March 10, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

Our live coverage of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has moved here.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has hit back at widely discredited Russian disinformation suggesting Ukraine is preparing a chemical attack. 

In a video message posted to Facebook late Thursday, Zelensky said no chemical weapon or weapons of mass destruction were developed in Ukraine, and Moscow’s accusations that Kyiv was developing biological weapons and preparing a chemical attack made him “really worried.”

“We’ve been repeatedly convinced: If you want to know Russia’s plans, look at what Russia accuses others of,” he said.
“We are accused of attacks on allegedly peaceful Russia. And now what? … What else have you prepared for us? Where will you strike with chemical weapons?” Zelensky asked, addressing Russia.

Some context: The United Nations Security Council will hold a meeting Friday at the request of Russia about its false claim the US is developing chemical weapons in Ukraine. The US’ UN Mission spokeswoman Olivia Dalton said the move was “exactly the kind of false flag effort we have warned Russia might initiate to justify a biological or chemical weapons attack.”

Owners of some Russian-themed establishments in the United States believe they are being targeted as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

The businesses said they have received threatening phone calls — and at least one has been vandalized. 

Here’s what’s happening around the country:

Washington, DC: Police are investigating whether hate or bias was behind vandalism at Russia House Restaurant and Lounge in DC, DC Metropolitan Police said.

According to an incident report, the owner of Russia House told police that parts of the restaurant, including five windows and a door, were vandalized between Feb. 25 and Feb. 27. The report noted that “bias-related signs were affixed to the property.”

CNN has reached out to Russia House Restaurant and Lounge but has not received a response. The restaurant is temporarily closed, according to its Facebook page.  

New York: The owners of the Russian Samovar restaurant in midtown Manhattan said they received harassing phone calls and that people have kicked down their sign since Russia invaded Ukraine.

Vlada Von Shats — who is from Russia, while her husband is from Ukraine — said she received a phone call telling her to die, and another calling “us Nazis and Fascists.” 

She said she had not reported any of the incidents to the police.

San Diego: Owners of Pushkin Russian Restaurant in San Diego have received threats following the invasion, according to CNN affiliate KFMB.  

One caller said they would blow up the restaurant “as payback for what Russia is doing to Ukraine,” owner Ike Gazaryan told KFMB. Another caller said “you killed my uncle and my whole family, you disgusting Russians,” KFMB reported.

Gazaryan is from Armenia, and most of his staff are from Ukraine. Despite the threats, the owner has no intentions of changing the name of his business.  

“This is the restaurant that has been here and the Russians in the United States do support Ukraine and support the people,” Gazaryan said in an interview with KFMB.

CNN reached out to Pushkin Russian Restaurant but has not received a response. The San Diego Police told CNN they are not actively involved in any investigation at this address.  

Twitter will add labels to Belarusian state media accounts “to better surface credible information” on the war in Ukraine, the social media giant said Thursday.

“We’re committed to providing context and transparency around the content you see on Twitter. Today we’re adding labels on state media accounts in Belarus to better surface credible information surrounding the war in Ukraine,” the company said in a tweet. 

Yoel Roth, Twitter’s head of site integrity, said the move comes “after detailed reporting” about the role of Belarusian state-affiliated media outlets in the war in Ukraine.

The background: Last week, Twitter launched labels on tweets sharing links to Russian state-affiliated news media, Roth said in a tweet Thursday. 

“Early data suggests that our interventions here are working: We’ve seen a 30% drop in impressions on Tweets labeled under this expanded policy,” Roth said.

Belarus is an ally of Russia and is being used as a launch point for Russian troops into Ukraine.

China has joined Russian propaganda efforts in promoting a conspiracy theory that the United States has funded the development of biological weapons in Ukraine.

Speaking in a briefing Thursday, Beijing’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said Washington should accept “multilateral inspection” of an alleged US-controlled bioweapons lab in the embattled country.

Zhao was referring to a report Monday by China’s state broadcaster CCTV, which cited allegations by a Russian Defense Ministry spokesman that Washington had funded the development of biological weapons in Ukrainian labs.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki on Wednesday dismissed the accusations as “conspiracy theories.”

“The Russian military operation that uncovered secrets about US laboratories in Ukraine is not something to be brushed off by saying it’s so-called propaganda and so-called ridiculous,” Zhao said Thursday.

Some background: A CNN analysis on Thursday found state-run news outlets in China — which dominate the country’s highly censored media space — have largely echoed Russian state media or information from Russian officials about the invasion of Ukraine.

In a series of tweets this week, Psaki slammed the biological weapons claims, noting the US had also seen Chinese officials “echo these conspiracy theories.”

“Now that Russia has made these false claims, and China has seemingly endorsed this propaganda, we should all be on the lookout for Russia to possibly use chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine, or to create a false flag operation using them. It’s a clear pattern,” she said.

Psaki also noted Russia’s “long and well-documented track record of using chemical weapons” as well as its pattern of “accusing the West of the very violations that Russia itself is perpetrating.”

Ukraine labs: Following the breakup of the Soviet Union, US-funded biolabs were established in Ukraine — partly to secure old weapons left behind in the former Soviet republics. The State Department has described the claims as nonsense — and the US and Ukrainian governments have repeatedly, and for years now, tried to bat down conspiracy theories about the labs and spoken about the work that is actually being done in them

Russia’s claims discussed at the UN: The United Nations Security Council will hold a meeting Friday at the request of Russia about the allegation the US is developing chemical weapons in Ukraine. The US’ UN Mission spokeswoman Olivia Dalton said the move was “exactly the kind of false flag effort we have warned Russia might initiate to justify a biological or chemical weapons attack.”

Read more about Russia’s disinformation machine:

Related article Analysis: Russia and QAnon have the same false conspiracy theory about Ukraine

Russian Maj. Gen. Andrei Sukhovetsky was killed while fighting in Ukraine, according to a statement from the Novorossiysk city government in Russia on March 3.

In the statement, the government said Sukhovetsky — the deputy commander of the 41st Combined Arms Army of the Russian Ground Forces — died on Feb. 28 “while performing a combat mission during a special operation in Ukraine.”

Sukhovetsky had previously served in the Russian military during operations in the North Caucasus region and Syria, the statement said. 

The US Senate has voted on a bipartisan basis to pass the massive $1.5 trillion government funding bill that includes $13.6 billion in aid to Ukraine.

The final tally was 68 to 31. 

The bill, which the House passed Wednesday evening, can now be sent to President Joe Biden for his signature.

What the Ukraine aid includes: Of the $13.6 billion in aid to Ukraine, money is set aside for humanitarian, defense, and economic assistance. The bill also includes provisions for sanctions enforcement.

The emergency aid package sets aside $4 billion to help refugees who have fled or were displaced within the country and it increases the President’s authority for defense equipment transfer to Ukraine and other allied nations to $3 billion, according to a fact sheet from the House Appropriations Committee.

President Joe Biden will announce Friday that the US, along with the G7 and European Union, will call for revoking “Most Favored Nation” status for Russia, referred to as permanent normal trade relations in the US, sources familiar with the move tell CNN.

Each country is expected to implement this measure based on its own national processes. The sources made note of congressional efforts to revoke Russia’s permanent normal trade relations.

The move would require an act of Congress.

Read more:

US President Joe Biden speaks about trade and Russia in Washington, DC on March 11, 2022.

Related article Biden to announce Friday that US will move to revoke 'most favored nation' status for Russia

The United Nations Security Council will hold a meeting Friday at the request of Russia about an allegation the United States is developing chemical weapons in Ukraine.

The US’ UN Mission spokeswoman Olivia Dalton said the move was “exactly the kind of false flag effort we have warned Russia might initiate to justify a biological or chemical weapons attack.”

“Russia has a well-documented history of using chemical weapons and has long maintained a biological weapons program in violation of international law. Russia also has a track record of falsely accusing the West of the very violations that Russia itself is perpetrating,” Dalton said.

Some context: At a UN meeting Thursday, Russia accused the US of funding research for chemical weapons in Ukraine. Earlier this week, White House press secretary Jen Psaki slammed the allegations as “false claims.”  

Ukraine has requested to withdraw more than 300 peacekeepers from five operations, a United Nations representative said Thursday.

According to UN Secretary-General spokesman Stephane Dujarric, the peacekeepers are in Mali, Cyprus, Kosovo, South Sudan and Abyei — a disputed border region claimed by Sudan and South Sudan.

This includes 250 troops, 36 staff officers and experts on mission and 22 police officers —  a total of 308 personnel from Ukraine.

“It is the right of any member state to withdraw, and we do need to thank the Ukrainian personnel and the use of their equipment for their longstanding contribution to peace operations and obviously the individual peacekeepers themselves as well,” Dujarric said. 

Additional peacekeepers from other regions will remain in these five locations.

“We are in discussions with other states to maintain our troop capabilities in all those missions,” Farhan Haq, deputy spokesman for the Secretary-General told CNN Thursday. 

It comes after an earlier Ukrainian request to withdraw peacekeepers from the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Ukraine has lost all communications with the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said in a statement Thursday.

The statement comes a day after the Russian-controlled site lost external power supplies.

Power to the site: IAEA chief Rafael Mariano Grossi said the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog is aware of reports that power has been restored to the site and is looking for confirmation.

Earlier on Thursday, Ukraine’s regulatory authority told the IAEA that emergency generators were providing electricity to the Chernobyl plant.

IAEA cited the Ukrainian regulatory authority, saying: “According to the information received before the loss of communication, both of the site’s power lines had been damaged, in effect disconnecting it from the grid.”

Effect of the disconnection: The IAEA statement said the disconnection from the grid “will not have a critical impact on essential safety functions at the site, where various radioactive waste management facilities are located, as the volume of cooling water in the spent fuel facility is sufficient to maintain heat removal without a supply of electricity.” 

According to the IAEA, Ukraine’s regulator said eight of the country’s 15 reactors remained operating, including two at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, three at Rivne, one at Khmelnytsky and two at South Ukraine. Radiation levels at the four sites were normal, it said.

Grossi also said the IAEA is in touch with Ukrainian authorities about radiation monitoring systems in Ukraine.

The IAEA has not been able to re-establish communication with the monitoring systems installed to monitor nuclear material and activities at the Chernobyl and Zaporizhzhia facilities following the loss of remote data transmissions from those systems.

The northwest suburbs of the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, and parts of the northern city of Chernihiv have sustained significant damage, new satellite images from Maxar Technologies show.

Satellite images taken on Thursday show fuel storage tanks on fire at the Russian-controlled Antonov Airbase in Hostomel, a northwest suburb of Kyiv. A thick black plume of smoke can be seen rising from the tanks, which are located on the southern end of the airbase.

The images also show a series of apartment buildings demolished in Borodyanka, a town just northwest of Kyiv. CNN has previously reported that these apartment buildings were damaged by Russian military strikes. 

A satellite image shows a warehouse just outside Kyiv’s city limits in Stoyanka completely gutted by fire. 

In Chernihiv, roughly 80 miles (130 kilometers) northeast of Kyiv, the Epicenter K supermarket has also been destroyed by fire, the images show. The charred remains of the building can be seen —  but there is no roof.

A fire is also seen burning in one of Chernihiv’s industrial districts, located on its south side.

With the clouds temporarily clearing around the Ukrainian capital, new satellite images taken earlier on Thursday show that the Russian military convoy northwest of Kyiv that stretched more than 40 miles (more than 64 kilometers) has “largely dispersed and redeployed,” Maxar Technologies says.

The satellite images show that some elements of the convoy have “repositioned” into forests and treelined areas near Lubyanka, Ukraine, according to Maxar. The satellite images were taken at 11:37 a.m. Kyiv time (4.37 a.m. ET) on Thursday.

Just north of the Antonov Airbase in Hostomel, Ukraine, Russian military vehicles are seen sitting on roadways in residential areas in the town of Ozera — 17 miles northwest of Kyiv. 

Towed artillery and other vehicles are seen taking cover in a sparse patches of trees near Lubyanka — about three miles northwest of the Antonov Airbase.

In Berestyanka — 10 miles west of the airbase — a number of fuel trucks and, what Maxar says, appears to be multiple rocket launchers are seen positioned in a field near trees.

Southeast of Ivankiv — the end of what was the 40+ mile convoy — a number of trucks and equipment are still seen on the roadway.

See more of the images below:

After multiple days of significant fighting to the west and northwest of Kyiv — the capital of Ukraine — Thursday saw additional battlefields develop.

There has been “an alarming development today, which is a real uptick in Russian activity to the east of the city, beyond a suburb called Brovary. We saw some very heavy fighting there,” said CNN’s Clarissa Ward, in a live report from Kyiv.

We “also saw a large column of Russian tanks come under fire in this extraordinary drone video, which appears to show Ukrainian forces firing anti-tank missiles, like those javelins that the US military has supplied them with, and basically picking off tanks in that Russian convoy,” Ward told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer.

In addition to video of the battle, Ward noted that there is also relevant audio.

“There is a voice heard over this video. Apparently, the voice of a Russian soldier in that tank unit saying that his commander has been killed,” she said.

But as the Ukrainians fight to defend their position, it’s worrisome for citizens of Kyiv, Ward noted, that Russian forces are expanding their offensive.

“It is certainly of grave concern to everybody here in this city that the Russians appear to be making a real play, pushing east and then potentially, of course, pushing downwards, presumably, the goal would be to totally encircle the city [of Kyiv]. And meanwhile, so many civilians, Wolf, are still pinned down and trapped under heavy fighting,” she added.

Ward noted that Ukraine’s Minister of Foreign Affairs — Dmytro Kuleba — shared social media video showing the war’s impacts, especially on children.

“We saw a tweet today from the Foreign Minister, Dmytro Kuleba, where he … shows the true cost of this, which are the children who are so often the victims in this war. And [Kuleba] posted some dramatic video that was shot during an evacuation in a town called Vorzel, again to the northwest, of an orphanage. A young child, a toddler, Wolf, one of two very sick children being ferried out of that orphanage looking frankly, completely unconscious,” reported Ward.

As the fighting continues, so too does the civilian suffering in the suburb, Ward said.

“The people in this suburb have had no access to water, to medicine, to food, to gas, to heat, to electricity. It has been a completely traumatic experience and rescue workers still struggling to get into these hardest-hit areas and get Ukraine’s most vulnerable citizens out,” said Ward.

Russia has been using Belarus as a springboard for many of its air operations in Ukraine, according to intelligence collected by NATO surveillance planes flying over the Polish-Ukrainian border and radar seen by CNN.

CNN accompanied NATO’s Flying Squadron 2 on one such surveillance mission on Thursday. Within two hours of taking off at 8 a.m. CET, the radar on board the NATO AWACS plane — short for Airborne Warning and Control System — picked up about a dozen Russian-made planes idling in Belarus just north of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, NATO tactical director Denis Guillaume told CNN.

Hours later, at least nine Russian-made planes were spotted entering Ukrainian airspace from Belarus, appearing to head toward Kyiv, the radar showed.

The “vast majority” of the Russian-made fighter jets that NATO forces have seen entering Ukrainian airspace since Russia’s invasion began have originated in Belarus, the NATO mission’s technical director told CNN on board Thursday’s flight.

On one particularly “active” day last week, NATO forces saw about 20 Russian jets heading to Kyiv from Belarus, he said. The military aircraft taking off from Belarus and entering Ukrainian airspace have been in support of Russian military operations in Ukraine, the NATO airmen told CNN.

Among the major questions looming over the war has been whether Belarusian forces have directly entered the conflict to support Russia. But the NATO troops said they could not answer that — Belarus and Russia use the same Soviet-era MiG-29s, they said, so it is difficult to say in real time who is actually operating them. Ukrainian pilots also use the MiG-29s, they noted, so it is similarly unclear how contested Ukraine’s airspace has become.

Still, some signs are obvious, they say. For example, the jets flying into Ukraine from Russian-allied Belarus are clearly not Ukrainian.

The AWACS plane on which CNN flew Thursday is one of the few military assets owned by NATO itself, rather than donated by a member country, and the fleet of 14 AWACS planes together conduct nearly two dozen missions per week, spying more than 400 kilometers east to ensure that no unfriendly aircraft are headed toward NATO’s airspace.

The missions are routine but have become particularly “intense” since Russia invaded Ukraine, one of the co-pilots told CNN. NATO has stepped up its defense of the eastern flank members over the last several weeks, and Thursday’s surveillance flight was particularly long, requiring a midair refueling.

Read the full report here.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said about 100,000 people have been evacuated via evacuation corridors over the past two days.

“One of the main tasks for us today was the organization of humanitarian corridors,” Zelensky said in a video address posted to Facebook late Thursday night. “Sumy, Trostyanets, Krasnopillya, Irpin, Bucha, Hostomel, Izium. Almost 40,000 people have already been evacuated this day. They were given safety at last. In Poltava, Kyiv, Cherkasy, Zaporizhzhia, Dnipro, Lviv.”

He said humanitarian aid, food and medicine was delivered.

Mariupol and Volnovakha, however, remain completely blocked, he said, adding that despite Ukrainian officials’ best efforts to make the corridor work, “Russian troops did not cease fire.” Regardless of this, Zelensky said he still decided to send a convoy of trucks carrying food, water and medicine.

“But the invaders started a tank attack exactly in the area where this corridor was supposed to be. Corridor of life. For the people of Mariupol,” the president said.

Earlier on Thursday: Local authorities in the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol said Russian forces have begun dropping bombs on the “green corridor” designated to evacuate Mariupol residents.

“Right now, the air bombardment of Mariupol is underway,” said Petro Andryushchenko, the adviser to the mayor of Mariupol.

“They did it consciously. They knew what they were disrupting. They have a clear order to hold Mariupol hostage, to torture it, to carry out constant bombardment,” Zelensky said.

He added: “Today they destroyed the building of the main department of the State Emergency Service in the Donetsk region. Right next to this building was the place where Mariupol residents were to gather for evacuation”

Earlier in the day, the mayor of Mariupol, Vadym Boychenko, also issued a furious video message condemning what he calls Russia’s “cynical and destructive war against humanity” and said every 30 minutes the city was invaded by Russian forces. The mayor said humanitarian aid cannot get through to Mariupol for the sixth day in a row.

Zelensky noted that the state would continue trying to bring Mariupol the aid its people “so desperately need.”

Regional authorities in eastern Ukraine say 20,000 people were evacuated from the Sumy region in northeastern Ukraine Thursday.

Dmytro Lunin, head of the Poltava region administration, said that “20,000 people left the Sumy region through a green corridor. Buses from Sumy and Trostianets are already arriving in Lubny, from where the evacuees will travel by train to the west of the country.” 

CNN cannot independently verify the number of evacuees, but in recent days the Ukrainian authorities have said that tens of thousands of civilians have been evacuated through evacuation corridors from Sumy, including hundreds of foreign students. 

Bipartisan talks in the US Senate are taking shape to take more aggressive action on Russia’s trade status — after the White House effectively watered down the Russia bill that passed the House Wednesday night.

Initially, there had been a bipartisan and bicameral agreement to revoke the “permanent normal trade relations” (PNTR) that Russia and Belarus enjoy with the United States. But the White House objected to that language, so the bill that passed in the House — which would ban Russian energy imports — instead simply called for a review of Russia’s status in the World Trade Organization.

Now, Senate Finance Chairman Ron Wyden, a Democrat from Oregon, told CNN that he is engaging in talks with the top tax writers in Congress and the Biden administration about the matter, as pressure grows to include tougher language in the House bill when the Senate takes it up — as soon as next week.

GOP Sen. Mike Crapo from Idaho, the ranking Republican on the Finance Committee, said he probably wouldn’t support the House bill without stronger language on its trade status — and made clear there would be an effort to amend it.

“The question is PNTR, which is absent. And then they had some other stuff on the WTO in there, which is kind of hollow if we don’t do PNTR,” Crapo said. “So, I probably would not support it because it doesn’t have the key things that you need for a proper trade response.”

US lawmakers are expected to pass a massive spending bill this week that would provide for a one-time $13.6 billion infusion of military and humanitarian aid to Ukraine as it fights back against Russia’s invasion.

The House of Representatives voted late Wednesday night to approve the legislation, and the Senate will need to pass it next.

The amount of money the bill includes for Ukraine increased as lawmakers negotiated over the past several days, growing from the $10 billion the White House had asked for last week.

Here’s a look at what is in the bill and how the Ukraine aid is expected to be spent:

The bill also calls for $25 million for the US Agency for Global Media, an independent federal agency, to combat disinformation in news broadcasts abroad.

Another $120 million would help support local Ukraine activists and journalists and promote accountability for Russian human rights violations.

Read more about the legislation here.

The mayor of the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, Vadym Boychenko, has issued a furious video message, condemning Russia for its “cynical and destructive war against humanity.”

Boychenko spoke of “two days of hell” after the bombing of a maternity hospital on Wednesday in which at least three people died, including a child.

“Today, they cynically shelled the State Service of Mariupol for Emergencies,” he said in the video that showed the extensive damage to the building. “Every 30 minutes, Mariupol was invaded by Russian aviation that was shooting at civilian buildings killing civilians — elderly, women and children.”

“It’s genocide that was created by the Russian army with Putin,” Boychenko said.

The mayor also said there is the “highest level of cynicism” around the evacuation corridors for civilians and humanitarian aid to pass.

“They cynically keep hostage of 400,000 Mariupol citizens that are waiting and hoping for a humanitarian corridor to open up,” he said in the video. “Humanitarian aid can’t get through to Mariupol for the sixth day now, although Russians claim it was peaceful and quiet in the occupied Mariupol. It’s the highest level of cynicism.”

The US has seen an “increase” in the use of “long-range fires, bombardment, missile launches, both from aircraft” and “mobile” missile launchers by Russian forces in Ukraine over the last few days, a senior US defense official told reporters on Thursday.

“I mean, just looking at the imagery they are clearly hitting populated areas and causing a lot of damage, so we definitely have seen and independently can verify an uptick in the increase of long-range fires as they have struggled to overcome the challenges in momentum that they have suffered in the first couple of weeks,” the official said.

The official said the US expected Russian forces to “adapt” and “overcome” the initial logistical challenges they were facing, and that’s what the world is seeing in the increased use of long-range fires on major population centers in Ukraine.

“You’re starting to see a little bit of that happening in just the last 24 as they begin to creep a little closer towards Kyiv from the northwest,” the official said.

Russian forces have “encircled Mariupol,” but they have not taken it, the official added.

Here’s a look at Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory: 

Due to “strong Ukrainian resistance,” Russian forces are increasing their number of deployed forces to encircle key cities which will reduce the number of forces available to continue advancing, according to an intelligence update from the UK’s Ministry of Defence on Thursday.

The UK MoD tweeted the update saying, “Due to strong Ukrainian resistance, Russian forces are committing an increased number of their deployed forces to encircle key cities. This will reduce the number of forces available to continue their advance and will further slow Russian progress.”

The UK MoD also tweeted that protests against Russian occupation have been reported throughout the week in the occupied cities of Kherson, Melitopol and Berdyansk, with 400 “reportedly detained by Russian forces in the Kherson Oblast yesterday.”

See the ministry’s intelligence update:

The Ukrainian State Emergency Services (SES) has released new video showing their staff members defusing a bomb from a downed Russian fighter jet in the northern Ukrainian city of Chernihiv.

A statement from the SES accompanied the video, which was published on March 9, which said that a group of pyrotechnic workers and the SES underwater demining department worked to defuse the bomb. The SES said they worked to clear 22 separate requests for defusing or demining in Chernihiv on March 9. 

CNN previously reported that the jet crashed in western Chernihiv on March 5. The Ukrainian military claimed responsibility for shooting down the Russian fighter jet.  

The plane crashed into a residential area, the SES said, adding that it was unknown if there were casualties. The crash caused fires in four private homes.

Emergency services in the northeast Ukrainian city of Kharkiv say they are tackling a fire near the Kharkiv Institute of Physics and Technology. 

The fire was at a dormitory near the institute.

CNN has not been able to confirm the cause of the fire.

There is “no question” that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has impacted gas prices in the US, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Thursday after a new consumer price index report showed consumer prices spiked more than 7.9% over the last 12 months.

“There’s also no question that when a foreign dictator invades a foreign country, and when that foreign dictator is the head of a country that is the third largest supplier of oil in the world, that that is going to have an impact, and it is,” Psaki told reporters at a White House briefing.

Psaki added, “We’ve seen the price of gas go up at least 75 cents since President Putin lined up troops on the border of Ukraine.”

The President released a statement earlier on Thursday suggesting Putin’s war in Ukraine was responsible for the soaring inflation — he called it “Putin’s price hike” — and said a large contributor to inflation this month was an increase in gas and energy prices. 

The White House is relying on the assessments of the Federal Reserve and of outside economic analysts, Psaki said, adding, “The expectations and their assessment at this point continues to be that it will moderate by the end of the year.”

A Ukrainian woman and her three children — aged six, 12 and 14 — crossed into the United States on Thursday after being turned away at the US-Mexico border a day earlier, according to the family’s attorney.

On Thursday, Vice President Kamala Harris committed to taking in more Ukrainian refugees on an overseas trip, but just hours earlier, the Ukrainian family had been barred from claiming asylum in the US, according to their attorney and advocates on the ground.

The Ukrainian woman and her children tried to claim asylum at the San Ysidro port of entry in southern California, but US Customs and Border Protection officials denied them entry, citing a Trump-era border policy that remains in effect, according to Blaine Bookey, who spoke with the officials and is representing the family. 

The family arrived in Tijuana, Mexico, which sits across from San Diego, on Monday after fleeing Ukraine in late February, Bookey said. 

Some background: More than 2 million people have fled war-torn Ukraine within the last few weeks, with most going to Poland. Most Ukrainian refugees are headed to other parts of Europe, but refugee advocates have also urged the Biden administration to expedite the refugee resettlement process — which can be long and cumbersome — for Ukrainians. The US previously resettled thousands of Ukrainian refugees, but it’s unclear how many will ultimately come to the United States as refugees as a result of the current conflict.

Read the full report here.

Russian forces have moved forward, in the vicinity of Hostomel Airport, by about 5 kilometers (or about 3 miles) in the last day, a senior US defense official told reporters Thursday.

Russian forces continue to “advance their troops” along two parallel lines outside of Kyiv, and in those lines, the closest line has “reached about 40 kilometers east of Kyiv,” the official said.

“We see Russian forces continue to advance their troops, they’re really along two sort of parallel lines there, and we assess that the northern most of those two lines, the closest line has reached about 40 kilometers east of Kyiv,” the official said. 

Out of those two lines, “the one that’s to the south of the two which kind of emanated out of Sumy, we also assess that some of [the Russian forces] might have reached approximately 40 kilometers from Kyiv,” the official said.

On the southern line, the official believes Russian forces “might be repositioning themselves back towards Sumy,” but it is not clear how many forces, how fast they are moving back, or why they are doing that, the official said.

The town of Chernihiv is “now isolated,” the official said.

The official also said Thursday that Russian forces have conducted “775 missile launches” of “all stripes, all different varieties” since the beginning of their invasion in Ukraine.

The US has seen “reports of internet outages particularly around Mariupol and Kherson,” over the last 24 hours, the official added.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he has commissioned the government to create a special state program dedicated to the reconstruction of every Ukrainian city impacted by the Russian invasion.

“After the war, after our victory, we will rebuild everything that was destroyed. Very quickly and with a very high quality,” Zelensky said in a statement Thursday. “A special state program for reconstruction will be created for each affected city. I have already instructed the government to start the elaboration.”

Zelensky continued by personally promising that the program will be widespread and of quality.

“The best architects, the best companies, the best projects. For every city! I want to say this on the example of Kharkiv. Our Kharkiv, which is now experiencing the worst suffering since World War II … Freedom Square will be such that everyone, all of us, all Europeans will be there!” he said.

“Poltava Way, Belgorod Highway, Myronosytska Street, Regional Children’s Hospital, Kharkiv Oncology Center, Karazin University, Labor Palace, Korolenko Library … We will rebuild everything! I promise you personally,” Zelensky added.

Moscow will unilaterally open evacuation routes for civilians in Ukraine that lead towards Russia at 10 a.m. local time daily (2 a.m. ET), said Colonel-General Mikhail Mizintsev of the Russian Defense Ministry on Thursday.

“We guarantee full security in the territories controlled by the Russian Armed Forces,” Mizintsev said.

It is unclear if there is an end time to these open routes.

He denied reports about Russia not observing promised ceasefire, calling the allegations a “vile lie.”

As NATO and Western powers continue to economically isolate Russia via sanctions, companies are taking note of their ties to the country and are halting or modifying business

as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Here are just some of the companies who recently announced they are pulling back from Russia:

Burger King pulled corporate support from its businesses in Russia. Restaurant Brands International, which owns the burger chain, said Thursday it “has suspended all of its corporate support for the Russian market, including operations, marketing and supply chain.” The company is also stopping investment and expansion in the region. 

Goldman Sachs announced the company was “winding down its business” in Russia Thursday, becoming the first major Wall Street bank to announce plans to do so after the invasion of Ukraine.

JPMorgan Chase, the largest bank in the US, said Thursday it is “actively unwinding Russian business and have not been pursuing any new business in Russia.” The bank said its current activities in Russia are “limited” and include helping global clients address and close out pre-existing obligations, helping clients manage Russia-related risks, acting as a custodian to clients and taking care of employees.

A full list of the companies and industries pulling back from Russia can be found here.

US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield said Thursday that actions committed by Russia against the Ukrainian people are “war crimes.”

“They constitute war crimes; they are attacks on civilians that cannot be justified by any – in any way whatsoever,” Linda Thomas-Greenfiel said in an interview with BBC Newshour.

State Department spokesperson Ned Price stopped short of declaring Russia’s actions against Ukrainian civilians “war crimes” during a briefing Thursday, instead reiterating that the United States is “supportive of efforts to document and to investigate reports of potential war crimes in Ukraine.”

“The fact is that we’ve seen very credible reports of deliberate attacks on civilians, which would, under the Geneva Conventions, constitute a war crime,” he said at a State Department briefing Thursday, citing attacks on the hospital in Mariupol and strikes on schools, hospitals, buses, cars, and ambulances.

“We are appalled by the brutal tactics that the Russian Federation, the Kremlin, has employed in prosecuting this war of choice,” Price said.

Thomas-Greenfield said the question of whether Russia is guilty of war crimes is the one “we’re being asked every day, and we’re working with others in the international community to document the crimes that Russia is committing against the Ukrainian people.” 

In the BBC interview, Thomas-Greenfield said she couldn’t predict how the war crimes would be prosecuted, but “what is important is that we collect the evidence and have the evidence ready and available to be used.”

The ambassador also indicated that the US is supportive of the International Criminal Court (ICC) probe of Russia’s actions in Ukraine, despite the US not being a member of the ICC and criticizing other ICC investigations.

“We’ve always been supportive of the Criminal Court taking actions when actions are required,” she said.

What other US officials are saying: Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Sunday that the US is looking into “credible reports of deliberate attacks on civilians, which would constitute a war crime,” but had not declared that the US had made the assessment that Moscow was guilty of war crimes. 

“What we’re doing right now is documenting all of this, putting it all together, looking at it, and making sure that as people and the appropriate organizations and institutions investigate whether war crimes have been or are being committed, that we can support whatever they’re doing,” Blinken said on CNN’s State of the Union. “So right now we’re looking at these reports. They’re very credible. And we’re documenting everything.”

Meanwhile, US Vice President Kamala Harris stopped short of calling Russia’s actions in Ukraine “war crimes” as civilians continue to be killed in the conflict

Speaking alongside Polish President Andrzej Duda in Warsaw Thursday, Harris said: “We are also very clear that any intentional attack on innocent civilians is a violation.”

She added: “The UN has set up a process by which there will be a review and investigations and we will of course participate as appropriate and necessary.”

Images from Ukraine clearly showed atrocities taking place, Harris said, even before an investigation determines what to call them.

Food supply in the city of Mariupol is “decreasing day by day,” according to a statement from the Mariupol city council on Thursday.

The statement called the situation in the city “critical” and said with blocked entrances to the city, there is no way to deliver food and water.

The maternity and children’s hospital that was bombed Wednesday — a strike that left three dead and 17 injured — is located in Mariupol.

The attack came despite Russia agreeing to a 12-hour pause in hostilities to allow refugees to evacuate a number of towns and cities.

The city council posted a video of the devastated hospital in the city and accused Russian forces of dropping several bombs on it from the air.

“The destruction is enormous,” said the council. “The building of the medical facility where the children were treated recently is completely destroyed.”

A top Russian official said on Thursday that China refused to support Russia with aircraft parts as Russia looks to source components following tough aviation sanctions.

Valery Kudinov, head of the Aircraft Airworthiness Department at the Federal Air Transport Agency, said on Thursday that there were around 70 aircraft in the Russian register before the end of February, Russian state news agency TASS reported.

Kudinov said the situation with maintenance of aircraft and imports of spare parts is planned to be resolved, including through the re-export of components, TASS reported. 

Quoted in TASS, Kudinov said: “As far as I know … China refused,” adding that the search would continue through other countries, possibly through Turkey or India. “Each company will negotiate on its own,” Kudinov added.

The world’s two biggest plane manufacturers, Boeing and Airbus, have both halted supply of aircraft components to Russian airlines.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Thursday said that he rejects a fast-track procedure for Ukraine’s membership in the European Union. 

“It is very important that we continue to pursue the things that we have indeed decided in the past,” Scholz told reporters on Thursday ahead of an EU summit in Versailles, France. 

Scholz referred to the association agreement that the EU and Ukraine concluded in 2017 that aims to deepen political and economic ties. “This is the course we have to follow,” Scholz said.  

The German leader insinuated that with 27 EU membership states, it is already difficult to reach unanimous decisions in the EU on issues such as foreign, economic and financial policy. He said that the EU must continue to develop in perspective “when it comes to bringing about decisions, making majority decisions possible.” 

Speaking in Versailles ahead of the summit, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte also rebuffed Ukraine’s call for a fast-track EU membership. 

“There’s no such thing as a fast-tracking of accession, such a thing doesn’t exist,” he said. 

Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Russia’s President Vladimir Putin is not against direct talks with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky. Cavusoglu has said as much to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, while speaking at a Thursday press conference in Antalya, following the trilateral meeting of the foreign ministers of Ukraine, Russia and Turkey. 

“It’s been said that Zelensky is ready for this kind of meeting, and Putin is not against it in principle. Putin also mentioned this idea to President Erdoğan,” Cavusoglu said at the press conference.

Cavusoglu also said the face-to-face meeting between Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov — facilitated and held in Turkey earlier Thursday, and which resulted in no breakthroughs — was at least a start. 

“No one should expect miracles with one meeting, but a ministerial level meeting is an important start”, the Turkish foreign minister said.

Poland’s Ambassador to the United States, Marek Magierowski, told CNN Thursday that sanctions on Russia should “last for a decade, maybe 15 years” following Moscow’s invasion and assault on Ukraine.  

“I think that if we wanted to retaliate for that invasion against Ukraine with punitive measures and by crippling the Russian economy, we have to be determined and ready to uphold the sanctions in a longer term. Maybe they should last for a decade, maybe 15 years, because I’m afraid we are going to live with Mr. Putin for many years to come,” Magierowski told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour in an interview.    

Magierowski said that Russian forces have committed “acts of barbarism in Ukraine” that he said were “war crimes, atrocities.” 

“I do believe and I am confident that Mr. Putin and his cronies and all his closest aides will end up in the dock, in the Hague, in the International Criminal Court, because this is what he has already fully deserved,” he said.    

When pressed on Poland not sending MiG-29 fighter jets to Ukraine, Magierowski told Amanpour that it was not a feasible strategy for the Polish government.  

“We could not, and we cannot deplete the arsenal of our aircraft by one-third without any back up and compensation,” he said.  

The Pentagon said Wednesday that it is bluntly opposed to a Polish plan to provide fighter jets to Ukraine. Poland’s initial proposal, which officials verbalized Tuesday, was to deploy all its MiG-29 fighter jets to help Ukraine in its fight against Russia — but by first sending the jets to US Ramstein Air Base in Germany, also a NATO nation.

“We decided to put the aircraft at the disposal of the US government and transfer them. We announced our willingness and our readiness to transfer these aircraft to the NATO air base in Germany,” Magierowski said. “The proposal has been rejected by our American partners who have come to the conclusion that it could be too escalatory and too risky, and actually this is what we were saying at the beginning of the debate about the Soviet made fighter jets at our disposal.”  

US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said Wednesday the intelligence community came to the conclusion that “the transfer of MiG-29’s to Ukraine may be mistaken as escalatory and could result in significant Russian reaction that might increase the prospects of a military escalation with NATO.”

Magierowski admitted to Amanpour that it’s “very hard to foresee a situation in which Russia would start making serious concessions,” in any diplomatic talks, but said that he did not believe that Putin’s forces were currently succeeding on the ground in Ukraine.  

“I don’t know whether we will find a diplomatic solution, but maybe a military solution… I believe the Ukrainian army is capable of defeating the Russian army right now,” he said.  

A Russian armored military train has appeared on a rail line in Ukraine’s Kherson region on a separate and unconnected line about 100 miles away from where an armored military train was spotted heading toward Melitopol.

CNN has geolocated and verified the authenticity of the videos.

In the videos, which have been published on social media in the last 24 hours, the hallmark gun cars and armored train engines are seen moving west into central Kherson.

At least one bulldozer is seen on the videos sitting on a flatbed train car.

One resident within Kherson confirmed they had personally seen the train on Thursday in Kherson. CNN is not naming the residents over concerns for their safety.​

The resident told CNN that they observed a number of military vehicles on the train. ​

On Tuesday, CNN reported that a Russian armored military train, carrying at least one military vehicle, was seen heading north on another train track in southeastern Ukraine near Novooleksiivka, Ukraine. Both armored military trains — the one in Novooleksiivka and in Kherson — came from Crimea​, based on eyewitness footage CNN verified from social media.

Russia​’s apparent ability to utilize and move the armored trains freely around ​parts of southern Ukraine speaks to their uncontested control of the area south​ of the Dnieper River in the broader Kherson region. It could also​ indicate that they are solidifying their resupply lines from bases in Russian-annexed Crimea, and deeper in Russia, for their military operations in southern Ukraine.

In northern Ukraine, Russian military advances have been repeatedly hampered by Ukrainian military forces taking out a number of supply and logistics convoys.

What Russia is saying: TV Zvedza, the press service for the Russian Ministry of Defense, claimed on Tuesday that an armored train in Ukraine ​was transporting ​non-Russian foreign nationals out of​ the country and into Russian-annexed Crimea. Russian state media outlet Russia-1 claimed in a report on Wednesday evening that the foreign nationals were transported​ from the Kherson region to Armyansk, Crimea.

Armyansk ​has direct rail links to Kherson, but in territory controlled by the Russians, and that line does not intersect with the sole line that goes to Novooleksiivka. 

CNN’s Mariya Knight contributed reporting to this post.

Former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma, who led the country from 1994-2005, published an appeal to the Ukrainian people Thursday.

The appeal was published on the Facebook page of Kuchma’s press secretary Darka Olifer.

Here is the full (translated) text of the statement:

My dear Ukrainians! 
We are of different ages and gender, we are of different blood and faith, but all of us today have one name – Ukrainians.
And I am proud to share this name with you.
In my entire life, I have never felt so much pride, pain and anger as I have during these days.
Although sometimes it seems that both our land and our hearts have been burning in fire not for 15 days but for eternity.
Russians have been bombing Kharkiv and Chernihiv, Sumy and Kyiv, Zhytomyr and Mykolayiv for eternity.
Ukrainian children and women in labor have been killed on Putin’s orders for eternity.
The brutal siege of Mariupol has been going on for an eternity.
For eternity, the residents of Irpen, Bucha, and Vorzel have been hiding in basements from Russian Nazi shelling.
For all eternity, the whole world has seen the superhuman courage of our soldiers, the dedication of our volunteers, the resilience and unity of civilians.
Invincibility and willingness to sacrifice always live in our hearts. It’s just like a volcanic eruption: it’s hard to wake up, but it’s impossible to contain. No one ever can stop our people when they rise for freedom of their homeland.
Here’s to our future. For our freedom.
I’m staying at home, in Ukraine, because all of us are on our native land, there’s no other. And to defend it we will all be together until the victory itself. No division on party columns, no personal interests and old faces. United around the Flag, Army, President.
Ukraine is not Russia. And it will never become Russia. Can’t wait.
We are already winning. And it’s not going to stop.
And to the address of the Russian Federation I will only say that I am joining the words of my compatriots who in one voice say: You be damned!            
Glory to Ukraine!
Glory to Ukrainians!

Ukraine’s energy minister Herman Halushenko said the country is doing “everything possible” to restore the electricity supply to the Chernobyl nuclear power station “as soon as possible.”

Halushenko’s comments came Thursday via a statement posted to the Ukrainian energy ministry website. The Energy Minister stressed that electricity is needed to maintain the cooling mechanisms at the storage facility for used nuclear fuel.

The minister explained that there are several power lines for the plant, with the last one “destroyed as a result of the occupant’s shelling” on Wednesday. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said it had been informed by Ukraine that Chernobyl had lost power, but that it saw “no critical impact” on the plant’s safety.  

“For the sake of [the] safety of Ukraine or Europe, and for the whole world, the [Russian] military has to leave the nuclear facilities,” Halushenko said.  

Halushenko went on to suggest that the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and IAEA missions should be placed at the nuclear facilities.

“Nuclear terrorism is not only when the nuclear stations are being targeted. It is when the staff is under great pressure, and a single mistake can have extensive repercussions,” Halushenko warned.

The minister thanked the staff at the Chernobyl and Zhaporizhzhia power stations for their “truly heroic” work under “physical and phycological pressure from the occupants.”

Oksana remembers how she knew the Russian attacks had started in Ukraine. It was about four in the morning when she heard a massive blast. Her adrenaline spiked. She shook her husband awake and said: “Kolya, there is a war!”

Suddenly the household was frantic. They started to seal the windows to keep the glass from shattering inwards, but Oksana knew that wasn’t enough. They had to get down to the basement. It was by no means a bomb shelter. It was never built for that. But it would have to do. There was no time to go anywhere else.

It wasn’t just Oksana and Kolya. She also cares for orphans and foster children in Brovary, just outside the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, for SOS Children’s Villages.

“A child started to scream,” Oksana told CNN. “I was trying to calm him: ‘look at me, breathe, we’re gonna seal the windows, everything is under control. Now we need you to stop the panic and help us,’” she said she told him.

War forces a grim choice: Tatyana, another Ukrainian woman involved with SOS Children’s Villages, managed to escape the war with her six foster children, without them hearing the bombing. But she had to make an awful decision. Stay in Ukraine with her family or leave and save her foster kids.

“I have a daughter and mother in Ukraine, I am worrying so much, but these children should be saved,” Tatyana said from the SOS Children’s Village in Bilgoraj, Poland, which lies close to the Ukrainian border and is taking in evacuees.

“My daughter is an adult already, I asked her if she wants to come to Poland as well, but she doesn’t want to,” she said, adding that her daughter wanted to stay to fight against the Russians.

Tatyana decided to foster children because she had always wanted a big family. Now that family has been forced apart.

One girl who has been mothered by Tatyana since she was just one year old was with her as we were talking. Now 13, she seems calm and has a sweet smile for strangers before opening up about her feelings.

“I’m anxious, scared,” she said. “I’m worrying for my relatives, for all Ukrainians.”

Read the full story here.

At least 549 civilians have been killed in Ukraine since Russia’s invasion began on Feb. 24, according to the latest figures from the United Nations Human Rights Office (OHCHR). 

The figures, compiled up to Wednesday and published Thursday, said 957 others have been injured so far, but the UN agency believes the real numbers are “considerably higher,” particularly in government-controlled areas.   

“The receipt of information from some locations where intense hostilities have been going on has been delayed and many reports are still pending corroboration,” the statement read. 

“This concerns, for example, the towns of Volnovakha, Mariupol, Izium where there are allegations of hundreds of civilian casualties. These figures are being further corroborated and are not included in the above statistics,” the statement read.

As Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan continues his attempts to position himself as the broker between Russian President Vladimir Putin and the West, he spoke by phone with US President Joe Biden.

They discussed “their shared concern about Russia’s unprovoked and unjustified invasion of Ukraine,” according to a statement from the White House. 

“They reaffirmed their strong support for the government and people of Ukraine, underscored the need for an immediate cessation of Russian aggression, and welcomed the coordinated international response to the crisis. President Biden expressed appreciation for Turkey’s efforts to support a diplomatic resolution to the conflict, as well as Turkey’s recent engagements with regional leaders that help promote peace and stability,” the statement read. 

The two also discussed “opportunities to strengthen bilateral ties,” it added.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki described the call as “constructive” and “lengthy,” saying they spoke for roughly an hour. She declined to say whether they discussed access to the Black Sea.

The United States and Canada “stand in solidarity” in outrage toward Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, Vice President Kamala Harris said in a meeting Thursday with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Harris and Trudeau were both in Warsaw, Poland, for talks about the ongoing war and met Thursday evening after a full day of events and meetings.

Harris described her mission as reaffirming the NATO alliance and the US commitment to Ukraine, as well as to the people of Poland, who are welcoming refugees by the millions.

She also said she would discuss security and humanitarian assistance with Trudeau, who has been visiting Europe this week.

Trudeau described the Biden administration as “strong” on the issue of the Ukraine war, which he deemed “unthinkable.” He also said Russian President Vladimir Putin underestimated the Ukrainian people.

Harris and Trudeau didn’t respond to questions. The meeting was Harris’ last of the day.

On Friday, the vice president will greet US and Polish troops in Warsaw before traveling onward to the Romanian capital of Bucharest.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Thursday echoed fears from US officials this week in predicting that Russia may use chemical weapons in Ukraine, saying that it’s “straight out of their playbook”.  

“The stuff that you’re hearing about chemical weapons, this is straight out of their playbook,” Johnson said in an interview with British broadcaster Sky News. 

“They start saying that there are chemical weapons that have been stored by their opponents or by the Americans. And so when they themselves deploy chemical weapons – as I fear they may – they have a sort of a maskirovka [Russian military deception] of a fake story ready to go,” he added.  

Johnson continued: “I just note that that is what they’re already doing. It is a cynical, barbaric government, I’m afraid.”

Foreign Secretary Liz Truss this morning also told CNN that the UK is “very concerned” about the potential of Russia using chemical weapons in Ukraine, saying “we’ve seen Russia use these weapons before in fields of conflict.”

Noting Russia’s “track record,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki on Wednesday warned that Russia could use chemical weapons in Ukraine or manufacture a “false flag” operation that uses them. 

French President Emmanuel Macron said Thursday that the conditions set by Russian President Vladimir Putin for a ceasefire in Ukraine are “not acceptable to anyone,” without specifying what Putin’s conditions were.

“I do not see a diplomatic solution in the coming hours or even coming days,” Macron told reporters in Versailles ahead of a summit of European Union leaders that will center on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, solutions to rising energy prices and less dependence on Russian gas and oil. 

Macron said he does not see ceasefire in Ukraine as “realistic” in the coming hours. 

“I’m definitely optimistic but I have to be realistic as well,” he added. 

Earlier on Thursday: Putin held a telephone conversation with Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. 

Speaking of Ukraine’s request for a fast-track accession to the EU, Macron told reporters: “With a country at war? I don’t think so … Must we close the door and say ‘never’? That would be unjust.” 

The French president said the war in Ukraine is a “tragedy … a human, political and humanitarian tragedy” but added that it’ll “lead to completely redefining the architecture of Europe.” 

“These are discussions that are strategic and historic. They will lead to, today, in the coming weeks and months, historic decisions for our Europe,” Macron said. 

The French leader said that he was “troubled” by seeing images from the deadly bomb attack on a maternity hospital in Mariupol in southern Ukraine on Wednesday. 

He said since the beginning of Russia’s war in Ukraine, “humanitarian tragedies of this kind were made at multiple occasions.” 

“The weapons, profoundly lethal, without discernment, were being used right in the middle of cities,” Macron continued.  

A no-fly zone over Ukraine would not protect against many of the weapons Russian forces are using in Ukraine right now, said Defense Intelligence Agency Director Lt. Gen. Scott Berrier.

Russian forces are using “a combination of mostly missiles, artillery, multiple rocket launchers. There are some precision guided munitions that are being dropped from aircraft, but that number is small,” Berrier said in an exchange with Sen. Angus King.

A no-fly zone would not protect against “inhibit missiles, rockets and artillery,” Berrier added.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has repeatedly asked NATO allies and the United States to establish a no-fly zone over Ukraine. The airspace over Ukraine remains contested, a senior US defense official told reporters on Wednesday.

The European Central Bank (ECB) predicts the war in Ukraine will push levels of consumer inflation up even further in the near term.

“The Russia-Ukraine war will have a material impact on economic activity and inflation through higher energy and commodity prices, the disruption of international commerce and weaker confidence,” ECB President Christine Lagarde said in a speech on Thursday. 

Lagarde said the impact of the conflict could push inflation in the euro area – which hit 5.8% in February – “considerably higher in the near term,” but is still expected to decline progressively to the central bank’s 2% target in 2024.

Financial sanctions against Russia, which include the banning of some Russian banks from the SWIFT payment network, have not yet caused problems for European banks, she said.

“[Sanctions] have so far not caused severe strains in money markets or liquidity shortages in the euro area banking system,” Lagarde said. “Bank balance sheets remain healthy overall, owing to robust capital positions and fewer non-performing loans.”

US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines would not say if the US has new intelligence that informed the decision not to send US fighter jets to Poland, so that Poland could send MiG-29 fighter jets to Ukraine, during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Thursday.

When Sen. Tom Cotton, a Republican from Arkansas, asked Haines if the intelligence community had new information that said Russian President Vladimir Putin would see Poland sending MiG-29 fighter jets to Ukraine as escalatory, Haines said there was a “new assessment” done by the intel community that informed that decision. But she would not clarify if there was new intelligence leading them to believe Putin would see the move as escalatory.

“This is a recent assessment that was done by the intelligence community. I’m very happy to provide that to you,” Haines said. “I know you know this, but obviously they’re looking at a body of intelligence, and then they are also providing their own knowledge and experience, and I do not know whether there is…”

Haines was cut off by Cotton, who said he believes there is no new intelligence on the matter.

Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said Wednesday the move would be seen as an escalatory step by Putin, according to the intelligence community.

Chinese President Xi Jinping is “unsettled” by the Russian invasion of Ukraine in part because “his own intelligence doesn’t appear to have told him what was going to happen,” CIA Director Bill Burns told the US Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday.

Chinese leadership is also concerned because of “the reputational damage that China suffers by association with the ugliness of Russia’s aggression in Ukraine” and “the economic consequences at a time when growth rates in China are lower than they’ve been in 30 years,” according to Burns.

Finally, he said, “President Xi is probably a little bit unsettled as he watches the way in which President Putin has driven Americans and Europeans more closely together and strengthen the Transatlantic alliance in ways that would have been a little bit hard to imagine before the invasion began.” 

More background: US officials have closely watched China’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as fears have grown that the two autocratic nations are moving closer together on the world stage. Just weeks before the beginning of the invasion, Putin and Xi met at the opening ceremony of the Olympics in Beijing and the two nations issued a joint statement affirming a partnership “without limits.

A Western intelligence report indicated that Chinese officials around the same time requested that senior Russian officials wait until after the Beijing Olympics had finished before beginning military action in Ukraine, CNN has previously reported — but the particulars of the report were open to interpretation, according to a source familiar with the intelligence, and it is not clear whether Putin addressed the matter with Xi directly.

European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Thursday that Russian President Vladimir Putin “believed he was going to conquer Ukraine” but “he failed.” 

“He believed he was going to divide us; he failed. He believed that he was going to weaken the transatlantic relationship and he failed. Now he has to stop,” he added while speaking to reporters while entering a summit of EU leaders in France’s Versailles.  

Borrell said after European countries reduce dependency on Russian energy exports, “we will be much safer. Have to spend less gas, use less gas, the climate requires that. For once, geopolitics and climate go together.”  

European Commission head Ursula von der Leyen told reporters that this was “a defining moment for Europe and it is a moment when we see that Putin’s war is a question of the resilience of democracies.” 

At the summit in Versailles, “we will rethink European defense with strong capabilities. We will rethink energy. We have to get rid of the dependence of Russian fossil fuels and for that we need massive investment in renewables,” she added.  

The United States and its allies are considering additional sanctions to punish Russia for “atrocities” committed in Ukraine even as existing sanctions deal a powerful blow to the Russian economy, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Thursday.

“The Russian economy will be devastated as a consequence of what we’ve already done, but we…continue to consider further steps we can take,” Yellen said during a Washington Post Live event.

Yellen did not detail specifics on what additional sanctions could be imposed, though she did note that Russia has not halted its invasion of Ukraine.

“We continue to work very closely with our allies to consider sanctions,” Yellen said. “At this point, we are not seeing Russia back off the horrific war they started, an unprovoked invasion of the Ukrainian homeland. In fact, the atrocities they are committing against civilians seem to be intensifying. So, it’s certainly appropriate for us to be working with our allies to consider further sanctions.”

The Treasury secretary spelled out the economic and financial damage caused by Western sanctions imposed in recent weeks.

“We have isolated Russia financially. The ruble has been in a free fall. The Russian stock market is closed. Russia has been effectively shut out of the international financial system,” Yellen said, adding that the Russian central bank’s access to its reserves has been largely cut off. 

Yellen conceded there is “certain” to be an economic effect on the United States and Europe from the sanctions, though she said officials have worked to minimize this. 

“It’s already pushed up global oil prices. We’re seeing that ourselves in prices at the pump,” Yellen said.

Asked if European allies will move to ban Russian oil and gas, Yellen reiterated that US officials recognize “not all countries are in the same position” to cut off shipments of Russian energy. 

“We have very little dependence on Russian oil,” Yellen said.

The governor of Ukraine’s Mykolaiv region, Vitaliy Kim, announced his plans to provide a hotline for what he called Russian soldiers “stranded” on the frontline in Ukraine’s south. 

In a video released on Kim’s Telegram channel on Thursday, the governor addressed the Russian troops, offering “a chance” for those who don’t want to fight. 

“What is the Russians’ problem? They don’t want to attack. They think they’ve been misled, they’ve been told these are military exercises, almost every one of them says that. But they can’t go back either, because they say those in Kherson will shoot at them when they retreat. So they are stranded in those villages, nor here nor there,” Kim said.

There have been no independently verifiable reports of desertion by Russian troops.

Based on the conversations between the locals and Russian troops “at the border between Mykolaiv and Kherson regions,” Kim announced his plan to create an option for Russian soldiers to avoid confrontation. 

“I’d like to arrange some kind of ‘green corridor’ for the Russians, those who haven’t fired at the civilians or committed any crimes yet. For those who’d like to live, I’ll organize a hotline to call in, to come and stay alive, and avoid jail when you get back to Russia. I’m arranging this, and I’m hopeful this will work,” he added.

Kim was unclear about what options or safety guarantees might be provided for those who call the hotline. He added the “green corridor” option won’t apply to artillery fighters and or rocket launching personnel, saying “after Mariupol, those guys have no chance: either run or lie in soil.”

US Senate Republicans and Democrats blasted the administration for not acting immediately to help in the transfer of aircraft to Ukraine, a sign of daylight emerging between Congress and the White House on Ukraine after weeks of unity on Capitol Hill. 

Members on both sides of the aisle during a Foreign Relations Committee hearing this morning challenged the administration about why the US isn’t helping facilitate planes to Ukraine that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said are desperately needed. They warned that Congress may take further action on banning Russian energy imports that go beyond what was passed by the House of Representatives and is backed by President Joe Biden’s administration. 

“It’s not clear why we are standing in the way,” Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat from New Hampshire, told CNN about the US’s position that it would not be appropriate to send Poland planes so that Poland could transfer their planes to Ukraine. 

Over the last several days, members have come to believe that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Secretary of State Antony Blinken share differing views on how to handle a potential transfer of aircraft to Poland that would facilitate Poland to transfer planes directly to Ukraine, a difference that has enraged some members on Capitol Hill who have come to see the administration itself as fracturing.

Sen. Jim Risch, the top Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee, told CNN it was an “embarrassing” division. 

“The first branch of government is almost unanimous on this. I don’t know who is against this up here, but it’s embarrassing for the second branch of government to be divided. This is a job for the President of the United States. He needs to step up. Knock heads together and get everybody in the same place,” Risch said. “We really need to do that. This is a matter of life and death.” 

Risch said the Pentagon’s explanation that a plane transfer could be perceived as escalatory by the Russians is “nonsense.”

“We’re taking their yachts, we’re taking their vacation properties, we are giving the Ukrainians all the arms we can give them. It is foolish to say this is somehow going to aggravate them more. That’s nonsense,” he said. 

GOP Sen. Rob Portman, who has been outspoken on this issue, told CNN that he believed that it was not the Biden administration’s place to be making decisions for Ukraine on what their military strategy should be and if they wanted planes, and the US needed to do everything in its power to help them. 

“The administration just told us they think Ukraine needs other things more and would be more effective in the battlefield. In theory, that means that you have the United States government deciding what the military strategy should be for Ukraine,” Portman said. “Ukraine wants planes. They have made a decision.”

Some Democrats, however, argue that Congress should give the administration more room to make the decisions for how they want to approach this conflict without “micromanaging.”

“I generally trust the administration’s decision making,” Sen. Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, told CNN. “I think this is a time when we should get behind the administration rather than constantly second-guessing.”

The humanitarian situation in Mariupol is becoming “increasingly dire and desperate,” the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Thursday.

The ICRC warned that “hundreds of thousands of people have no food, water, heat, electricity, or medical care,” and said that “people urgently need respite from violence and humanitarian aid.”

“All the shops and pharmacies were looted four to five days ago. Some people still have food but I’m not sure for how long it will last,” said Sasha Volkov, the ICRC’s deputy head of sub-delegation, in an interview recorded Wednesday and published on the ICRC website. 

“Many people in Mariupol have reported having no food for children,” Volkov said.

“People started to attack each other for food. People started to ruin someone’s car to take the gasoline out,” Volkov continued. 

Medicine is also starting to run out, “especially for diabetes and cancer patients,” Volkov said, adding that there is no way to find it in the city. Hospitals are partially functioning because the city council delivers fuel, Volkov added.

US President Joe Biden reacted to news Thursday that consumer prices have soared over 7.9% over the last 12 months, suggesting the new consumer price index report reflected the pinch Americans are feeling due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. 

Biden cast blame on Russian President Vladimir Putin and his country’s invasion for the rising prices, but said the costs the US has imposed on Russia in response are “far more devastating” than the costs Americans are facing at home. 

“Today’s inflation report is a reminder that Americans’ budgets are being stretched by price increases and families are starting to feel the impacts of Putin’s price hike. A large contributor to inflation this month was an increase in gas and energy prices as markets reacted to Putin’s aggressive actions,” Biden said in a statement. 

He continued: “As I have said from the start, there will be costs at home as we impose crippling sanctions in response to Putin’s unprovoked war, but Americans can know this: the costs we are imposing on Putin and his cronies are far more devastating than the costs we are facing.” 

He pointed to efforts to bring prices down, including a release from the strategic petroleum reserve, and other actions the administration is taking to strengthen supply chains and promote competition.  

What Putin is saying: The Russian president has claimed Western nations that have taken “unfriendly steps” toward Moscow are trying to blame Russia for their own mistakes and are deceiving their own populations. Sanctions that have been imposed against Russia are illegitimate and would have happened regardless, he said. 

“They point to the sanctions that they impose against us as the reason for the deterioration of their situation. It is very strange, despite the fact that we fulfill all our obligations,” Putin told a meeting of his government ministers in Moscow. 

Russia is fulfilling its obligations on energy exports, he said, and blamed inflation on bans on Russian oil.

“Their prices are rising, but it is not our fault. This is the result of their miscalculations. Nothing to blame on us. They are trying at all costs to reach an agreement with countries against which they themselves have imposed illegitimate restrictions. The same will happen in relations with our country, I have no doubt about that,” he said.

Putin added that with Russia and its partners, “those who do not recognize these illegal actions,” together will “certainly find solutions to all the problems that they are trying to create for us.”

Putin acknowledged that sanctions will bite, but Russia has weathered such problems in the past. “The markets will gradually re-direct themselves and will understand that there are no such problems that we could not solve.” 

He also warned that food prices will rise if international economic pressure on Russia continues because it is a major global supplier of fertilizer.

International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva said the war in Ukraine comes “at a delicate time for Africa,” which is particularly vulnerable to economic aftershocks.

“Africa is particularly vulnerable to impacts from the Ukraine war through four main channels—increased food prices, higher fuel prices, lower tourism revenues, and potentially more difficulty accessing international capital markets,” Georgieva said in a statement published on Thursday.

Georgieva urged the international community and African policymakers to come together to address policy responses.

“Redoubling efforts to advance reforms that further promote resilience is a priority for many countries. At this difficult moment, the Fund stands ready to help African countries address the repercussions of the war, and to help design and implement reforms through our policy advice, capacity development, and lending. Recent reforms to the Fund’s lending toolkit provide greater flexibility to help meet financing needs,” she said.

More background: Russia and Ukraine are key players in the global agricultural trade, with both nations accounting for a quarter of the world’s wheat exports, including at least 14% of corn exports in 2020, and a joint 58% of global sunflower oil exports in the same year, analyses show.

Trade between African countries and the former Soviet neighbors, especially Russia, has flourished in recent years with Russian exports to the continent valued at $14 billion annually, and imports from Africa pegged at around $5 billion per year.

But parts of Africa could be plunged into hunger in as fast as three months if Russia’s invasion of Ukraine lingers, said Wandile Sihlobo, the chief economist of the Agricultural Business Chamber of South Africa.

Read more on the situation here:

A worker scans and picks items for click and collect orders inside a supermarket in Johannesburg, South Africa, on Friday, February 18, 2022.

Related article Higher food prices and slumping trade. How the war in Ukraine could hit Africa

CNN’s Nimi Princewill contributed reporting to this post.

A total of 343,515 Ukrainian citizens have entered Romania since the onset of the Russian invasion through Wednesday, of which 258,844 have since proceeded onward to other countries, according to Romanian officials. More than 84,000 Ukrainians currently remain in Romania.

Many of the Ukrainian refugees who remain are in the capital of Bucharest, which has shelters open for others arriving. The city is planning to open its largest indoor public space, Romexpo, to accommodate the influx, the government announced. It can hold up to 2,000 refugees. 

Romania is also trying to expand more permanent housing options for Ukrainians, according to Dr. Raed Arafat, Romania’s minister of internal affairs. The government is also organizing large aid shipments to go to Ukraine. 

At the main Bucharest train station, throngs of refugees have been arriving daily. Ukrainians are now getting specific colored cards to direct them either to airports or other borders or elsewhere, to make the process quicker and more streamlined.   

Romanian Border Police have released the latest daily tally on those entering Romania, saying that 69,662 people entered through multiple border points on March 9, of which 23,546 were Ukrainian citizens, which was a decrease of the previous day’s numbers.

Ukraine said that 44 evacuation buses carrying about 2,000 people have left the eastern city of Izium on Thursday.

The evacuees will go to the central city of Dnipro, according to presidential adviser Kirill Timoshenko.

Timoshenko said that humanitarian aid was delivered for those still in Izium, which has suffered extensive damage. 

The city’s hospital was damaged by shelling on Tuesday and much of the city is without power and water.

Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko in Moscow on Friday, the Belarusian state news agency Belta reports.

Lukashenko and Putin will discuss topical issues of bilateral relations, the development of cooperation of the Union State of Russia and Belarus, economic cooperation under sanctions pressure, as well as the situation in the region and Ukraine, according to Belta.

Belarus is an ally of Russia and is being used as a launch point for Russian troops into Ukraine.

The United Kingdom is “very concerned” about the potential of Russia using chemical weapons in Ukraine, British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss told CNN on Thursday.  

Truss said it would be a “grave mistake on the part of Russia, adding to the grave mistakes that have already been made by Putin.”

Her comments come after the White House warned Wednesday that Russia could use chemical weapons in Ukraine or manufacture a “false flag” operation that uses them. 

“We’ve seen Russia use these weapons before in fields of conflict,” Truss continued, echoing White House press secretary Jen Psaki Wednesday, who noted Russia’s “track record” and slammed false claims from Russia that the US is developing chemical weapons in Ukraine.

Meanwhile, the UK “absolutely believe[s] there are war crimes being committed” by Russia in Ukraine, Truss said shortly after US Vice President Kamala Harris stopped short of calling the actions “war crimes” during a press conference in Poland Thursday. 

Asked if it would be helpful if the US went further with their language, Truss replied, “we are working with our allies, including the United States, on this issue.”

US Vice President Kamala Harris visited with a group of Ukrainian refugees during her trip to Warsaw, Poland, for a discussion about their experiences, saying Thursday that their conversation would help inform how the US can best support those leaving Ukraine.

“The conversation we will have this afternoon will help inform me, the President of the United States and the American people about what you have experienced so that we can best support you and your families,” Harris said.

She continued, “You’ve been through so much. And the people at this table represent over a million people who must be seen, their story must be known, so that we as a community of people around the world can support you.” 

Harris met with seven people who have fled Russian aggression from Ukraine, including a Ukrainian advocate for persons with disabilities, a Moroccan university student, a professional film producer from Odessa, a Senegalese community leader and teacher, a LGBTQIA+ rights activist from Kyiv, and a Ukrainian energy expert and her young adult daughter, according to a White House official.

She thanked the group for “your willingness, your courage and your time.”

“We are here to support you, and you are not alone … We around the world are watching,” she said.

The United Nations estimates that at least two million people have fled Ukraine since the beginning of the Russian invasion on Feb. 24.

The White House is calling the group “displaced persons” instead of “refugees” because some may still desire to return to Ukraine.

Democratic and Republican aides are skeptical the Senate can quickly move this week on the House-passed bill that banned oil, gas and coal imports from Russia.

They say the bill will likely need to undergo some changes before it can pass the Senate and the bill is on the backburner to the must-pass government funding bill. 

While most lawmakers agree that Congress should take further action to ban energy imports from Russia as it wages war against Ukraine, the nuances of how to structure such a proposal and differences among members about how much to stymie Russian involvement in the World Trade Organization is likely to bog down any fast-track. Members of the Finance Committee, including Chair Ron Wyden, have made clear they want to see the House version strengthened back to the original version that was agreed to with Republicans. 

Amending the House bill back to its previous form is likely take time and could come with additional pushback from the White House that would need to be overcome. 

It’s always possible Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer could ask for unanimous consent to fast track this, but sources say there would likely be objections from both Republicans and Democrats on the current version of the bill. 

 The Bank for International Settlements — which effectively serves as the central bank of central banks — has suspended Russia’s central bank following the invasion of Ukraine.

“The Bank for International Settlements is following international sanctions against the Central Bank of Russia, as applicable, and will not be an avenue for sanctions to be circumvented,” a BIS spokesperson told CNN on Thursday in a statement. “The access of the Central Bank of Russia to all BIS services, meetings and other BIS activities, has been suspended.”

The suspension comes after Western powers, led by the United States and European Union, imposed punishing sanctions on Russia and its central bank. 

Founded in 1930, the BIS is owned by 63 central banks, including the US Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank. The BIS says on its website its mission is to support central bank monetary policy and financial stability through international cooperation and to “act as a bank for central banks.”

Goldman Sachs is exiting Russia, becoming the first major Wall Street bank to announce plans to do so after the invasion of Ukraine.

“Goldman Sachs is winding down its business in Russia in compliance with regulatory and licensing requirements,” a Goldman Sachs spokesperson told CNN on Thursday. 

The decision by Wall Street’s most influential firm to get out of Russia deals another financial blow to Moscow. News of Goldman’s exit from Russia was previously reported by Bloomberg News.

“We are focused on supporting our clients across the globe in managing or closing out pre-existing obligations in the market and ensuring the wellbeing of our people,” the Goldman Sachs spokesperson said. 

It’s not immediately clear how many people Goldman Sachs employs in Russia nor how much money the firm makes there. 

Citigroup confirmed on Wednesday that it is continuing its previously announced efforts to exit its consumer business in Russia. Citi said it is operating that consumer business “on a more limited basis given current circumstances and obligations.”

Citi said it is supporting corporate clients in Russia, including many American and European multinational corporations, as they suspend or unwind their business there.

Following economic sanctions by the West, the Russian government has set a list of goods and equipment previously imported into Russia from abroad that are prohibited from being transferred out of the country until the end of the year, the press service of the Cabinet of Ministers announced on Thursday.

According to the official statement published on the government’s website, the list includes over 200 items, including “technological, telecommunications, medical equipment, vehicles, agricultural machinery, electrical equipment” as well as “railway cars and locomotives, containers, turbines, metal and stone processing machines, monitors, projectors, consoles and panels.” 

“The export of these goods is temporarily limited to all foreign countries, with the exception of the states of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), Abkhazia, and South Ossetia,” the statement said.

This decision comes after a decree signed by President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday.

It follows a mass exodus from Russia by Western companies.

In addition, the Russian government temporarily restricted the export of certain types of timber from Russia in states that have committed unfriendly actions, according to the issued list.

The restrictions will remain in effect until the end of 2022. “This measure is necessary to ensure stability in the Russian market,” the message read.

Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said the government in Kyiv was open to creative thinking about the future security status of the country.

Speaking after talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Turkey on Thursday, Kuleba said: “It’s written in our constitution to eventually join NATO as a full member and enjoy security guarantees. But we understand this is not going to happen in the blink of an eye or the foreseeable future.”

He added that Ukraine is aware NATO is not ready to act collectively to stop the war and to protect civilians in Ukraine from Russian attacks

Kuleba added: “If we could reach an agreement where a similar system of guarantees as envisaged by the North Atlantic Charter could be granted to Ukraine by the permanent members of UN Security Council, including Russia,” as well as by Ukraine’s neighbors, “this is something we are ready to discuss. Ukraine exists in a security vacuum and we have to think creatively on how to address this issue.”

Kuleba’s meeting with Lavrov on Thursday ended without an agreement between the two sides on evacuation corridors out of besieged areas, nor on a ceasefire in Ukraine.

After the meeting, Kuleba said Russia was not prepared to negotiate on his top goals of arranging an evacuation route away from the city of Mariupol, which has endured deadly airstrikes this week.

According to Kuleba, a “broad narrative Lavrov conveyed today was they [Russia] will continue their aggression until we surrender.” He said he hopes Lavrov will follow up on the humanitarian issues in Ukraine by “reaching out to his colleagues in charge who can make decisions.”

Estonia will not be issuing tourist visas for Russian citizens looking to enter the country for the duration of the Ukrainian invasion, the Estonian Minister of Foreign Affairs Eva-Maria Liimets said Thursday in Tallinn. 

“Estonia is no longer issuing new C and D category (tourist) visas to Russian citizens. The ban will last for as long as Russian continues waging war against Ukraine,” she said. “We are actively working to ensure that our deterrence measures in this region are stronger than they have been so far, because the situation in Europe and in security has changed dramatically and will probably never return to Feb. 23.”

Exceptions will be made for people with family in Estonia and for humanitarian or medical reasons, she added. 

There has been a higher number of Russian citizens than usual entering Estonia since the invasion. According to the Estonian Foreign Ministry and Border Guard, more than 12,000 Russian citizens have crossed the land border with Estonia in the past two weeks, which is 2,200 people more than the average over that period before the Russian invasion of Ukraine two weeks ago. 

These images show the extent of the damage to homes and stores across the southeastern Ukrainian city of Mariupol.

The UK has moved its visa application system for Ukrainian refugees online after receiving criticism for reported delays at application centers.

British Home Secretary Priti Patel told lawmakers in the House of Commons Thursday that Ukrainians with passports no longer need to go to a visa processing center before traveling to the UK, from next week. 

The UK system drew criticism after some refugees managed to reach the French port city of Calais before being told to travel to appointments in Paris or Brussels as part of the administrative procedures. 

“Ukrainians with passports will be able to get permission to come here fully online from wherever they are and will be able to give their biometrics once in Britain,” Patel said. 

Security checks on Ukrainians entering the UK will also continue, Patel said. She added that has received “assurances” which enabled the changes, saying that previous Russian poisonings of dissents in Britain, had made clear, “what Putin is willing to do on our soil.”  

The home secretary added that she had two key objectives when dealing with this issue: “first to keep the British people safe, second to do all we can to help Ukrainians.”

In a video message Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said his government was “securing humanitarian corridors again for our cities.”

“Buses have already left, cargo vehicles are en route carrying food, water and medications,” Zelensky said.

He mentioned corridors for the port city of Mariupol, the besieged city of Volnovaha in the east and the northeastern cities of Izyum and Sumy.

It’s unclear whether these corridors have allowed safe passage for civilians and aid on Thursday. As of 3:30 p.m. local time (8:30 a.m. ET), there was no sign that a relief column had reached Mariupol, which saw further bombing Thursday morning.

Zelensky claimed that Russia wants “to humiliate our people so they take bread and water on their knees from the occupants, so they can save lives only by going to the occupied territories or Russia. “

“That’s why they are blocking Mariupol, Valnovaha, and other cities,” he said.

A ceasefire to the hostilities in Ukraine was never going to be agreed on Thursday during trilateral talks between Russia, Ukraine and Turkey, according to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. 

Speaking in a news conference in Antalya after the talks, Lavrov said he had warned his Turkish and Ukrainian counterparts that Russia did not want to create a “parallel track” to talks already taking place alongside the Belarusian border. 

“It is there that all practical issues are discussed, it is there that it was explained in the most detailed way what needs to be done in order to end this crisis. This includes demilitarization and denazification and ensuring the neutral status of Ukraine,” Lavrov said, echoing rhetoric that Russian President Vladimir Putin has invoked to justify his invasion of Ukraine.

During the last round of Belarus talks, Russia presented Belarus with a draft legal document detailing “extremely specific considerations” with the Ukrainian side assuring that they would give answers, he said.  

Russia wants to “have a serious conversation on the Belarusian site,” Lavrov said, stressing the country’s belief that the issue “should be resolved in the context of a comprehensive settlement of the Ukrainian crisis.”

The foreign minister added that he “wasn’t surprised” that Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said it wasn’t possible to reach a ceasefire during Thursdays talks. 

“No one was going to agree on a ceasefire [at this meeting], these proposals and the sequence of steps outlined in these proposals are well known to the Ukrainian side,” the Russian foreign minister continued. 

The parties “mainly talked about humanitarian issues at the initiative of our Turkish friends,” Lavrov added.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has warned Russian propagandists they “will be held responsible for complicity with war crimes” in a video message Thursday.

“Russian citizens will hate you for consistently lying to them for many years. When they will feel the consequences of your lies, feel with their wallets, their dwindling opportunities, with the stolen futures of the Russian children. The war is never isolated. It always harms the victim but also the aggressor. Only the aggressor understands that later. But always understands and always suffers,” he said.

It comes after Ukrainian Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova on Wednesday called for a “new model” of investigative efforts to tackle alleged war crimes in Ukraine.  

The prosecutor general said her office also “took action against those who incited war and provoked further atrocities in Ukrainian territory.”  

A warning was reportedly issued to a number of people she called Russian “propagandists,” including several Russian celebrities who Venediktova described as Putin supporters. 

The World Health Organization said Thursday it had recorded 24 verified incidents of attacks on health care in Ukraine since the start of the Russian invasion on Feb. 24.

“These attacks have led to at least 12 deaths and 17 injuries. At least 8 of the injured and 2 of the killed were verified to be health workers. The attacks took place between 24 February and 8 March,” the WHO said in an email to CNN. 

A deadly bombing of a maternity and children’s hospital in Mariupol, which Ukrainian officials said killed three people, has been widely condemned.

The European Union’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell condemned Russia’s bombing of Mariupol hospital as a war crime.

“Mariupol is under siege. Russia’s shelling of maternity hospital is a heinous war crime,” Borrell said Thursday on his verified Twitter account.

Read more about the attacks across Ukraine health facilities here:

A woman walks outside a maternity hospital that was damaged by shelling in Mariupol, Ukraine, Wednesday, March 9, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)

Related article Russia condemned over repeated strikes on Ukraine hospitals

US Vice President Kamala Harris stopped short of calling Russia’s actions in Ukraine “war crimes” as civilians continue to be killed in the conflict

Speaking alongside Polish President Andrzej Duda in Warsaw Thursday, Harris said: “We are also very clear that any intentional attack on innocent civilians is a violation.”

She added: “The UN has set up a process by which there will be a review and investigations and we will of course participate as appropriate and necessary.”

Images from Ukraine clearly showed atrocities taking place, Harris said, even before an investigation determines what to call them.

Duda went further, saying war crimes are “obvious” in Ukraine and that refugees coming to his country have evidence of it on their phones.

Vatican Secretary of State Pietro Parolin has expressed dismay at the Russian bombing of a maternity and children’s hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, Vatican News reported Thursday.

Parolin said that the bombing of medical centers for women and children is unacceptable, Vatican News reported.

He reiterated the Vatican’s desire to mediate peace talks between Ukraine and Russia, if requested.

Parolin admitted that the space for negotiations is slight, but expressed hope some agreement could be reached.

Polish President Andrzej Duda has called a Russian strike on a Ukrainian maternity and children’s hospital an “act of barbarity and genocide” and called for further sanctions against Moscow.

Speaking in Warsaw following a bilateral meeting with US Vice President Kamala Harris, Duda thanked the US for imposing sanctions on Russia, calling it a “vanguard” while also urging for more help for Ukraine from the international community.

“We need to take a tough stance as representatives of the free world,” he said, adding that “we have to rescue Ukraine,” and calling for an “all hands onboard” approach. 

Regarding the US rejection of a Polish plan to send Soviet-era fighter jets to Ukraine by way of a US-NATO air base in Germany, he said Poland had been ready to supply the fighter jets to Ukraine but wanted it to be a common decision made by NATO. “We want Poland to remain a credible member of NATO,” he said. 

More than 1.5 million Ukrainian refugees have entered Poland, Duda said, adding that he was “proud” of how ordinary Polish families have received them in their “private homes.” None of the refugees are being housed in camps, he said.

US Vice President Kamala Harris sought to reinforce cooperative ties between the United States and Poland after an apparent disconnect between the two countries over providing Ukraine with fighter jets.

“I want to be very clear. The United States and Poland are united in what we have done and are prepared to help Ukraine and the people of Ukraine — full stop,” Harris said alongside Polish President Andrzej Duda during a joint press conference.

Still, Harris skirted directly addressing the episode that unfolded earlier this week, when Poland said it would hand over its jets to the US instead of giving them directly to Ukraine.

Harris underscored the military support the United States is already providing Ukraine short of air power, including antitank missiles.

“We’re making deliveries every day in terms of what we can do,” Harris said.

Asked what more Ukraine could expect, Harris said, “that is an ongoing process and that is not going to stop to the extent there is a need.”

US Vice President Kamala Harris said she traveled to Poland, one of NATO’s easternmost allies, to show the United States’ commitment to the region’s security.

“What is at stake, this very moment, are some of the guiding principles around the NATO alliance. And in particular, the issue of the importance of defending sovereignty and territorial integrity and in this case of Ukraine,” Harris said at a news conference.

“The United States is prepared to defend every inch of NATO territory. The United States takes seriously that an attack against one is an attack against all,” Harris said.

Speaking alongside Polish President Andrzej Duda, Harris said her presence in Warsaw was a signal of American commitment to the military alliance.

“I am here in Poland as an expression of the enduring and important relationship, that, again, has been longstanding, but in particular on the issue of Ukraine is unified and is clear: we will do everything together in partnership, in solidarity to support what is necessary at this very moment in terms of the humanitarian and security needs of Ukraine and the Ukrainian people,” she said.

She said the US was fulfilling requests to provide Poland with Patriot missiles.

“What compels us also is the moral outrage that all civilized nations feel when we look at what is happening: innocent men, women, children, grandmothers, grandfathers who are fleeing everything,” Harris said.

Harris added that “atrocities of unimaginable proportions” were underway in Ukraine.

She also said that the US is committed to helping Poland deal with a massive flow of people coming from Ukraine, adding that the US is also willing to take in more migrants.

Harris said “we recognize the burden that it places on the government of Poland on the president and the infrastructure of this country.”

Harris also said she explained the American position to the Polish president during their talks.

The Kyiv regional administration says there are several dangerous routes beyond the capital because of heavy fighting, including the main highway westward to Zhytomyr and the town of Makariv, which is on that route.

It also said that areas to the north remained among the most dangerous, including the suburbs of Bucha, Irpin and Hostomel, as well as the district of Vyshorod further north from the capital.

The administration highlighted fresh fighting in settlements around Brovary, which is across the Dnieper River, east from the capital.

“Evacuation through humanitarian corridors from Bucha, Irpin, Hostomel and Borodianka is planned today,” the administration said, after limited success in evacuating civilians from those areas Wednesday.

Separately, Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Ukrainian television that “the key goal of the Russians is to capture Kyiv.”

“Their task from the first day of war is to surround Kyiv, to encircle it and then continue to attack, overthrow the government,” he said.

“Their plans are not being realized, thanks to our guys who are now in Bucha, Vorzel, Irpin, Hostomel, where fierce fighting is taking place. Our guys are thwarting all plans to surround Kyiv,” Klitschko said.

He also discussed refugees leaving the capital.

“Every second Kyiv resident has left the city, there are just a bit less than two million residents now in Kyiv,” he said, adding, “now Kyiv has become a fortress, every street and every building.”

The Ukrainian military claims to have defeated a regiment of Russian troops and eliminated its commander, Col. A. Zakharov, in Brovary, which is northeast of Kyiv, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense said on Thursday. 

“The commander of the occupier’s regiment, Colonel Zakharov, was liquidated. During the battle in the Brovary district of Kyiv region, the battalion tactical group (BTGr) of the 6th tank regiment (Chebarkul) of the 90th tank division of the Central Command suffered significant losses of personnel and equipment,” the ministry said on Twitter.

CNN has geolocated and verified the video shared by the defense ministry showing a Russian military column coming under attack and retreating. 

The Ukrainian Armed Forces shared videos of the aftermath, which showed a number of destroyed vehicles.

Russian forces are approaching Kyiv from the northeast and east in an effort to complete the encirclement of the capital, but Ukrainian anti-tank weapons have held them off so far. 

The leaders of Germany and France demanded an “immediate ceasefire” in Ukraine during a three-way phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday, according to an Elysée Palace readout.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron also “insisted that any solution to the crisis must be negotiated between Russia and Ukraine,” said the Elysée.

The three leaders said they would remain in close contact with each other over the next few days. European Union leaders are meeting Thursday outside Paris to discuss the war in Ukraine.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday the economic situation in Russia is “absolutely unprecedented” and blamed the West for waging an “economic war” against the country.

Peskov attributed high inflation rates to “a shocking external influence” on Russia’s economy.

A raft of sanctions have been levied against Russia by the UK, the US and the European Union, among other countries, since the invasion of Ukraine.

“There are negative consequences, they will be minimized. At the moment the situation is turbulent,” he said.

Peskov added that “measures to calm down this situation are already being implemented,” but that Russia needs “to act in order to minimize the consequences and further risks.”

Refugees fleeing Ukraine are starting to reach western Europe and more than 7,000 people have arrived in France since the Russian invasion began, French Citizenship Minister Marlene Schiappa told journalists Thursday.

Of the total 7,251 people, who are “mostly women and children,” 6,967 are Ukrainian nationals, France’s Interior Ministry told CNN.

“We can see that things are increasing as the conflict progresses and today we have 25,000 places of refuge for these people,” said Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin, speaking alongside Schiappa, adding that France has seen 3,000 arrivals in two days.

Darmanin added that he will visit Poland with the German Interior Minister before traveling to Romania on Friday. 

The ministers’ comments come a day after France launched an inter-ministerial crisis unit to prepare for and manage the arrival of Ukrainian refugees in France.

Local authorities in the besieged Ukrainian city of  Mariupol say Russian forces have started dropping bombs on the “green corridor” designated to evacuate Mariupol residents.

“Right now, the air bombardment of Mariupol is underway,” said Petro Andryushchenko, adviser to the mayor of Mariupol.

Andryushchenko claimed that the airstrikes were being carried out in order to destroy road infrastructure and completely isolate the city.

There is no word from the Russian side on the Ukrainian claim.

Late Wednesday, the Russian Defense Ministry claimed that its forces had advanced in several districts around Mariupol.

Two weeks into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov falsely claimed Thursday that the country “did not attack” its neighbor.

He also said there are no plans for Russia to attack other countries and reiterated that a “situation in Ukraine” posed a “direct threat to the Russian Federation”

Lavrov, who met with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba on Thursday, said the West is behaving dangerously. That includes the European Union, who “have violated their principles and values” while delivering weapons to Ukraine, according to Lavrov.

The meeting between Kuleba and Lavrov ended without an agreement reached on evacuation corridors or a ceasefire in Ukraine.

Some context: Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine began in the early hours of February 24 and its attacks have continued unabated since then. Russia has, repeatedly and without any basis, asserted that it was not the aggressor in the conflict, which it launched after amassing up to 150,000 troops on the border with Ukraine in what it claimed were military exercises but were in fact preparations for war.

A meeting between Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and Russia Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Turkey has ended without an agreement reached on evacuation corridors or a ceasefire.

Kuleba said he raised the prospect of establishing an evacuation route to allow civilians to flee from the besieged city of Mariupol, but “unfortunately Minister Lavrov was not in a position to commit himself to it.”

In a press conference following the short meeting, Kuleba said a 24-hour ceasefire was also raised in order “to resolve the most pressing humanitarian issues,” but he said they “did not make progress” on the issue “since it seems there are other decision makers for this matter in Russia.”

Kuleba said they did agree to continue efforts to “seek a solution to the humanitarian issues on the ground,” and added that he is ready to meet again “in this format if there are prospects for substantial discussion and seeking solutions.”

More than 95,000 refugees have arrived in Germany from Ukraine since the beginning of the Russian invasion two weeks ago, according to Germany’s interior ministry.

The ministry says it has registered 95,913 refugees from Ukraine, but the actual number of incoming refugees could be significantly higher, an interior spokesperson told CNN Thursday.

German Federal Police are now carrying out ”intensified checks” at the border between Germany and Poland, where most Ukrainian refugees are coming from.

Germany’s capital Berlin has become a major hub for refugees from Ukraine, city mayor Franziska Giffey said Wednesday night.

Over the past three days more than 13,000 refugees arrived in Berlin by train or bus, said Giffey, adding that others fled from Ukraine by car.

Most refugees from Ukraine intend to stay in Berlin, but the city has asked other German federal states for help.

More than two million people have fled Ukraine since the Russian invasion began, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.

These are some of the neighboring countries where Ukrainian refugees have fled:

French European Affairs Minister Clement Beaune said that Ukraine, among other Eastern European countries, will “probably” join the European Union “in a few years.”

“It is my deep conviction that there will be a European Union which will be in a few years, I don’t know when, in a few years, probably extended to Ukraine, to Moldova, to Georgia, perhaps to other countries,” Beaune told French broadcaster France Inter, speaking ahead of a meeting of EU leaders today and Friday in Versailles, outside Paris.

The admission of Ukraine to the EU though “is not for tomorrow,” he added.

Beaune joined a chorus of global condemnation of a Russian “massacre” on a Ukrainian maternity hospital, adding that strikes against civilians were intensifying.

The minister also reiterated the need to move away from Russian gas as “fast as possible,” adding that “Russia counts on the fact that we have need of her.”

“By buying Russian gas, we are financing the war of Vladimir Putin,” he said.

Beaune also called for joint European military defense complementary to the NATO military alliance.

He said that this would require investment, and the possibility of funding these efforts through joint European debt would be discussed at the Versailles summit.

Ukrainian athletes and officials called for an end to the war in their country as they observed a minute’s silence at the Beijing Paralympics on Thursday.

Led by Ukrainian Paralympic Committee president Valerii Sushkevych, the entire delegation held up a “Peace For All” banner in the Zhangjiakou Athletes Village, accompanied by raised fists.

“It’s not only one-minute solidarity. Today one minute was about thousands of people, including children and people with disabilities,” said Sushkevych.

“Today all civilized mankind looks in solidarity at this terrible war in our country, but I want to ask you (about your) role. If mankind is civilized, (it) must not overlook, (it) must stop the war in my country.

“(There) must be an understanding that children, people, women must live, not die. Today many, many people died. Stop war. If you are civilized, you must stop war.”

Ukraine’s team captain Grigorii Vovchyynski called for a no-fly zone over the country.

“It (war) must be stopped now. It’s not life for Ukraine, it’s not life for our children, no future for all the world. Everyone (who) saw it, you must do something. Please close the sky above Ukraine.”

Head coach Andriy Nesterenko added that seven members of the team were from Kharkiv, a city which in under ongoing attack by Russian forces.

Nesterenko said some of them will not “have the possibility to come back,” adding: “Their flats, their private houses are already destroyed.”

“We kindly ask the people all over the world, we need your support immediately. We need your support today, not later.”

Ukrainian athletes have so far claimed six gold medals at the Games and sit third in the table behind China and Canada.

The UK government has sanctioned Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, freezing his assets, including English Premier League soccer club Chelsea.

In a statement Thursday, the UK government said Abramovich has had “his assets frozen, a prohibition on transactions with UK individuals and businesses, a travel ban and transport sanctions imposed.”

Abramovich, who has owned Chelsea since 2003, announced last week that he was selling the club, but the sanctions now cast doubt on the sale and the immediate future of the Premier League side.

“To ensure the club can continue to compete and operate we are issuing a special licence that will allow fixtures to be fulfilled, staff to be paid and existing ticket holders to attend matches while, crucially, depriving Abramovich of benefiting from his ownership of the club,” UK Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries said in a tweet.

She added that the government’s priority is to “hold those who have enabled the Putin regime to account.”

According to the UK government, Chelsea can continue to “fulfil its fixtures and carry out football business,” but certain actions will not be permitted, such as selling tickets for games beyond those already sold to fans.

Abramovich and Putin ally Igor Sechin are among seven oligarchs and politicians to be added to the UK’s sanctions list.

The sanctions are estimated to be worth close to $20 billion (£15 billion), the UK government said.

Last month, UK lawmaker Chris Bryant called for Abramovich to lose ownership of Chelsea after seeing a leaked 2019 UK government document identifying Abramovich as an individual of interest due to his “links to the Russian state and his public association with corrupt activity and practices.”

In its statement, the UK government said Abramovich, who is worth around $12 billion (more than £9 billion), is “one of the few oligarchs from the 1990s to maintain prominence under Putin.”

Seven further oligarchs and politicians are being added to its sanctions list, including:

Three people died after they were injured in a Russian bomb attack on a maternity hospital in southern Ukraine, Mariupol city council said Thursday

“As of today, we know that after the terrorist bombing by Russian aircraft of the children’s hospital in Mariupol there are 17 victims — children, women, doctors — and three died, among them one child, a girl,” the council said.

The full extent of the casualties is unclear but preliminary reports said at least 17 people were injured in the bombing.

French government spokesperson Gabriel Attal has denounced a Russian strike against a maternity and children’s hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, as “inhumane” and “unjustifiable.”

“I want to say in the name of the French government that the strike by Russia against Mariupol’s pediatric hospital was inhumane and cowardly. It’s women, children, health care workers who were targeted, it’s unjustifiable,” he said in an interview with French radio station RTL.

Calling again for a ceasefire in Ukraine, Attal predicted the worst is yet to come in the Russian invasion.

The Ukrainian government said it is opening humanitarian corridors in several parts of the country Thursday.

As of 10 a.m. local time it was not clear whether the corridors — designed to allow civilians to escape to safer regions — had been agreed with Russia or international humanitarian agencies.

Iryna Vereshchuk, Ukrainian minister of Reintegration of Temporarily Occupied Territories, said on Facebook the corridors would apply to three routes in eastern Ukraine — Sumy to Poltava, Trostianets to Poltava and Krasnopilllia to Poltava.

Another corridor is set to be opened from the eastern city of Izium to the city of Lozova in Kharkiv region. Additionally, she said, the Ukrainians planned to open corridors from the besieged city of Mariupol to Zaporizhzia 

Vereshchuk added that a corridor would be opened from districts north of the capital, Kyiv: Bucha, Borodianka, Irpin and Hostomel. Attempts to evacuate people from those districts Wednesday were only partially successful.

Three evacuation corridors are planned to be opened in Ukraine’s northeastern Sumy region on Thursday, the head of the regional administration Dmytro Zhyvytsky said on his official Telegram channel. 

“Green corridors” allow civilians to escape to safer regions of the country as Russian forces bombard Ukrainian cities.

The proposed evacuation routes were tentatively set to start at 9 a.m. local time (2 a.m. ET) Thursday, he said, with civilians heading to Poltava, about 160 kilometers (100 miles) away in central Ukraine.

Efforts to evacuate civilians from Sumy have been stepped up after at least 21 people were killed Tuesday in a Russian airstrike on the city.

Some context: Nearly 35,000 people were rescued via humanitarian corridors in Ukraine on Wednesday, according to President Volodymyr Zelensky. Ukrainian authorities were preparing six humanitarian corridors to get people out of areas under attack by Russian forces, he added.

But local authorities in areas close to Kyiv said efforts to evacuate people to safety Wednesday failed. The city council of Bucha said 50 buses were blocked by the Russian military in nearby Stoyanka.

A loud and growing chorus is calling for an international effort to investigate potential war crimes committed by Russian forces in Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called the Russian bombing of a maternity and children’s hospital in the southern city of Mariupol Wednesday a “war crime” and “proof of a genocide of Ukrainians.”

“We never did and we would have never done nothing like this anything close to this war crime in any cities of Donetsk or Luhansk region, or any region,” he said, referring to two separatist-held territories of eastern Ukraine.

The UN said it would follow up “urgently” and that health care facilities, hospitals and health workers should not “ever, ever be a target.”

On Wednesday, Ukrainian Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova called for a “new model” of investigative efforts to tackle alleged war crimes in the country, saying a special tribunal should be created for the “unprecedented” crisis. She said 39 countries have joined Ukraine’s appeal to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) against Russia. 

Russia’s attack of a nuclear power plant, suspected use of cluster bombs and so-called vacuum bombs in dense areas, and targeting of hospitals, schools and civilian areas have also been described as war crimes.

Last week, the International Criminal Court (ICC) said it would immediately proceed with an active investigation of possible war crimes following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The UN is also establishing a Commission of Inquiry to investigate possible human rights violations by Russia.

What is a war crime? The ICC has specific definitions for genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime of aggression. Targeting civilian populations, violating the Geneva Conventions, targeting specific groups of people and more could be potential Russian war crimes. “One thing is certain, that intentionally directing shelling or targeting civilians or civilian objects is a crime within the jurisdiction of the court,” the ICC’s chief prosecutor, Karim Khan, told CNN last week.

What is the ICC? Located in The Hague, Netherlands, and created by a treaty called the Rome Statute first brought before the UN, the ICC operates independently. Some 123 countries are parties to the treaty, but there are very large and notable exceptions, including Russia and the United States. And, for that matter, Ukraine.

Read more about war crimes:

Russian President Vladimir Putin attends his New Year address to Russians in central Moscow on December 31, 2017. (Photo by Alexey NIKOLSKY / AFP) (Photo by ALEXEY NIKOLSKY/AFP via Getty Images)

Related article Analysis: Everything you need to know about war crimes and how Putin could be prosecuted

Two weeks after Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine, Russia’s “precision strikes” have become much less precise and its ground forces arelaboring to seize territory.

On the eve of the offensive, some US officials predicted Kyiv would fall within 48 to 72 hours of hostilities beginning. Yet the blue-and-yellow flag of Ukraine still hangs from its buildings.

If, as Putin asserted, Ukraine was not a real country, it would surely have collapsed by now. But even with 150,000 Russian troops inside its borders, according to US assessments, they control at most about 10% of Ukraine.

On the ground: Serious defenses and countless checkpoints have popped up around Kyiv. Ukrainian forces — to the surprise of many observers — have been nimble and effective against Russian armor that has struggled to make progress.

Small, mobile units that know the territory have cut down Russian convoys. The anti-tank weapons acquired mainly from the US and UK have left smoking hulks on roads across the country. Turkish-made attack drones have been deployed to precise effect.

In the few areas occupied by Russian forces — even those that are predominantly Russian-speaking — crowds of hundreds have hurled abuse at bewildered Russian soldiers. They have built mountains of tires to defend their towns and painted over street signs.

Not that the Ukrainians have the upper hand: They can’t defeat a vastly superior Russian force, but the evidence so far suggests that — fortified by weapons and other help flowing across the border from Poland — they may yet deny Putin victory.

Read the full analysis:

A member of the Ukrainian Territorial Defence Forces walks past destroyed Russian military vehicles in a forest outside Ukraine's second-biggest city of Kharkiv on March 7, 2022.

Related article Analysis: Two weeks of war have revealed cracks in Putin's master plan for Ukraine

In public statements and at international summits, Chinese officials have attempted to stake out a seemingly neutral position on the war in Ukraine, neither condemning Russian actions nor ruling out the possibility Beijing could act as a mediator in a push for peace.

But while its international messaging has kept many guessing as to Beijing’s true intentions, much of its domestic media coverage of Russia’s invasion tells a wholly different story.

There, an alternate reality is playing out for China’s 1.4 billion people, one in which the invasion is nothing more than a “special military operation,” according to its national broadcaster CCTV; the United States may be funding a biological weapons program in Ukraine, and Russian President Vladimir Putin is a victim standing up for a beleaguered Russia.

To tell that story, major state-run news media outlets — which dominate China’s highly censored media space — have been largely echoing Russian state media stories or information from Russian officials.

A CNN analysis reviewed nearly 5,000 social media posts from 14 Chinese state media outlets during the first eight days of Russia’s invasion posted onto China’s Twitter-like platform, Weibo. The analysis found that of the more than 300 most-shared posts about the events in Ukraine almost half were what CNN classified as distinctly pro-Russian, often containing information attributed to a Russian official or picked up directly from Russia’s state media.

Read the full story:

FILE PHOTO: Russia's President Vladimir Putin and China's Xi Jinping walk down the stairs as they arrive for a BRICS summit in Brasilia, Brazil November 14, 2019. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino/File Photo

Related article China's promotion of Russian disinformation indicates where its loyalties lie

Disturbing photos show bodies being lowered into a mass grave in the besieged city of Mariupol, southern Ukraine on Wednesday. 

The images from the Associated Press show men, some dressed in overalls or blue protective suits, placing bodies into a trench. In some photos, the corpses are in body bags, but others are wrapped only in what appear to be blankets.

The city has been under attack for days, bombarded and isolated by Russian forces.

At least 1,300 civilians have been killed in Mariupol since the Russian invasion began, an adviser to the city’s mayor said Wednesday.

Residents have been cut off from water and electricity and on Tuesday Ukraine’s Foreign Minister accused Russia of committing war crimes by holding 300,000 civilians “hostage.

“Really, we can’t calculate how many deaths we have — I mean three to four times more. We are not even able to count how many people on the streets have been killed by bombing and artillery,” Mariupol’s deputy mayor, Sergei Orlov told CNN.
“We do not know how many, because we cannot collect all the bodies and we cannot count.”

To deal with the sheer number of bodies, city workers dug a deep trench over 75 feet (22 meters) long inside a graveyard and laid to rest the bodies of soldiers and civilians who had been killed during repeated attacks by Russian forces. 

Evgeniy Maloletka, a photojournalist with the AP who captured the scene, said some of the bodies are “brought wrapped in carpets or plastic bags.” “Forty came Tuesday, another 30 so far Wednesday,” he added.

Pressure is growing on the Biden administration and its European allies to justify whether they are doing enough to stop the atrocities that are being inflicted on the Ukrainian people as horrific new images emerged Wednesday from the alleged Russian bombing of a maternity and children’s hospital in Mariupol.

The photographs of pregnant women emerging from the bomb-ravaged hospital in blood-stained clothing were the kinds of images certain to stir the consciences of people around the world watching their own leaders try to respond to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s widening campaign, which is increasingly resulting in civilian casualties.

What the democratic nations of the world are willing to do in the face of mounting Ukrainian casualties and millions of refugees fleeing the country is the most unnerving question now facing the US and its allies.

Read the full analysis:

Ukrainian emergency employees and volunteers carry an injured pregnant woman from a maternity hospital that was damaged by shelling in Mariupol, Ukraine, Wednesday, March 9, 2022.

Related article Analysis: Ukrainian hospital bombing increases heat on US and allies to do more to stop Russia

Ukrainian air defenses are largely denying the Russian military access to Ukrainian airspace, a US official said Wednesday, but cautioned Russia’s superior combat power still has the capability to overwhelm the country’s defenses.

Russia’s air force is largely avoiding Ukrainian airspace because of an array of anti-aircraft systems that have denied Russia air superiority, according to the US official.

Russia is flying 150-200 sorties per day, but they’re virtually all over Russian territory, the official said. Russian pilots have not ventured far into Ukrainian airspace because of the effective use of surface-to-air missiles, including portable Stingers provided by the US and larger systems.

Although some Russian aircraft have entered Ukrainian airspace quickly for an attack, they don’t loiter or provide significant cover for Russian ground forces. 

Ukrainian air defenses have denied Russia the freedom to maneuver in the skies, underscoring what Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said earlier Wednesday about the “limited” effectiveness of Russian air operations

Air defense is from anti-aircraft systems: In addition, Ukraine has operational jets, but they are not flying a significant number of combat missions, the official said. The air defense is coming primarily from their anti-aircraft systems, which is why it’s more effective to provide Ukraine with the weapons that have proven most problematic for the Russians: anti-armor missiles and anti-aircraft missiles. 

Russian losses: Russia has lost approximately 20-25 helicopters and 15-20 other aircraft, the official said, while also losing hundreds of vehicles, including tanks and armored equipment. CNN previously reported that Russia has lost 8-10% of its military assets in the invasion.

Some context: The official’s comments come after the Pentagon said it did not support the transfer of Polish MiG-29 fighter jets to Ukraine through the US. Kirby said Wednesday the proposal would offer little benefit to the Ukrainian military, which already has operational aircraft, but entails a high risk of escalation with Russia.

Ukrainians effectively fighting back: Despite the massive Russian advantage in combat power, they have not been able to bring that force to bear at a decisive place and time, the official said. Ukraine has fought back very effectively, using small teams composed of light infantry to attack large Russian convoys which generally travel by road.

The Ukrainians are fighting on their home turf, giving them an advantage in knowing the terrain and allowing them to use the local population as their eyes and ears. The US also has anecdotal evidence of dissension in the Russian ranks.

Russia has potentially suffered 6,000 troops killed in action since its invasion of Ukraine began, according to a US official, who cautioned that an accurate estimate of combat casualties is incredibly difficult to make — especially as the fighting unfolds in real time.

The official said the number of Russian troops killed could be in the 5,000 to 6,000 range or even higher, but emphasized there is low confidence in the numbers.

Some context: The latest assessment comes after the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency Lt. Gen. Scott Berrier told the House Intelligence Committee Tuesday the intelligence community assesses that 2,000 to 4,000 Russian troops have been killed in Ukraine.

Berrier also said there is “low confidence” in the assessment.

The number of wounded could be three times as high, he added.

Russia has escalated its attacks on civilians as Ukrainians rush to escape through evacuation corridors. Wednesday saw Russian forces bomb a maternity hospital in Mariupol, fighting in the streets of Voznesensk and gridlock as people tried to escape areas near Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv.

Here are the latest developments:

Harrowing images show a heavily pregnant woman clutching her belongings, her face covered with cuts, as she walks down a bombed-out staircase at a maternity and children’s hospital in the city of Mariupol, southern Ukraine. Inside, smashed incubators and bloodied beds lay among the wreckage.

Russian forces bombed the hospital Wednesday, Mariupol officials said — an attack described by Ukraine’s President as an “atrocity” and “proof of a genocide.”

Here’s what we know:

Leader’s reaction: Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said the bombing is “proof of a genocide of Ukrainians taking place” and repeated his call for NATO to declare a no-fly zone over Ukraine.

More bombings: A city administration building and a university in Mariupol, less than a kilometer from the bombed-out hospital, has been identified by CNN as a second location in the city hit by an apparent Russian military strike.

Evacuation corridor: The attacks came as humanitarian corridors were set up around Ukraine to evacuate civilians to safety. It is unclear if any people made it out of Mariupol, which has been has been under siege for days and isolated by Russian forces.

“Desperate situation”: About 1,300 civilians have been killed in Mariupol since the Russian invasion began, two officials in the city said. Residents have been cut off from water and electricity for days, and on Tuesday Ukraine’s Foreign Minister accused Russia of committing war crimes by holding 300,000 civilians “hostage.” Photos show bodies being placed into a mass grave in the city.

Destruction of city: New satellite images Wednesday from Maxar Technologies show homes, buildings, grocery stores and shopping malls across Mariupol damaged or destroyed in the fighting.

Ukraine’s Chernobyl nuclear plant has been disconnected from the electricity grid and lost its supply of external power, Ukraine’s energy operator Ukrenergo and state-run nuclear company Energoatom said Wednesday.

It comes two weeks after Russian forces seized control of the plant, which was the site of the world’s worst nuclear disaster in 1986.

Here’s what we know:

What happens if Chernobyl loses power?: The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said it had been told by Ukraine that Chernobyl had lost power, but that it saw “no critical impact” on the plant’s safety. 

“Specifically, regarding the site’s spent fuel storage facility, the volume of cooling water in the pool is sufficient to maintain effective heat removal from the spent fuel without a supply of electricity. The site also has reserve emergency power supplies with diesel generators and batteries,” IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said in a statement.

Is Chernobyl still active? The Chernobyl site is not currently operational and handling of nuclear material has been halted, the IAEA said, citing information from Ukraine’s nuclear regulator. The facility holds decommissioned reactors as well as radioactive waste facilities.

However, the lack of power “is likely to lead to a further deterioration of operational radiation safety at the site,” Grossi said.

Chernobyl radiation leak warning: Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and the country’s security and intelligence service warned of a possible radiation leak after the plant was disconnected.

“Reserve diesel generators have a 48-hour capacity to power the Chornobyl NPP. After that, cooling systems of the storage facility for spent nuclear fuel will stop, making radiation leaks imminent,” Kuleba said in a tweet Wednesday. 

Ukraine’s technical security and intelligence service echoed Kuleba’s concerns, warning that “all nuclear facilities” in the Chernobyl exclusion zone were without power, and that if the pumps could not be cooled, a “nuclear discharge” could occur. 

Neither Kuleba nor the intelligence service commented on whether the diesel generators could be sustained beyond the 48-hour period.

Lines down: On Tuesday, the IAEA said it had lost contact with remote data transmission from safeguard monitoring systems at Chernobyl. 

Staff pushed to the limit: The loss of power at Chernobyl has raised further concerns for some 210 personnel that have been working for two weeks straight at the site since Russian forces seized control of the facility. Grossi said they have been effectively living there, working around the clock and unable to rotate shifts.

“From day to day, we are seeing a worsening situation at the Chornobyl NPP, especially for radiation safety, and for the staff managing the facility under extremely difficult and challenging circumstances,” Grossi said. “I repeat my urgent appeal to the forces in effective control of the plant to respect internal radiation protection procedures, to facilitate the safe rotation of staff and to take other important steps to ensure safety.”

Eight of Ukraine’s 15 nuclear reactors are currently operating, including two at Europe’s largest nuclear power plant in Zaporizhzhya — which is also now under Russian control —  and that radiation levels still appear normal, Ukraine’s nuclear regulator told IAEA.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said “all in all almost 35,000 people were rescued” via the humanitarian corridors established Wednesday.

“Today we were able to organize three humanitarian corridors: from the city of Sumy, from city of Kyiv and Kyiv region, and from Enerhodar,” he said, adding that efforts will continue Thursday.

Zelensky said Ukrainian authorities were preparing six humanitarian corridors to get people out of areas under attack by Russian forces.

“We are praying to be able to evacuate people from Mariupol, from Izium, from Volnovakha, etc. to evacuate to safe places of free Ukraine. And I’m sure that every Ukrainian that knows these people need help will make sure these people feel cared for,” he said.

While some routes were successful in evacuating people to safety, others had to be abandoned.

What happened: Local authorities in areas close to Kyiv that have been under attack for more than a week said efforts to evacuate people to safety Wednesday failed. The city council of Bucha said 50 buses had been blocked by the Russian military in nearby Stoyanka.

The White House warned Wednesday that Russia could use chemical weapons in Ukraine or manufacture a “false flag” operation that uses them. 

White House press secretary Jen Psaki, slamming what she called false claims from Russia that the US is developing chemical weapons in Ukraine, tweeted: 

“Now that Russia has made these false claims, and China has seemingly endorsed this propaganda, we should all be on the lookout for Russia to possibly use chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine, or to create a false flag operation using them. It’s a clear pattern.”

Psaki also noted Russia’s “long and well-documented track record of using chemical weapons” as well as its pattern of “accusing the West of the very violations that Russia itself is perpetrating.”

Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned earlier this year of the possibility of Russia carrying out a fake or real chemical weapons attack as a manufactured pretext for an invasion into Ukraine. But his comments came before Russia’s full invasion began.

Read the tweets:

CNN’s Kylie Atwood contributed to this report.

The swift US rejection of a Polish plan to get MiG-29 fighter jets into Ukraine is the clearest example yet of the complications that the US and its NATO allies face trying to help Ukraine defend itself against Russia’s brutal assault while ensuring they don’t get dragged into a wider war.

The negotiations fell apart almost as quickly as they came together.

Poland’s announcement on Tuesday that it was ready to provide MiG fighter jets to Ukraine via a US Air Force base in Germany caught the US off-guard. By Wednesday morning, US and Polish officials were still discussing the prospect of providing fighter jets to Ukraine, an administration official told CNN.

But on Wednesday afternoon, the Pentagon bluntly announced it was opposed to the idea, which Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin conveyed in a call to his Polish counterpart.

“Secretary Austin thanked the minister for Poland’s willingness to continue to look for ways to assist Ukraine, but he stressed that we do not support the transfer of additional fighter aircraft to the Ukrainian air force at this time, and therefore have no desire to see them in our custody either,” Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said at a briefing.

The episode underscores how the US and its allies may be reaching the limits of what they can do to help Ukraine — while staying out of the conflict — and points to possible cracks in an alliance that has remained strongly unified in the early part of the war as members enacted stiff sanctions and provided security aid.

It also demonstrates that the Biden administration is still working to get on the same page.

Read more:

Effects of the bombing in the center of Kharkiv, Ukraine on March 9, 2022 as Russian attacks continue.

Related article How the US is trying to help Ukraine without triggering a wider war with Russia

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky asked why a maternity hospital was a “threat” to Russia, in a video message posted to Telegram late Wednesday night.

The video comes after a maternity hospital in Mariupol was bombed earlier in the day.

“Russian bombs fell on a hospital and maternity center in Mariupol. A children’s hospital, a working maternity hospital, those buildings are ruined!” the President said.

Zelensky said at least 17 people were injured in the attack and authorities are continuing to search through the rubble for more victims.

Russia claims Ukraine was establishing combat positions at the hospital, something CNN has not been able to verify. 

In a video message posted to Telegram on Wednesday, Mariupol Mayor Vadym Boichenko called on the global community for help and urged them to “close the sky over Ukraine” following the bombing of a maternity hospital in the city.

“Today I am asking the global community for help. Close the sky over Ukraine. Our will has not been broken, we will fight to the end,” Boichenko said, “We have motivated soldiers and officers who defend our homeland. But today we need support.”

The mayor said he is sure the time will come when “all these occupiers will face justice at The Hague” and said this “war crime will be punished, and the perpetrators will burn in hell.”

Russia claims Ukraine was establishing combat positions at the hospital, something CNN has not been able to verify. 

Several hours before the maternity hospital in Mariupol was bombed, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova accused Ukraine of establishing combat positions at the hospital.

At her regular briefing, Zakharova said that “in Mariupol, the Ukrainian national battalions, having expelled the staff and patients from the maternity hospital, equipped combat positions in it.”