempt on Kyiv" soon, and it could be highly destructive.
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1:32
Kharkiv doctor: 'It's a disaster'
The MOD, in its latest intelligence update, said Russian troops have remained largely on the road network and have "demonstrated a reluctance to conduct off-road manoeuvre".
The destruction of bridges by Ukrainian forces has also played a "key role in stalling Russia's advance".
The ministry continued: "Russia's continued failure to gain control of the air has drastically limited their ability to effectively use air manoeuvre, further limiting their options.
"The tactics of the Ukrainian armed forces have adeptly exploited Russia's lack of manoeuvre, frustrating the Russian advance and inflicting heavy losses on the invading forces."
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1:27
Explosions and projectiles seen in Kyiv
A plume of smoke was seen rising into the sky after an artillery shell rammed into an apartment block in the centre of Kyiv on Wednesday morning, obliterating the top floor and starting a fire.
Two people were hurt, according to early reports.
In addition, social media footage shows two high-rise buildings in the capital's Schevchenkivskyi district being shelled on Wednesday morning.
Loud booms are heard and smoke rises as the airstrikes hit. Sky News has verified the video and located it.
In Mariupol, Russian forces are shooting from artillery positions in the grounds of a hospital they captured on Tuesday, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said.
She added that 400 civilians, patients and medical staff are being held hostage.
Regional leader Pavlo Kyrylenko put that number at 500, saying troops had forced about 400 people from nearby homes into the Regional Intensive Care Hospital and about 100 patients and staff were not being allowed to leave.
President Zelenskyy said the "occupiers are using it as a shelling position" and it is a "war crime".
A team of investigators from the International Criminal Court is in Ukraine collecting evidence, he added.
Ms Vereshchuk said it was an "open question" whether a humanitarian corridor would be opened in the port city on Wednesday.
Ukraine's prosecutor general has said 103 children have now been killed since the invasion began.
Russian forces have struck more than 400 educational establishments and 59 of them have been destroyed, Iryna Venediktova said on Facebook.
Russian soldiers have taken hundreds of civilians hostage at a hospital in the besieged city of Mariupol, the regional governor has reported.
“Russian occupiers have taken doctors and patients hostage,” Pavlo Kyrylenko, governor of Donetsk Oblast, wrote on his Telegram channel. He said one of the hostages told local officials that the Russians had herded about 400 civilians into the hospital and were preventing anyone from leaving.
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“We can’t get out of the hospital,” the unnamed hostage was reported to have said. “They’re shooting a lot. We’re sitting in the cellar.”
Mariupol, a port city of 420,000 people near the Russian border, has been under almost constant bombardment for two weeks. It has become a symbol of Ukraine’s resistance, and of the appalling human
Boris Johnson will hold talks with the leaders of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates as he bids to end the West's "addiction" to Russian oil and gas.
Speaking to broadcasters at the Emirates Palace hotel in Abu Dhabi, he said: "When we look at the dependency the West in particular has built up on Putin's hydrocarbons, on Putin's oil and gas, we can see what a mistake that was because he's been able to blackmail the West and hold western economies to ransom - we need independence."
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This would allow Western nations to wean themselves off Russian supplies and deal a further financial blow to Moscow.
He said the government would be setting out the energy strategy "next week" to include a "massive jump forward on renewables, more nuclear, using our own hydrocarbons more effectively" and sourcing fossil fuels from outside Russia.
The Saudi crown prince has also been largely shunned by the West since the 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, which he is accused of having ordered.
PM's intent to build 'widest possible coalition' so Putin does not succeed
Just over three years ago, Mr Johnson himself described the killing of Khashoggi as "barbaric act" and suggested the Saudi state had "copied the playbook of Vladimir Putin" with the "ostentatious horror of this murder".
Fears have been expressed that - in seeking to now turn away from Putin's regime - the UK and other Western nations could instead find themselves more reliant on other leaders accused of human rights abuses.
On Wednesday Mr Johnson defended trying to forge closer ties with Saudi Arabia.
Asked about working with a regime with such a questionable human rights record, the PM said: "I've raised all those issues many, many times... since I was foreign secretary and beyond and I'll raise them all again today.
"But we have long, long standing relationships with this part of the world and we need to recognise the very important relationship that we have."
Downing Street said the PM was expected to use Wednesday's visit to discuss with Gulf leaders his current efforts to improve energy security and reduce volatility in energy and food prices amid concerns over a cost of living crisis in the UK.
The talks will also focus on regional security and humanitarian relief following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, as well as the importance of allies working together to increase the diplomatic and economic pressure on Mr Putin's regime, Number 10 said.
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0:32
Putin like a 'pusher' for hydrocarbons
Ahead of his arrival in the UAE, Mr Johnson said: "The brutal and unprovoked assault President Putin has unleashed on Ukraine will have far-reaching consequences for the world, well beyond Europe's borders.
"The UK is building an international coalition to deal with the new reality we face. The world must wean itself off Russian hydrocarbons and starve Putin's addiction to oil and gas.
"Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are key international partners in that effort.
"We will work with them to ensure regional security, support the humanitarian relief effort and stabilise global energy markets for the longer term."
ANALYSIS: PM hopes cosy WhatsApps will aid him on trip to desert
"We need to take back control," says Boris Johnson. Sound familiar?
The PM is now applying his famous Brexit slogan to the West’s dependence – an “addiction”, he calls it – on Russian oil and gas.
That’s why he’s in Saudi Arabia: to try and persuade the kingdom’s influential Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to turn on the taps and release more oil for the UK.
Government insiders claim the PM has better links with the Saudi prince than any other G7 leader. The pair exchange WhatsApp messages, after all.
When Mr Johnson was foreign secretary he praised bin Salman’s reform agenda. And this week he brushed aside questions about the mass execution of 81 men in Saudi on Saturday.
Contrast the PM’s cosy relationship with the prince with the Saudi's rift with US President Joe Biden.
The prince refused to take a call from the president because he denounced Saudi Arabia as a “pariah” over the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
And, unlike the US, the UK has continued to sell arms to Saudi Arabia, defying critics who protested that the weapons were being used in the war in Yemen.
So if the PM can pull it off during his visit to the desert, he’ll take all the flak over the Saudis’ human rights record.
Number 10 said the prime minister would also discuss shared strategic priorities with the leaders of the UAE and Saudi Arabia, including the current situation in Iran and Yemen, increased security cooperation, trade and investment and supporting human rights and civil society.
UK should not depend on 'another unreliable and sometime hostile regime'
Senior Conservative MP Julian Lewis, who chairs Parliament's intelligence and security committee, called on ministers to ensure that "in seeking to lessen our dependence upon one source of oil and gas, we do not end up creating a source dependency on another unreliable and sometimes hostile regime".
Ex-Labour leader Ed Miliband, now the party's shadow climate secretary, said: "It is a sign of our vulnerability and energy insecurity as a country that the prime minister is going to Saudi Arabia to seek an increase in oil production, despite the appalling human rights record of the regime.
"Once again it demonstrates that the best solution to the energy crisis we face is a green energy sprint at home so once and for all we end of our dependence on fossil fuels.
"The best way to tackle the cost of living crisis with Labour's plan for a windfall tax on oil and gas producers to reduce household energy bills."
Katie Fallon, of the Campaign Against Arms Trade, said Mr Johnson's trip "signals that the prime minister plans not only to replicate but to entrench another trading relationship with a murderous regime with no regard for the right to life of their own citizens, yet alone those of another country such as Yemen".
"When we ask ourselves how did Russia feel so emboldened as to invade Ukraine, indiscriminately targeting civilians throughout the first three weeks of this devastating war, the answer lies in decades of silence, excuses and short-sighted self-interest illustrated perfectly by the unconscionable actions of the prime minister," she added.
Mr Johnson will miss Prime Minister's Questions on Wednesday due to his trip, with deputy prime minister Dominic Raab to stand in for him in the House of Commons.
The Russian journalist who interrupted a state TV news broadcast by holding up a sign protesting against the country's invasion of Ukraine has been fined.
During a live broadcast on Channel One on Monday evening, Ms Ovsyannikova, who is thought to have worked for the company for years, walked on to the set behind the presenter with a placard denouncing the country's invasion of Ukraine- a move the Kremlin has described as "hooliganism".
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It was a risky protest in a country where independent media has been blocked, and it has become illegal to contradict the government's narrative of the war.
Image:The Channel One employee leaves court building in Moscow after being fined
The UN's human rights office called on Russian authorities to ensure that she "does not face any reprisals for exercising her right to freedom of expression".
Mr Chikov, who is head of the Russian human rights group Agora, said Ms Ovsyannikova had been arrested and taken to a police station in Moscow.
There were fears she may face charges under a law designed to clamp down on free speech.
The law, passed on 4 March, makes public actions aimed at discrediting Russia's army illegal and bans the spread of fake news or the "public dissemination of deliberately false information about the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation". The offence carries a jail term of up to 15 years.
The placard Ms Ovsyannikova held read in English: "No war. Russians against war."
In Russian, it said: "NO WAR. Stop the war. Don't believe propaganda. They are lying to you here."
While she stood behind the host who continued to read from her autocue, Ms Ovsyannikova could be heard saying: "Stop the war! No war! Stop the war! No war!"
She could still be heard after the broadcast was switched to alternative output.
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0:54
Protester interrupts Russian state TV
Ms Ovsyannikova, who said her father is Ukrainian and her mother Russian, also released a video of herself before her demonstration, in which she blamed President Vladimir Putin for the war.
She said that "unfortunately" she had been working for Channel One in recent years, working for the "Kremlin's propaganda and I'm very ashamed of it - that I was letting them tell those lies from the TV screen... and allowed the Russian people to be zombified".
She added: "We kept silent in 2014 when all of this was just in the beginning (annexation of Crimea). We didn't go to rallies when the Kremlin poisoned Navalny. We just silently watched this inhumane regime. Now the whole world has turned away from us, and even 10 generations of our descendants will not be enough to wash away the shame of this fratricidal war.
"We, the Russian people, thoughtful and smart. It's up to us to stop this madness. Go to rallies, don't be afraid of anything, they can't imprison all of us."
Channel One, which is broadcast throughout Russia and has more than 250 million viewers worldwide, said it was conducting an internal review into the incident, TASS reported. The channel closely follows the Kremlin line that Moscow was forced to act in Ukraine to demilitarise and "de-Nazify" the country in a "special military operation".
A state television employee burst on to Russia’s main state television evening news broadcast on Monday to protest against Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, the largest sign yet of simmering discontent at the three-week war.
Marina Ovsyannikova, an editor at Channel One, appeared for a few seconds live on air holding a sign that said “Stop the war — Don’t believe propaganda — They’re lying to you” and chanting “Stop the war! No to war!”
Though the channel cut the feed after a few seconds, Ovsyannikova’s unprecedented intervention was an extraordinary act of defiance after Russia ramped up already draconian censorship laws when the war began in late February.
Police detained Ovsyannikova under a new law that criminalises acts such as “discrediting the Russian armed forces” and spreading “fake news” of the conflict, said Pavel Chikov, whose Agora legal defence foundation is representing Ovsyannikova.
Though the strictest punishments carry a potential prison sentence of up to 15 years, Chikov said Ovsyannikova was likely to be fined Rbs30,000 to Rbs60,000 ($250 to $500).
Channel One told state newswire Ria Novosti it was investigating the incident.
In a video recorded beforehand and posted by Ovd-Info, a website that monitors arrests at protests, Ovsyannikova blamed Putin, Russia’s president, for the war and said she was ashamed of her role in it as a Channel One employee.
“What’s happening in Ukraine is a crime, and Russia is the aggressor. The responsibility for this aggression lies with one man: Vladimir Putin,” Ovsyannikova said.
