Russia's Defence Ministry has said that Russian assault troops had captured three more districts in the western part of the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut.
The Russian military sometimes refers to the Wagner group of fighters as "assault troops".
Ukrainian and Russian units have been battling for months over the eastern city, much of which lies in ruins.
"The airborne troops were restraining the Ukrainian units on the flanks and supported the actions of the assault squads to capture the city," the ministry said in its latest bulletin.
Meanwhile, Russia will expel more than 20 German diplomats, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has told RIA Novosti news agency, in a tit-for-tat move.
Ms Zakharova told state-run television Zvezda that Russia had decided to expel "more than 20" diplomats after her ministry denounced "another mass expulsion of employees of Russian diplomatic missions in Germany."
"We strongly condemn these actions of Berlin, which continues to defiantly destroy the entire array of Russian-German relations," Russia's Foreign Ministry said earlier today.
It said Germany's ambassador in Moscow had been notified about the moves on 5 April.
Relations between Russia and Germany, which used to be the biggest buyer of Russian oil and gas, have frayed since Russia sent troops into Ukraine in February last year and the West responded with sanctions.
Belgorod residents returning home after bomb scare
More than 3,000 people in the Russian city of Belgorod were returning to their homes today after being evacuated while an explosive was disposed of, the local governor said.
Two days earlier a Russian warplane accidentally dropped a bomb on the city, damaging local houses, authorities said.
Those evacuated lived in the same area.
Military explosive experts decided to "neutralise" the explosive at a training ground, Belgorod region governor Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote on Telegram.
"The operational headquarters decided to evacuate 17 apartment buildings within a radius of 200 metres. According to preliminary data, it is more than 3,000 people. Anyone who needs help with temporary accommodation, it will be provided," he said.
He said later that people had started to return to their homes after a "shell" was removed from the area.
On Thursday, a Russian Sukhoi-34 supersonic warplane accidentally fired a weapon into Belgorod, causing an explosion and injuring three people, Russian officials said.
US data firm to help Ukraine prosecute alleged Russian war crimes
Ukraine plans to deploy software from US data analytics provider, Palantir Technologies, to help it prosecute alleged war crimes committed by Russia, the company told Reuters.
Palantir, which has supplied Ukraine with a range of systems that could help it target tanks and support refugees, is now working with the country's prosecutor general's office to let investigators across Europe pool and process data, the company said.
Its software will combine intelligence and satellite imagery to build a map of evidence.
For instance, establishing the proximity of Russian equipment to crime scenes or aggregating photographs that Ukrainians have uploaded to social media, the company said.
Andriy Kostin, Ukraine's prosecutor general, said in a statement provided by Palantir: "Analysing this amount of evidence would be virtually impossible without modern IT solutions".
The data that the software will process relates to claims of alleged killing, rape, torture and destruction, that is part of more than 78,000 crimes reported in Ukraine since Russia invaded last year.
Russia has denied attacking civilians or perpetrating war crimes.
A successful prosecution would require Ukraine to navigate overlapping court jurisdictions and furnish evidence despite often restricted access to suspects or crime scenes.
Palantir said its technology would allow investigators to access otherwise siloed data while working to prevent evidence tampering.
A UN-mandated investigative body last month faulted Russia for war crimes, though its chair said it had not found evidence of genocide, which is being investigated by Ukraine.
