Russia-Ukraine updates: Russian missiles hit close to nuclear reactors: IAEA director

Russia announced Tuesday that it was banning the wife and daughter of U.S. President Joe Biden from entering the country.

The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the names of 25 U.S. citizens were added to the country's "stop list," including Biden's wife Jill and daughter Ashley. The ministry also banned entry to U.S. Sens. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Susan Collins, R-Maine, Ben Sasse, R-Neb., and Kirstin Gillibrand, D-N.Y., whom it identified as "responsible for the formation of the Russophobic course."

"This was done in response to the continuous expansion of U.S. sanctions against Russian politicians and public persons," the ministry said in a statement Tuesday.

The U.S. Treasury Department announced Tuesday that it’s prohibiting the import of Russian gold to the U.S., two days after President Joe Biden said the U.S. and other G-7 nations would ban the import of Russian gold.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on CNN Sunday that the West’s bans on Russian gold imports would cost Russia about $19 billion in revenue annually.

“It can’t acquire what it needs to modernize its defense sector, to modernize its technology, to modernize its energy exploration,” Blinken said.

The Treasury Department also announced Tuesday that the U.S. is sanctioning 70 entities and 29 individuals “critical” to Russia’s “defense industrial base, including State Corporation Rostec, the cornerstone of Russia’s defense, industrial, technology, and manufacturing sectors.” The Treasury said the State Department is also sanctioning 45 more entities and 29 more individuals, including targeting Russian military units and the FSB.

-ABC News' Ben Gittleson

Ukrainian forces are still consolidating their positions on higher ground in the eastern city of Lyschansak after falling back from nearby Sieverodonetsk, the U.K. Ministry of Defense said Tuesday in an intelligence update.

"Ukrainian forces continue to disrupt Russian command and control with successful strikes deep behind Russian lines," the ministry added.

According to the ministry, Russian forces over the weekend "launched unusually intense waves of strikes across Ukraine using long-range missiles."

"These weapons highly likely included the Soviet-era AS-4 KITCHEN and more modern AS-23a KODIAK missiles, fired from both Belarusian and Russian airspace," the ministry said. "These weapons were designed to take on targets of strategic importance, but Russia continues to expend them in large numbers for tactical advantage. Similarly, it fielded the core elements of six different armies yet achieved only tactical success at Sieverodonetsk."

"The Russian armed forces are increasingly hollowed out," the ministry added. "They currently accept a level of degraded combat effectiveness, which is probably unsustainable in the long term.

The death toll from a Russian missile strike on a Ukrainian shopping mall continued to rise Tuesday as rescuers sifted through the charred rubble.

Monday's attack in the central Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk killed at least 18 people and wounded 59 others, including 25 who remain hospitalized Tuesday, according to the State Emergency Service of Ukraine. A day of mourning for the victims was declared Tuesday in the wider Poltava Oblast.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Monday in his nightly address that more than 1,000 shoppers and workers were inside the mall during the afternoon attack and that it will take time to "establish the number of victims." He condemned the incident as "one of the most daring terrorist attacks in European history."