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Sri Lanka will shut schools and only allow fuel supplies to services deemed essential like health, trains and buses for two weeks starting Tuesday, a minister said, in a desperate attempt to deal with a severe shortage, CNN reported.

The country is suffering its worst economic crisis, with foreign exchange reserves at a record low and the island of 22 million struggling to pay for essential imports of food, medicine and, most critically, fuel.

Industries like garments, a big dollar earner in the Indian Ocean nation, are left with fuel for only about a week to 10 days. Current stocks of the country will exhaust in just under a week based on regular demand, Reuters calculations show.

medical services and vehicles that transport food starting Tuesday until July 10, Bandula Gunewardena, the spokesman for the government cabinet, told reporters.

Schools in urban areas will be shut and everyone is urged to work from home, he said. Inter-provincial bus service will be limited.

"Sri Lanka has never faced such a severe economic crisis in its history," Gunewardena said.

Autorickshaw driver W. D. Shelton, 67, said he had waited in line for four days for fuel, according to CNN.

"I haven't slept or eaten properly during this time," he said. "We can't earn, we can't feed our families."

Leaders of the world's seven richest nations have promised to support Ukraine "for as long as it takes" on the second day of a summit in Germany, BBC reported.

In a statement, the G7 group also said that Russia must stop blocking food from leaving Ukraine's ports. 

Addressing the summit via video-link, Ukraine's president appealed for more heavy weapons from Western allies.

G7 leaders are under pressure to be united in their approach against increasing Russian aggression.

"We will continue to provide financial, humanitarian, military and diplomatic support and stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes," they said in a strongly worded statement on Monday.

"We remain appalled by and continue to condemn the brutal, unprovoked, unjustifiable and illegal war of aggression against Ukraine by Russia and aided by Belarus."

The G7 leaders - Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the US - have been joined in Bavaria, Germany by two representatives from the European Union, according to BBC.

The high-level talks were held as Russian forces escalated their attacks on Ukraine, where officials said a busy shopping centre was struck by a missile in the central city of Kremenchuk, killing at least ten people according to the local governor.

Dialling into the luxury hotel spa where the summit is being held, President Volodymyr Zelensky asked for more heavy weapons for Ukraine and said he hoped the war would be over by the end of the year "before winter sets in". There are concerns that harsh winter conditions will make battle conditions tougher for Ukraine's troops.

He also urged Western allies to keep the pressure on Russia with more sanctions.

In their joint statement, the G7 leaders said they remain committed to "sustaining and intensifying" sanctions against President Vladimir Putin's government and enablers in neighbouring Belarus. There will be sanctions on gold and oil exports and also "targeted sanctions on those responsible for war crimes", the joint statement said.

The G7 also demanded that the Kremlin allow food to leave Ukraine's ports - and blamed Moscow for rising threats to global food insecurity as a result of the conflict, BBC reported.

Much of Ukraine's highly valued grain exports are in danger of rotting in local warehouses as Russian forces continue blocking Ukraine's ports on the Black Sea.

"We urgently call on Russia to cease, without condition, its attacks on agricultural and transport infrastructure and enable free passage of agricultural shipping from Ukrainian ports," the G7 statement says.

A BBC investigation has also found evidence that Russian forces in occupied areas of Ukraine have been systematically stealing grain and other produce from local farmers.

Russian long-range bombers struck a crowded shopping mall in Ukraine’s central city of Kremenchuk with a missile on Monday, raising fears of what President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called an “unimaginable” number of victims in “one of the most daring terrorist attacks in European history.”

Zelenskky said that many of the more than 1,000 afternoon shoppers and staff inside the mall managed to escape. Giant plumes of black smoke, dust and orange flames emanated from the wreckage, with emergency crews rushing in to search broken metal and concrete for victims and put out fires. Onlookers watched in distress at the sight of how an everyday activity such as shopping could turn into a horror, Associated Press reported.

The casualty figures were changing as rescuers searched the smoldering rubble into early Tuesday. Ukraine’s emergency services reported late Monday that at least 16 people were dead and about 60 wounded.

Soldiers worked into the night to lug sheets of twisted metal and broken concrete, as one drilled into what remained of the shopping center’s roof. Drones whirred above, clouds of dark smoke still emanating from the ruins several hours after the fire had been put out.

“We are working to dismantle the construction so that it is possible to get machinery in there since the metal elements are very heavy and big, and disassembling them by hand is impossible,” said Volodymyr Hychkan, an emergency services official.

At Ukraine’s request, the UN Security Council scheduled an emergency meeting in New York on Tuesday to discuss the attack. 

In the first Russian government comment on the missile strike, the country’s first deputy permanent representative to the United Nations, Dmitry Polyansky, alleged multiple inconsistencies that he didn’t specify, claiming on Twitter that the incident was a provocation by Ukraine. Russia has repeatedly denied it targets civilian infrastructure, even though Russian attacks have hit other shopping malls, theaters, hospitals, kindergartens and apartment buildings, according to Associated Press.

The missile strike unfolded as Western leaders pledged continued support for Ukraine, and the world’s major economies prepared new sanctions against Russia, including a price cap on oil and higher tariffs on goods. Meanwhile, the U.S. appeared ready to respond to Zelenskyy’s call for more air defense systems, and NATO planned to increase the size of its rapid-reaction forces nearly eightfold — to 300,000 troops.

Zelenskyy said the mall presented “no threat to the Russian army” and had “no strategic value.” He accused Russia of sabotaging “people’s attempts to live a normal life, which make the occupiers so angry.”

In his nightly address, he said it appeared Russian forces had intentionally targeted the shopping center and added, “Today’s Russian strike at a shopping mall in Kremenchuk is one of the most daring terrorist attacks in European history.” He said Russia “has become the largest terrorist organization in the world.”

Russia has increasingly used long-range bombers in the war. Ukrainian officials said Russian Tu-22M3 long-range bombers flying over Russia’s western Kursk region fired the missile that hit the shopping center, as well as another that hit a sports arena in Kremenchuk.

The Russian strike echoed attacks earlier in the war that caused large numbers of civilian casualties — such as one in March on a Mariupol theater where many civilians had holed up, killing an estimated 600, and another in April on a train station in eastern Kramatorsk that left at least 59 people dead.

“Russia continues to take out its impotence on ordinary civilians. It is useless to hope for decency and humanity on its part,” Zelenskyy said, Associated Press reported.

Kremenchuk Mayor Vitaliy Maletskiy wrote on Facebook that the attack “hit a very crowded area, which is 100% certain not to have any links to the armed forces.”

The United Nations called the strike “deplorable,” stressing that civilian infrastructure “should never ever be targeted,” U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said. Group of Seven leaders issued a statement late Monday condemning the attack and saying that “indiscriminate attacks on innocent civilians constitute a war crime. Russian President Putin and those responsible will be held to account.”

The attack coincided with Russia’s all-out assault on the last Ukrainian stronghold in eastern Ukraine’s Luhansk province, “pouring fire” on the city of Lysychansk from the ground and air, according to the local governor. At least eight people were killed and more than 20 wounded in Lysychansk when Russian rockets hit an area where a crowd gathered to obtain water from a tank, Luhansk Gov. Serhiy Haidai said.

The Supreme Court (SC) on Sunday issued an interim order directing the government to make arrangements for the prisoners to vote in the upcoming elections.

Responding to a writ filed jointly by the students of Kathmandu School of Law--Nishant Malla and Pradesha KC--a single bench of Justice Sapana Pradhan Malla issued the order to the government to make arrangements for the inmates to vote.

Malla also ordered the government to collect the names of the jailbirds eligible to vote.