March 23, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

Our live coverage of the war in Ukraine has moved here.

At least 264 civilians, including four children, have died in the Ukrainian capital since the beginning of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, according to Kyiv Mayor Vitaly Klitschko.

More than 300 people have been hospitalized due to injuries and more than 80 buildings have been destroyed, Klitschko said.

“The target of aggressors is the capital of Ukraine,” the mayor said in a video on his YouTube channel Wednesday.

The bombardment of Ukraine by Russian forces began one month ago.

Before the war, about 3 million people lived in Kyiv but the population has now dwindled to about half that because of how many people have fled, Klitschko said.

“We need support right now in this very difficult time,” he said.
“Everybody’s surprised how tough Ukrainian army, how tough Ukrainian soldiers (are) because we stand in front one of the strongest armies in the world: the Russian army.”

Klitschko said Ukrainians are “so tough” because, unlike Russian soldiers, they are fighting to defend their children, their families, their city and their future.

Russia, he said, wants to rebuild its empire but Ukraine wants “to be part of the European family as a democratic, modern European country of Ukraine.”

The mayor of Chernihiv said the northern Ukrainian city’s cemetery cannot handle all the dead as the Russian onslaught takes its toll on the civilian population.

Badly damaged buildings line rubble-strewn streets, while still-burning fires fill the air with heavy smoke, as seen in a new video from Mayor Vladyslav Atroshenko.

The video, geolocated and verified by CNN, offers an extensive look from the ground at the city that has seen some of the most intense shelling since Russia invaded Ukraine four weeks ago.

“The city cemetery cannot handle all the dead, so we are keeping people in morgues and refrigerators longer than normal. We are burying people in the old cemeteries that haven’t been used in a while,” Atroshenko said in the video while driving through the city’s Desnyans’kyi district.

When the person recording the video asked how many people have died so far, the mayor said the city is not keeping statistics but all cases will be handled by the prosecutor’s office.

“There was a direct strike here. There is a tractor over there burning,” he said. “We are located right now in the zone of combat.”

Driving on Shevchenka street, located in the eastern part of the city, the mayor looks out at tattered billboards and homes with their roofs blown off or caved in.  

Watch: Video shows destroyed buildings, smoke and debris-filled streets in Chernihiv

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01:54 - Source: cnn

The leaders of Western powers are making the same mistakes with Russian President Vladimir Putin that their predecessors did with Hitler, says former Russian oil tycoon and Kremlin critic Mikhail Khodorkovsky.

Khodorkovsky — once Russia’s richest man — spent more than a decade in prison for tax evasion and fraud following a prosecution he said was part of a Kremlin campaign to destroy him. He now lives in exile overseas.

Speaking to CNN’s Erin Burnett on Wednesday, Khodorkovsky said he sees parallels between the situation in Ukraine today and the lead up to World War II.

“Western leaders kept saying they were afraid to aggravate Hitler and they thought well, if you’re not showing any resistance, eventually he’ll stop,” he said. “However, that mistake has cost hundreds of millions human lives. Hundreds of millions of human lives were lost and the same mistake is being committed now.”

Some context: NATO is unwilling to get directly involved in the war beyond supporting Ukraine’s resistance as it could escalate the conflict.

On the ground, Ukraine’s forces are being helped by Russia’s corruption, Khodorkovsky said, adding: “the level of (Russia’s) unpreparedness has come as a great surprise to me.”

It comes after US officials said the Russian military is suffering shortages of food and fuel and is plagued with logistics and sustainment problems. One official said there are indications some Russian soldiers have gotten frost bite because they lack the appropriate cold-weather gear.

Going after the oligarchs: Asked whether Russian oligarchs deserved to be sanctioned by the West, Khodorkovsky replied that even though it was “preposterous” to think the tycoons had any real influence over Putin, those who continued to back the Russian leader were “dangerous.”

“Oligarchs are not true oligarchs in the sense that they actually do not influence Putin,” he said.

“Yet they are Putin’s instruments of influence and to see for real who has broken their relations with Putin would be when they actually denounce him and when they admit that he is a war criminal. And if that doesn’t happen, that means they still depend on him and they’re still dangerous.”

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Thursday he has raised concerns about the possibility of Russian President Vladimir Putin attending the G20 summit in Indonesia in November.

“The idea of sitting around a table with Vladimir Putin, who the United States are already in the position of calling out (for) war crimes in Ukraine, for me is a step too far,” Morrison said during a media briefing.
“We’ve been raising concerns about this. And Russia has invaded Ukraine. I mean this is a violent and aggressive act that shatters the international rule of law.”

Russia’s ambassador in Jakarta said Wednesday that Putin “wants to go” to the G20 summit, in response to unconfirmed reports the US and its Western allies are assessing whether Moscow should remain within the group.

 Indonesia currently holds the rotating G20 chair.

“G20 is not only a summit. G20 is a process. There are a lot of meetings that were held by Indonesia both online and offline and Russia is actively participating in these meetings,” the Russian ambassador told reporters in Jakarta.

Izyum, an eastern Ukrainian city about 72 miles (116 kilometers) southeast of Kharkiv, has been cut off from nearly all communications since intense battles between Russian and Ukrainian forces broke out there last week.

Now, the first videos and images have emerged from the city.

They show widespread destruction, charred and bombed-out buildings, and bodies left lying in the streets.

CNN has geolocated and verified the authenticity of the videos, which were uploaded to social media on Tuesday. The population of Izyum was around 54,000 people.

Some context: A senior US defense official told CNN earlier Tuesday that Ukrainian armed forces were fighting to knock the Russian military out of the town after the Russians moved in from Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region.

The first set of videos was uploaded to Instagram by a man walking around the town’s central park. CNN is not naming or showing the individual out of concern for the person’s safety.  

The park: Many of the trees that once lined the park’s paths are splintered, their branches lying on the ground. 

“Take a look,” the man said. “This is our park.” 

The camera pans over to a charred building that once housed businesses and a restaurant.  

Then, an explosion is heard in the video. The war may have moved out of central Izyum, but its brutality is evident in the destruction it has left behind.  

As he walks deeper into the park, a dead body is seen in the street.

“Look, over there is another corpse,” he said, pointing off the path. “And another one, and another one.”  

The medical college: A second video clip from the man shows him near the Izyum Medical College dormitory. He walks by the burnt remains of a cafe.

Back near the park, another burnt building — which used to house a number of shops — is seen. Just across the street from it is a large crater.

“There is a three-meter crater here,” the man said, as he pans the camera back toward the park where more splintered trees are seen.  

The playground: In northern Izyum, another video shows the effect military strikes have had on more residential areas. It is filmed from a playground, and begins with a view northeast toward an apartment building that has been destroyed in the middle — it has been reduced to rubble. 

As the camera pans to the east, the center section of another apartment complex is seen completely destroyed.  

“Well look, here is the entrance to my building,” someone is heard saying in the video. 

The camera pans toward the southwest, to a church and another building.

A top Russian diplomat issued a warning to NATO countries Wednesday, saying they are dealing with a nuclear power and should not threaten Moscow.

“If Russia is provoked by NATO, if Russia is attacked by NATO I don’t know … we are a nuclear power, why not?” Russian Deputy Ambassador to the UN Dmitry Polyanskiy said in an interview with Sky News.

When asked if that was a “legitimate thing” to say, Polyanskiy replied: “I don’t think it’s the right thing to be saying but it’s not a right thing to threaten Russia and to try to interfere. So when you’re dealing with a nuclear power of course you have to calculate all the possible outcomes of your behavior.”

Some context: In an interview with CNN, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s chief spokesman previously refused to rule out that Russia would consider using nuclear weapons against what Moscow saw as an “existential threat.”

War crimes: On Wednesday, the US government formally declared that members of the Russian armed forces have committed war crimes in Ukraine. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken cited “credible reports” of the deliberate targeting of civilians and indiscriminate attacks, including the destruction of apartment buildings, schools and hospitals.

But Russian diplomat Polyanskiy denied that Russia was committing war crimes in Ukraine.

“Of course it’s not up to me to assess — I’m not there, you’re not there, you’re looking at the videos, you’re looking at many videos considered to be fake news,” he told Sky News.

Fact Check: The US State Department specifically cited Russian attacks on a maternity hospital and a theater in Mariupol. The theater was marked with the Russian word for “children” in letters visible from the sky, the State Department said. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensksy has also repeatedly accused Russia of war crimes.

When shown photos of wrecked apartment buildings on fire in Mariupol, Polyanskiy asked “how do you know it’s Russian missiles?”

“It can easily come from Ukraine from the center of the city,” Polyanskiy said, adding, without providing evidence, “they have their own missile launchers and lot of cases that I know are reported from Ukrainian missiles themselves.”

Fact Check: Russia has repeatedly denied it is targeting civilian areas and infrastructure and has blamed Ukrainian forces for much of the destruction. But Ukrainian forces on the ground, journalists, and people who have fled Mariupol have described a city under constant bombardment from Russian strikes. Civilians still in the city have been without water, power and food, and describe bodies left in the street because it is too dangerous to collect them. Zelensky has said the sustained Russian attack on Mariupol is an “act of terror” that will be “remembered for centuries.”

In a video message posted to Facebook Wednesday night, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky addressed Russians and told them, “save your sons from the war.”

Zelensky said Ukraine had never threatened the security of Russia, adding that Russian propagandists “lie about the war, which is paid for by your taxes.”

Ukrainians, he said, are doing everything they can to bring peace back to their land.

“Not to yours — to our land. To our people. We are doing everything to end this war. And when we succeed, it will certainly happen, you will be sure of at least one thing: your children will no longer be sent to die on our land, on our territory,” he said.

The Ukrainian President said Russia’s original plan “already failed” in the first two days of the invasion but Russia is still “getting manpower from everywhere.” 

“Equipment. Air bombs, missiles. Looking for mercenaries around the world. Any scum capable of shooting at civilians,” Zelensky said.
“Russian troops destroy our cities. Kill civilians indiscriminately. Rape women. Abduct children. Shoot at refugees. Capture humanitarian convoys. They are engaged in looting. They burn museums, blow up schools and hospitals. The target for them is universities, residential neighborhoods … Anything! Russian troops do not know the limits of evil.”

Key talks: Zelensky referred to three upcoming meetings with world leaders — the NATO Summit, EU Summit and G7 Summit — and said politicians need to support freedom for Ukraine.

The President repeated his requests for a no-fly zone over Ukraine, saying the Ukrainian sky has not been made safe from Russian bombs and Kyiv has not received aircraft, modern anti-missile weapons or tanks. 

A Russian journalist working for the independent news site The Insider was killed in a shelling incident in Kyiv, the outlet said in a statement on Wednesday.

Oksana Baulina had been filming the shelling destruction in the capital’s Podilskyi District by Russian troops when she came under rocket fire. Another civilian died with her, The Insider’s statement said. Two people accompanying her were also wounded and hospitalized.

Baulina went to Ukraine as a correspondent and filed “several reports” from Lviv and Kyiv, The Insider said.

“The Insider expresses its deepest condolences to Oksana’s family and friends,” the outlet said in the statement. “We will continue to cover the war in Ukraine, including such Russian war crimes as indiscriminate shelling of residential areas where civilians and journalists are killed.”

The Insider’s statement did not say when Baulina was killed. But soon after it was released, colleagues took to Twitter to mourn her death.

Read more here.

President Volodymyr Zelensky is calling for worldwide demonstrations in support of Ukraine as the Russian invasion reaches the one-month mark.

The Ukrainian President made the remarks in a speech posted to Facebook Wednesday evening, with the goal of seeing demonstrations begin Thursday.

“It breaks my heart, hearts of all Ukrainians and every free person on the planet. That’s why I asked you to stand against the war starting from March 24, exactly one month after the Russian invasion. From this day and after that, show your standing, come from your offices, your homes, your schools and universities, come in the name of peace, come with Ukrainian symbols to support Ukraine,” Zelensky pleaded.

Zelensky said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a war against freedom and that Russia aims to defeat the freedom of all of Europe and the world.

“To support freedom, to support life. Come to your squares, your streets, make yourselves visible and heard. Say that people matter, freedom matters, peace matters, Ukraine matters,” Zelensky said. 

Zelensky urged the world to unite against Russia’s invasion, saying, “the war of Russia is not only the war against Ukraine, its meaning is much wider.” 

Watch Zelensky’s speech below:

CNN teams on the ground witnessed a barrage of outgoing fire late Wednesday evening that occurred in northwest Kyiv.

Earlier on Wednesday, a senior US defense official told reporters that Ukrainian forces have pushed Russian forces back on the frontlines east of Kyiv.

Russian forces are about 55 kilometers (roughly 34 miles) away from Kyiv’s city center to the east, an increase of between 25 and 35 kilometers (roughly 15 to 22 miles) as compared to the same location yesterday, the official said.

To the northwest of Kyiv’s city center, Russian forces are “digging in, and they are establishing defensive positions,” the official said. They have not gotten any closer to Kyiv’s city center along this line, the official added. They remain 15-20 kilometers (9-12 miles) away from Kyiv’s city center to the northwest.

Here’s more of the most recent headlines from the Ukraine-Russia conflict:

The United Kingdom is set to announce a “major new military support package” for Ukraine at Thursday’s NATO and the G7 leaders’ meetings.

The support package will include 6,000 missiles, consisting of anti-tank and high explosive weapons, and £25 million (33 million $USD) in financial backing for the Ukrainian military, according to a Downing Street press release on Wednesday.

“This more than doubles the defensive lethal aid provided to date to more than 10,000 missiles, and comes on top of the £400 million (528 million $USD) the UK has committed in humanitarian and economic aid for the crisis,” the release read.

The UK will also provide an additional £4.1 (5.5 million $USD) for the BBC World Service “to tackle disinformation in Russia and Ukraine, as well as new financial and policing support for the International Criminal Court’s investigation into war crimes.”

“But we cannot and will not stand by while Russia grinds Ukraine’s towns and cities into dust. The United Kingdom will work with our allies to step up military and economic support to Ukraine, strengthening their defenses as they turn the tide in this fight,” he added.

“One month into this crisis, the international community faces a choice. We can keep the flame of freedom alive in Ukraine, or risk it being snuffed out across Europe and the world”, Johnson said.

According to the Downing Street statement, the UK has “already provided over 4,000 anti-tank weapons to Ukraine’s armed forces, including Next-Generation Light Anti-Tank Weapons Systems, or NLAWs, and Javelin missiles. The Government is also supplying Starstreak high-velocity anti-air missiles to help Ukrainians defend themselves against aerial bombings, as well as body armour, helmets and combat boots.”

CNN teams on the ground witnessed a barrage of outgoing fire late Wednesday evening that occurred in northwest Kyiv.

Earlier on Wednesday, a senior US defense official told reporters that Ukrainian forces have pushed Russian forces back on the frontlines east of Kyiv.

Russian forces are about 55 kilometers (roughly 34 miles) away from Kyiv’s city center to the east, an increase of between 25 and 35 kilometers (roughly 15 to 22 miles) as compared to the same location yesterday, the official said.

To the northwest of Kyiv’s city center, Russian forces are “digging in, and they are establishing defensive positions,” the official said. They have not gotten any closer to Kyiv’s city center along this line, the official added. They remain 15-20 kilometers (9-12 miles) away from Kyiv’s city center to the northwest.

French carmaker Renault announced in a statement Wednesday that it has suspended all activities at its Moscow factory. The announcement comes as Ukrainian leaders have called for a boycott against the company, accused Renault of “sponsoring Russia’s war machine.”

Just one day earlier, Renault had said it was resuming production for three days only.

Regarding its involvement in major Russian car manufacturer AvtoVAZ, owned by Renault, the French carmaker said that it’s “assessing the available options, taking into account the current environment, while acting responsibly towards its 45,000 employees in Russia.”

The also company said it is “already implementing the necessary measures to comply with international sanctions.”

AvtoVAZ’s brand Lada represented nearly 21% of the Russian market in 2021, according to Renault Group’s financial results.

Earlier on Wednesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called out major French companies, including Renault, by name for continuing their operations in Russia.

“Renault, Auchan, Leroy Merlin and others must stop being the sponsors of Russia’s war machine,” Zelensky said.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba went further, calling for a global boycott of the carmaker.

“Renault refuses to pull out of Russia. Not that it should surprise anyone when Renault supports a brutal war of aggression in Europe,” Kuleba said in a tweet. “But mistakes must come with a price, especially when repeated. I call on customers and businesses around the globe to boycott Group Renault.”

Renault declined to comment when asked by CNN if the decision to suspend its activities at the Moscow factory is connected to the strong words from Ukrainian leaders.

Renault said in the statement that the value of its consolidated intangible assets, property, plant, equipment, and goodwill in Russia amounted to above $2.41 billion at the end of 2021.

A Russian-proposed draft resolution on the humanitarian situation in Ukraine failed to pass in the United Nations Security Council Wednesday evening.

Two countries voted in favor, zero countries voted against, and 13 countries, including the United States, abstained from the vote. Nine votes in favor were required for the resolution to pass.

US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield spoke ahead of the vote, stating that Russia was once again trying to use the Security Council to “provide cover for its brutal actions.”

“It really is unconscionable that Russia would have the audacity to put forward a resolution asking the international community to solve a human crisis that Russia alone created,” Thomas-Greenfield said. “Russia does not care about the deteriorating humanitarian conditions, or the millions of lives and dreams the war has shattered. If they cared, they would stop fighting.”

The US ambassador added that Russia’s resolution “makes no mention of its role as the sole cause of this crisis. And our vote [of abstention] will show that we will play no part in that.”

Russian Ambassador to the UN Vassily Nebenzia also spoke ahead of the vote Wednesday evening, claiming that their draft resolution was “analogous to other draft humanitarian resolutions.”

A top Estonian official on Wednesday called on the international community to do more to ensure a “full defeat” of Russia in Ukraine, saying that “anything short” of that “would be destabilizing and escalatory.”

“Frankly, I cannot see a way for the Russians to really win on the battlefield in the classical sense,” Secretary General of the Estonian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Jonatan Vseviov said in an interview with CNN in Washington, DC, ahead of the NATO Leaders Summit Thursday.

“The question is whether we will be able to actually defeat this aggression,” he said. “If Putin comes away from this aggression with some gains, then he’s likely to attempt this again – against Ukraine, against others, he’s likely to move ahead. So he needs to be absolutely defeated.”

Vseviov also said NATO must prepare for the “new era” once the active phase of the war is over, calling for the military alliance to “build up military muscle in the east” to deny any future aggression.

He spoke of the need for NATO to make decisions about its defense posture for the “long haul,” telling CNN that such discussions will take place this week but he expects major decisions will not be made until the NATO Summit in June, noting that such decisions require detailed military planning.

“It’s clear that we cannot just continue with NATO with business as usual, with the same approach to defense and deterrence, NATO’s relations to Russia that we’ve had since the annexation of Crimea,” Vseviov said. 

He said the alliance cannot take the risk that Russia “will miscalculate regarding collective defense,” so a “small, tripwire force – that international force that the Allies have had, for instance, in the Baltic states, is clearly no longer sufficient.”

Vseviov, a former Estonian ambassador to the US, met with key officials at the White House, Defense and State Department during his trip to Washington.

He said he could not predict how long the war will last, but said he believes the Ukrainian military will be able to hold on “for a long time,” but partner nations must continue to supply them with weaponry as the war wages on.

“The balance of military power clearly favors the aggressor, so we need to help the Ukrainians to hold on and do whatever is necessary to provide them with the relevant equipment and also humanitarian assistance,” Vseviov said, noting that it’s likely that “the level of brutality” unleashed by Russian forces against the civilian population “will go up dramatically” as the conflict continues. 

Vseviov expressed skepticism about any diplomatic solutions proposed by Moscow.

“I think talk of this potential breakthrough in negotiations is a Russian game of smoke and mirrors to trap us or our to dissuade us – it’s a diplomatic trap to dissuade us from additional sanctions and additional military assistance,” Vseviov said. 

“I will not believe any deal before I see it actually implemented on the ground. I think the Russian strategy has not changed. It is still to destroy Ukraine and the idea of a sovereign Ukraine and then move on to fundamentally alter European security architecture,” he added.

Some of South America’s biggest exporters are taking a hit as the impact of Russia’s war on Ukraine continues to disrupt trade from the region.

Now Ecuador, the world’s largest exporter of bananas, is facing billions of dollars in losses.

On March 18, a group of 13 national organizations involved in Ecuador’s banana trade published a joint statement warning that more than 20,000 tons of the fruit were not being exported every week as result of the conflict.

The country exports around 22% of its banana exports to Russia according to the group.

More than 95% of the bananas consumed in Russia come from Ecuador, generating $2 billion every year, according to Pulso Bananero, an independent banana consultancy in Ecuador.

It’s not just Ecuador’s trade with Russian that has been disrupted – Ukraine also accounts for 3% of Ecuador’s bananas exports.

While the country’s banana exporters have been able to divert some of their product to other markets, fruit that was not exported had to be thrown away, the statement warned. Also, because of their short shelf life, bananas are exported – and paid for – on a weekly basis. Industry experts say the long-term outlook for the industry is bleak.

“The social impact is already being felt because the trade cycle is very fast; if you don’t export this week, you don’t get paid this week,” said Raul Villacres, a former executive director of the Association of Banana Exporters of Ecuador.

Approximately a quarter of Ecuador’s banana workforce – roughly 50,000 people – works on exports allocated for eastern European markets, including Russia, according to Villacres.

In Colombia, the flower industry is suffering. Producers there say they haven’t been paid by Russian customers for past deliveries due to the SWIFT sanctions.

“We were lucky that most of the deliveries for the most important flower day of the year in Russia – Women’s Day, on March 8 – were dispatched before the conflict began, but now it’s the payment from Russia that are being delayed,” Augusto Solano, the president of the Colombia Association of Flower Producers ASOCOLFLORES, told CNN.

Flowers are more difficult to place on in alternative markets than bananas because they are produced specifically to accommodate specific customers’ taste, Solano said.

Russian flower buyers, for example, prefer enormous, expensive roses that are purchased by luxury clientele, many of whom are likely to have been affected by US and European sanctions.

According to ASOCOLFLORES, flower exports to Russia from Colombia are worth around $25 million annually, accounting for about 2-3% of ASOCOLFLORES’ revenue.

“Because of the way the flower market works, we have producers who specialize in the Russian markets and on flowers destined for Russia,” Solano said. “For them, this is a tragedy, we are talking of 20-30% of their annual exports gone.”

South America’s meat trade has also been disrupted because of the war, with Brazil’s poultry exporters likely to soon feel the crunch. In 2021, Russia was the 10th largest customer of Brazilian chicken, purchasing more than 100,000 tons, and it has only recently opened its market to Brazilian pork. While it is too early to analyze data of the war’s impact over the last month, the Brazilian Association of Animal Protein – representing producers and exporters of chicken and pork– said the conflict has already created a challenge due to the increased costs of maize from Ukraine, which is used as chicken and pork feed.

Read more about this here:

FILE - Farmers harvest with their combines in a wheat field near the village Tbilisskaya, Russia, July 21, 2021. The Russian tanks and missiles besieging Ukraine also are threatening the food supply and livelihoods of people in Europe, Africa and Asia who rely on the vast, fertile farmlands known as the "breadbasket of the world." Russia and Ukraine combine for about a third of the world's wheat and barley exports and provide large amounts of corn and cooking oils. (AP Photo/Vitaly Timkiv, File)

Related article War has brought the world to the brink of a food crisis

The day before NATO’S extraordinary summit takes place in Brussels, multiple sources have told CNN that a significant amount of time on Thursday will be spent discussing how the alliance should respond if Vladimir Putin uses chemical or biological weapons against Ukrainian citizens.

Multiple officials, who spoke on the condition of total anonymity, agreed that while the official NATO position that it will not get directly involved in this war will remain, chemical weapons could be a game changer as such an escalation would likely prompt the public in NATO nations to demand action.

Sources said that the alliance was sensitive to public thinking, and while it is likely that NATO will not issue redlines to Russia this week in terms of a response, we will likely see deliberate posturing from NATO, indicating its preparedness for chemical attacks.

That could mean a strengthening of the rapid deployment teams and special units that NATO already has in place to handle such threats. Such tools at NATO’s disposal have not previously been used to help a country outside of the alliance, but sources said that the Russian invasion of Ukraine was prompting unprecedented conversations about how best NATO can support countries that are not members.

Speaking to reporters earlier on Wednesday, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said that President Biden will “consult on potential contingencies” surrounding the use of chemical or biological weapons, along with “how to deal with the rhetoric and the commentary coming out of Russia on this whole question of the potential use of nuclear weapons.”

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said on Wednesday that the alliance would provide Ukrainians with protective kit, similar to the response from Western countries after Bashar-al Assad used chemical weapons against civilians in Syria.

Three NATO allies – France, the UK and the US – launched airstrikes against locations associated with Assad’s alleged April 2018 chemical attacks. Multiple Syrian activist groups documented the damage to Syrian civilians. The Syrian government denied it was responsible, and the Russian government said the attack was a “hoax.”

Officials told CNN that sending this combined message of preparedness to Russia along with the ambiguity of precisely what consequences might befall should hopefully deter Putin from committing a war crime that provided him few gains – even if only to defend himself from possible legal action in the future.

Ukrainian forces have pushed Russian forces back on the frontlines east of Kyiv, a senior US defense official told reporters Wednesday.

Russian forces are about 55 kilometers (roughly 34 miles) away from Kyiv’s city center to the east, an increase of between 25 and 35 kilometers (roughly 15 to 22 miles) as compared to the same location yesterday, the official said.

To the northwest of Kyiv’s city center, Russian forces are “digging in, and they are establishing defensive positions,” the official said. They have not gotten any closer to Kyiv’s city center along this line, the official added. They remain 15-20 kilometers (9-12 miles) away from Kyiv’s city center to the northwest.

At the same time, the official said that Russian forces are becoming more active in the eastern part of Ukraine in the Donbas area, saying they’ve “applied a lot more energy” in the Luhansk and Dontesk regions, the two areas the Kremlin declared as independent republics ahead of last month’s invasion.

“We’re starting to see them sort of dig in around Kyiv, but really trying to go more on the offense than they have been, more energy apply to that eastern part,” the official said. “So that’s a little bit of a change from what we’ve been talking about before.”

Moscow announced it will expel US diplomats from Russia, according to a statement issued by the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Wednesday.

A senior diplomat from the US diplomatic mission in Moscow was handed a note on Wednesday with a list of expelled American diplomatic employees declared “persona non grata,” according to the statement.

Persona non grata literally means “an unwelcome person.”

The move was in response to Washington’s expulsion of 12 diplomats from the Russian Permanent Mission to the UN in New York, as well as a Russian employee of the UN Secretariat.

“The American side was firmly told that any hostile actions of the United States against Russia would receive a decisive and adequate response,” the statement read.

The statement did not specify which diplomats or how many it intends to expel.

US President Joe Biden has arrived in Brussels for a set of emergency summits meant to address Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Air Force One landed at the Brussels airport at 9:03 p.m. local time after a roughly seven-hour flight from Washington.

Biden is expected to be greeted by Belgium’s prime minister at the airport. He begins intensive talks with NATO, the G7 and the European Union starting Thursday.

US President Joe Biden departed Wednesday for Europe on one of the highest-stakes presidential trips in recent memory.

His visits to Brussels and Poland could still underscore the alliance’s limits in ending the bloodshed in Ukraine, with Western leaders struggling to find ways to halt Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war. So far, punishing Western sanctions haven’t stopped Putin, and it’s unclear whether the new steps expected this week — including sanctions on hundreds of members of Russia’s lower legislative body and changes to NATO’s force posture along its eastern edge — will be different. 

Here are more of the headlines from today in the Russia-Ukraine conflict:

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday called out French business giants Renault, Auchan and Leroy Merlin for their continued presence in Russia, as he urged French companies to leave the country.   

“French companies must leave the Russian market. Renault, Auchan, Leroy Merlin and others must stop being the sponsors of Russia’s war machine,” Zelensky said in his video address to the French parliament on Wednesday. 

For some of the French companies Zelensky called out, the Russian market represents a crucial part of their profits. Russia is the second-most important markets for Renault, ranking only behind the carmaker’s home base France in terms of sales volume, according to the company’s 2021 sales results.   

The Russian market is also crucial for the French home retail giant Leroy Merlin. Present in both Russia and Ukraine, the former represents 18% of the brand’s global activities, CNN’s French affiliate BFMTV reported. 

The company will continue its operations in Russia, Veronique Retaux, a spokesperson for the mother company Adeo Group told CNN on Wednesday. The spokesperson did not provide further details.

Earlier in the week, a Leroy Merlin store in the Retroville shopping complex in Kyiv was hit by an explosion, according to the Ukrainian defense ministry. CNN has geolocated and verified the authenticity of photos on social media showing damage to the store. 

The incident prompted many to call on the company to leave Russia as it itself became an apparent victim of the Russian invasion.   

An online petition was launched on March 20 calling on the Adeo Group and Association Familiale Mulliez, the mother company of Leroy Merlin, to leave Russia. So far it has gathered more than 14,000 signatures.  

Renault confirmed to CNN on Tuesday that its Moscow factory resumed production on Monday, but would last for only three days. The company declined to provide more details when CNN asked why the company is restarting its production for three days.   

Meanwhile, some French companies are cutting their ties with Moscow. French oil giant TotalEnergies announced on Tuesday that it will stop purchasing Russian oil and oil products by the end of 2022 as its plan to move towards a gradual suspension of its activities in Russia. 

CNN’s Niamh Kennedy and Katie Polglase contributed reporting to this post. 

New drone video near the Ukrainian village of Rakivka shows flooding in the Irpin River basin, northwest of Kyiv.

For days, satellite images have shown rising water levels of the Irpin River. Now, new drone video is giving a better glimpse of just how far south flooding has spread. 

CNN geolocated and verified the authenticity of the video. It was published on Tuesday, but its metadata shows the video file was created on Monday.

The video also shows a Russian tank firing toward the eastern bank of the Irpin River.

The Russian military controls much of the western bank of the Irpin River around Rakivka; the Ukrainian military is dug in and is defending northwestern Kyiv around Moshchun.

Why this matters: The river is critical to the Russian advance toward Kyiv; if the Russians cannot cross it, they can’t take Kyiv from the west.

It’s unclear how the dam began flooding — whether the gates were opened on purpose by the Ukrainians, or it was hit by a military strike.

Watch the video:

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President Joe Biden has asked the governors of all 50 US states and the mayor of the District of Columbia to bolster the cybersecurity of state computer systems and critical infrastructure in the face of potential Russian hacking threats.  

“[T]here are things that only you as governor can do to secure your state’s computer systems, your critical infrastructure, your citizens, and through those efforts, our Nation,” Biden wrote in a March 18 letter to the governors and mayor reviewed by CNN.  

Biden reiterated in the letter that “we must prepare for any contingency, including cyber attacks on our homeland” from Russia. 

Politico first reported on the letter. 

Some more context: This is the latest in a series of statements from Biden administration officials for critical infrastructure firms to be on high alert for any potential Russian cyber activity. 

The FBI advised five US energy firms last week that Russian internet addresses were scanning their networks in possible preparation for a hack. There are no known compromises from that activity. Scanning, which involves checking computer networks for devices and vulnerabilities, happens on the internet all the time. 

Biden urged the governors and mayor, if they haven’t already, to meet with their leadership teams to discuss how they will protect critical infrastructure and state resources in the event of a cyberattack.  

“Has your chief information security officer done all that he or she can do to lock down your state’s systems and put your cybersecurity teams on high alert?” Biden asked. 

Russian hacking groups have in 2015 and 2016 used cyberattacks to cut off power in parts of Ukraine. That has’t happened in the US. The electric sector and other critical industries have invested heavily in defenses and preparatory work.

About 1,000 residential buildings have been destroyed in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, Mayor Ihor Terehov said Wednesday.

The city, which is regarded as a key target for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invading forces and has sustained weeks of heavy assault, sits just 30 kilometers (about 18 miles) from the Russian border. 

Terehov revealed the extent of the damage done, reporting a total of 1,143 buildings destroyed by Russian fire, of which 998 were residential buildings.

Seven hundred people have managed to escape towns in the far east of Ukraine on Wednesday, according to Luhansk’s regional governor, despite continued Russian shelling through the day.

Authorities had posted the addresses of collection points on Facebook where people could pick up buses and small vans to drive them to railway stations and then onward to the west of Ukraine.  

In addition to the evacuations, Gov. Serhii Haidai said about 600 tons of aid had made it into the region, even though he suggested Russia’s observation of a ceasefire around the evacuation corridor had been “nominal.”

The governor said shelling on the towns of Rubizhen and Popasna had been “massive and continuous” adding that Kreminna and Severodonetsk were also under fire. There were civilian casualties, he said, without providing additional details.

Madeleine Albright — who championed the expansion of NATO and was the first woman US secretary of state — has died. She was 84 years old.

She pushed for the alliance to intervene in the Balkans to stop genocide and ethnic cleansing, sought to reduce the spread of nuclear weapons, and championed human rights and democracy across the globe. 

The news of her death comes as NATO leaders, including US President Joe Biden, prepare to meet Thursday in Brussels for a summit on Russia’s invasion in Ukraine.

Her death was confirmed in an email to staff of the Albright Stonebridge Group, a global strategy firm founded by Albright.

Albright was a central figure in President Bill Clinton’s administration, first serving as US ambassador to the United Nations before becoming the nation’s top diplomat in his second term.

In a New York Times op-ed, written last month just before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Albright argued that Russian leader Vladimir Putin would be making “a historic error” in invading Ukraine and warned of devastating costs to his country.

“Instead of paving Russia’s path to greatness, invading Ukraine would ensure Mr. Putin’s infamy by leaving his country diplomatically isolated, economically crippled and strategically vulnerable in the face of a stronger, more united Western alliance,” Albright wrote.

Read more about Albright and her leadership here.

US and European officials have held an “intense back and forth” on reducing dependence on Russian energy in the lead-up to emergency summits in Brussels this week, the White House said.

US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said the matter would be a “substantial topic of conversation” among US President Joe Biden and other leaders at G7 and EU summits Thursday, and was a “major priority” for them. 

Sullivan said leaders have weighed a “practical roadmap” for ending European dependence on Russian oil and natural gas, and that Biden would have more to say on the matter on Friday.

He said the US would look to increase supplies of liquified natural gas in Europe in the short-term, though did not spell out specifics of a plan.

The White House on Wednesday left open the possibility that Russia could be kicked out of the Group of Twenty, but declined to weigh in publicly on reports that the US and allies want the country removed from the group.

“We don’t believe it can be business as usual with Russia an international institutions,” National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters on Air Force One, when asked directly if Russia could be booted from the forum. “In terms of specific answers to that kind of question, for the G20, or other international organizations, we want to have the opportunity to consult with our allies partners around the world…before I opine on that question publicly.”

As CNN previously reported, China said on Wednesday that no member of the G20 has the right to “expel another country” from the intergovernmental economic forum, amid reports the US and its Western allies are assessing whether Russia should remain within the group of major economies following its invasion of Ukraine.

Russian President Vladimir Putin “wants to go” to the G20 summit in Indonesia in November, Russia’s ambassador in Jakarta said on Wednesday, also in response to those reports.

US President Joe Biden will unveil new sanctions on Russian political figures and oligarchs when he attends a series of summits in Brussels on Thursday.

Speaking aboard Air Force One as Biden headed to Europe, US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Biden would also discuss NATO’s force posture on its eastern edge and contingency plans for a potential Russian use of chemical or nuclear weapon in his talks.

Biden will begin at NATO by meeting Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg “to check signals” and get on the same page for the ensuing summit. Biden will attend the extraordinary NATO summit for approximately 3 hours, Sullivan said.

Among the priorities is “how we make sure that we’re continuing to support Ukraine and its effort to defend itself,” Sullivan said, even though NATO itself hasn’t facilitated military assistance to Ukraine, but left those decisions to individual members.

Sullivan said the alliance would “discuss the question of NATO’s force posture on the Eastern flank.” He said leaders would ratify certain decisions taken by defense ministers last week, and task their military and political officials to set out a “longer term game plan for what forces and capabilities are going to be required in those eastern flank countries. 

The longer-term plan will be agreed to at this summer’s NATO summit in Madrid, which had been previously announced. The new force posture will ensure “we’ve got a long term footprint that is matched to the new security reality that’s been created both by Russia’s full scale invasion of Ukraine and by what’s happening in Belarus,” Sullivan said. 

At a subsequent meeting of the G7, Biden and fellow leaders will “agree on an initiative to coordinate on sanctions enforcement,” disallowing Russian efforts to evade existing sanctions, Sullivan said.

Biden will also “announce a package of sanctions designations tomorrow that relate both to political figures and oligarchs.” 

Sanctions will also be up for discussion at the European Union, along with how to manage China as it considers providing military assistance to Russia.

And in all his discussions, Biden will “consult on potential contingencies” surrounding potential cyberattacks or the use of chemical or biological weapons, along with “how to deal with the rhetoric and the commentary coming out of Russia on this whole question of the potential use of nuclear weapons.”

Sullivan said US concerns about chemical or nuclear weapons centered primarily around the “deliberate drumbeat of misinformation, propaganda and lies on this subject that has all the markers of a precursor to them actually using these weapons.”

The US government has formally declared that members of the Russian armed forces have committed war crimes in Ukraine, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement Wednesday.

The official US declaration that Moscow has committed the violations of the laws of conflict come after Blinken, President Joe Biden and Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman all said it was their personal opinion that war crimes have taken place.

“Today, I can announce that, based on information currently available, the U.S. government assesses that members of Russia’s forces have committed war crimes in Ukraine,” Blinken said.

“Our assessment is based on a careful review of available information from public and intelligence sources,” he said.

“As with any alleged crime, a court of law with jurisdiction over the crime is ultimately responsible for determining criminal guilt in specific cases,” Blinken continued. “The U.S. government will continue to track reports of war crimes and will share information we gather with allies, partners, and international institutions and organizations, as appropriate. We are committed to pursuing accountability using every tool available, including criminal prosecutions.”

Up to 15,000 Russians soldiers have been killed in one month in the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, two senior NATO military officials said. The officials made the estimate during a briefing with reporters on Wednesday. 

The officials specified the range could be as low as 7,000 or as high as 15,000 in total Russian soldiers killed in the conflict so far. Their estimate is based on what Ukraine is telling them, what they know from Russia “intentionally or by mistake” and from “open source” information, one of the officials said.

“The estimate we have is based on what the Ukrainians tell us, what the Russian let us know, intentionally or by mistakes, because mistakes happen in a war, and on intelligence we get on open sources, we think that the Russians have lost between 7,000, up to maximum 15,000 dead,” the official said Wednesday. 

The General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces estimates that 15,600 Russian soldiers have been killed in the conflict. 

Overall, they estimate that there could be between 30,000 to 40,000 Russian soldiers either killed, wounded or missing altogether. 

“Statistically in conflicts when you have one killed soldier, you generally have three wounded soldier, so if you go four fold, it would be, I would say between 30,000 to 40,000 losses, losses killed in action, wounded in action, prisoner of war are missing, you don’t know what happened to the soldier,” the official said.

Other US officials have estimated a similar range of as low as 7,000 and as high as 14,000 Russian soldiers killed, but they have expressed “low confidence” in those estimates.

Neither NATO nor the United States have troops on the ground in Ukraine, making it incredibly difficult to get an accurate estimate on the number of Russian casualties. An accurate tally could take weeks or even months and may only be possible after the fighting has ceased. 

The Russian government has not put out a number of total soldiers killed in the conflict. The Russian tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda published — then later removed — a report that the Russian Ministry of Defense had recorded 9,861 Russian Armed Forces deaths in the war in Ukraine.

The report from the tabloid originally read: “According to the Russian Defense Ministry, during the special operation in Ukraine, the Russian Armed Forces lost 9861 people killed and 16153 wounded.”

The World Health Organization has confirmed 64 attacks on health facilities in Ukraine so far, WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Wednesday.

 “WHO has now verified 64 attacks on health care since the start of the war, and we are in the process of verifying further attacks,” Tedros said in a media briefing.

 “Attacks on health must stop. Health systems, facilities, and health workers are not and should not, [ever] be a target,” he said.

Dr. Mike Ryan, director of the WHO Health Emergencies Programme, shared statistics from the International Organization of Migration on the vulnerabilities of the millions of people who have been internally displaced in Ukraine, including that 32% of displaced households include someone who is chronically ill and nearly 20% include someone who is disabled.

Situations like those in Ukraine, Ryan said, frequently lead to conditions where even accessing health facilities “becomes a life-threatening experience.”

“We have reached maybe for once in my lifetime an appropriate level of horror of what’s happening in Ukraine and particularly what’s happening in Mariupol. And I hope that is the new level of horror we will express in all of these situations around the world from now on.”

Speaking on the difficulty of working in Ukraine and other regions in crisis including Ethiopia, Ryan said “basic” principles around aid are being forgotten. 

“It shouldn’t be upon the humanitarian community to have to constantly renegotiate and negotiate and then have bureaucratic blocks and stop, start, stop, start,” he said. 

“This is not the way it is supposed to be. We are forgetting the basic principles of humanitarian law, when we end up in these interminable discussions about getting the most simple and basic of access to populations who desperately, desperately need us.”

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Wednesday told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky of his “intention” to use Thursday’s G7 and NATO meetings to “substantively” increase defensive lethal aid to Ukraine, a Downing Street spokesperson said on Wednesday.

“The Prime Minister set out his intention to use tomorrow’s G7 and NATO meetings to increase the pressure on Vladimir Putin’s regime and work with partners to substantively increase defensive lethal aid to Ukraine. Leaders would look to address Ukraine’s requests and ensure President Zelenskyy is in the strongest possible position in ongoing peace talks,” the spokesperson said following the call between the two leaders.

During the call, Johnson reiterated “his admiration for the bravery of the Ukrainian armed forces and their success in repulsing Russia’s onslaught.”

“[Zelensky] said the bombardment of civilian areas, including the siege of Mariupol, is unconscionable and demands a response from the international community,” the spokesperson added.

President Joe Biden departed Wednesday on one of the highest-stakes presidential trips in recent memory, a moment for the US President to assume leadership of a newly united West.

His visits to Brussels and Poland could still underscore the alliance’s limits in ending the bloodshed in Ukraine, with Western leaders struggling to find ways to halt Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war. So far, punishing Western sanctions haven’t stopped Putin, and it’s unclear whether the new steps expected this week — including sanctions on hundreds of members of Russia’s lower legislative body and changes to NATO’s force posture along its eastern edge — will be different. 

Yet as he departed the White House early Wednesday, Biden appeared intent on using his last-minute wartime visit to Europe to send a message. Asked what he’d say to his partners, Biden said he’d wait to deliver it face to face.

Emergency summits of NATO, the European Union, and the G7 will focus on displays of cooperation in punishing Russia and providing support to Ukraine as it comes under fire. A stop afterward in Poland is meant to highlight the massive refugee crisis that’s followed Russia’s invasion as well as to reassure allies on NATO’s eastern edge.

For Biden, the last-minute talks are a venue to demonstrate the foreign policy credentials he promised as a candidate, when he vowed to restore American leadership and repair broken alliances. The war in Ukraine is widely viewed inside the White House as one of the defining challenges for Biden and his presidential legacy.

An emotional challenge from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, issued last week during his virtual address to Congress, now hangs over Biden’s entire trip: “Being the leader of the world means being the leader of peace.”

Read more here.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine may spark a food crisis in the Middle East and North Africa, as countries reliant on Ukrainian and Russian wheat imports encounter shortages, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said Wednesday.

“Food, fuel and fertilizer prices are skyrocketing, supply chains are being disrupted,” Guterres said during a meeting of the UN Security Council. “All of this is hitting the poorest the hardest, and planting the seeds for political instability and unrest around the globe.”

Guterres cited Egypt, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen as nations that import at least half of their wheat from Ukraine or Russia.

Russia’s attack on Ukraine has already caused a rise in wheat prices, adding to inflation in food prices. Wheat futures at the beginning of March were at their highest level since 2008. 

Russia and Ukraine together comprise 14% of all global wheat production and 29% of all wheat exports. 

Kharkiv resident and cellist Denys Karachevtsev performed on the streets of Kharkiv while surrounded by damaged buildings and rubble to raise awareness of the destruction and help raise funds to help restore his city.

“I love my heroic city which is now struggling to survive the war. I deeply believe that we can help. I believe we can restore and rebuild our city and our country when the war is over,” he wrote in a Facebook post.

NATO leaders will approve the deployment of four additional battle groups in Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Slovakia at their summit Thursday, US Ambassador to NATO Julie Smith said Wednesday.

She said they are “not just national forces,” saying additional details would be shared on Thursday.

Speaking at an Atlantic Council event, Smith said NATO is in discussions about its medium- and long-term force presence in its eastern flank. 

“We’re going to have to make a series of ongoing assessment about our force posture that will take us weeks and months into the future,” she said, noting “it’s still an open question” of how the alliance takes the NATO-Russia Founding Act — which NATO allies believe Russia is “in clear violation of” — and moves to its longer-term posture.

“All options are on the table,” including permanent basing, she said.

Smith claimed Poland’s proposal of a NATO peacekeeping mission for Ukraine isn’t “dead in the water,” but said there are “a lot of open-ended questions” and “allies want to know more about what Poland is suggesting here.”

“We want to encourage this type of fresh thinking,” she said. “No one ever shirks or turns away when an ally brings an idea into our discussions here.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine has put the NATO alliance and its member nations “absolutely at risk,” a Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) official told reporters on Wednesday, a month into Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

The official called Putin “reckless” and said he and his inner circle “don’t care about human life.” 

“From Russia, we realize that Putin and his close circle, they are absolutely reckless people. They don’t care about human life. They lie publicly to conceal their military operations. Putin has totally changed his speech toward the West, and he has a deep hatred of our societies, of our values, so we really assess that he is dangerous, and that the alliance is absolutely at risk,” the official said on Wednesday.

SHAPE is the headquarters of the NATO alliance military operations in Europe. It is located in Brussels, Belgium. Two SHAPE officials briefed reporters on the NATO military posture and how they are responding to Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. The briefing comes ahead of US President Joe Biden’s trip to NATO headquarters in Brussels to meet with NATO allied countries’ leaders as the Ukraine crisis continues.

The war has created a “new reality” for NATO allies, another SHAPE official said, echoing Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg’s words at a news conference earlier Wednesday.

“You just listened to the SecGen’s presser, and he said it’s a new reality and we must reset our defense and our deterrence posture,” the second SHAPE official said. “This is a permanent and profound change in the European security environment, and SecGen has said the same thing.”

The officials said it is too early to predict how NATO will permanently shift its military force posture across Europe because of Putin’s actions, but they spoke to how the posture has changed so far to reinforce the eastern flank, where NATO allied countries border Ukraine, and to ensure they are prepared for any scenario the war in Ukraine might cause for NATO countries.

Because the NATO Response Force was activated for the first time in NATO’s history, “40,000 troops” in NATO allied countries along the eastern flank are now working for the “collective security, collective defense,” of all NATO countries, not just for their own nations. There are eight battle groups, one in each eastern flank country, that are part of this NATO Response Force activation, the second SHAPE official said. 

This is a “tenfold increase” in what was there before the invasion of Ukraine, the official added.

“In the land domain, in land forces, there are now 40,000 troops in those eight battle groups, which are on the one in each country along the eastern flank, that is a tenfold increase on what was there prior to the invasion by Russia,” the second SHAPE official said.

In the air, there are an “additional 100 plus airplanes,” the official said. 

“We always do what we call air policing,” the official said, but now after the invasion started, they have eight aircraft flying to give the alliance “24/7 airborne presence on the eastern flank.”

In the waters around NATO allied countries, the alliance has “25 ships at any given time that are patrolling the waters providing 360 degree deterrence,” the official said.

“In addition to that, there’s normally about 150 ships from NATO nations additionally that are also cruising the waters and can flex back and forth under NATO command and control,” the official added. 

While it is too soon to tell what the permanent changes to NATO military force posture will be because of Putin’s invasion, the official said the current force posture “at a minimum” is a good “starting point” of what things could look like long-term. 

“We are preparing for the worst but doing everything that we can so that the worst does not happen,” the first official said.

In a joint statement with G7 health ministers, US Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra condemned Russian President Vladimir Putin’s attacks on health facilities and health workers in Ukraine.

“Intentionally directing attacks at civilians and civilian infrastructure, including health care facilities and workers, violates International Humanitarian Law. Health must remain a priority, with health workers being protected so they can provide emergency care to save lives, and with health systems and facilities being protected so that they remain accessible to all who need them,” the health ministers said in the statement. 

The ministers warned that Ukraine’s health care system is under “significant strain” and said they are concerned about aid organizations being able to deliver medical aid to those in need. 

At least 12 people have been killed and 34 people have been injured in at least 43 attacks on health care facilities in Ukraine, World Health Organization Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said last week. 

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s Health Minister Viktor Liashko said medical workers in his country should be wearing body armor.

Liashko said six medics had been killed by Russian forces and 58 ambulances had been fired upon since the start of the war.

Yulia Kesaieva in Lviv contributed reporting to this post.

Ukrainian Ambassador to the United Nations Sergiy Kyslytsya called on the General Assembly to vote in support of a resolution that calls in part for an immediate cessation of hostilities by the Russian Federation.

The resolution, which is non-binding, has been co-signed by nearly eight dozen other member countries, including the US. 

The resolution also deplores the dire humanitarian consequences since Russia’s invasion and reaffirms the commitment to the sovereignty of Ukraine and its internationally recognized borders.

Tomorrow marks a month since the invasion, Kyslytsya said, one month since the lives of Ukrainians were split in “two parts” — a peaceful past and now one full of “war, suffering, death and destruction,” he told the General Assembly at a continuation of the UN emergency meeting.

“Thousands” of Ukrainians are dead, he said, and “they died because of Russia decided to attack — attack Ukraine, attack peace, attack all of us.”

At least 902 civilians have been killed and 1,459 injured since the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said Sunday.

He described citizens “starving to death” and “killed in their attempt to flee” and cities “razed to the ground,” with neighboring countries at their limits in trying to support new refugees.

He said aligning with the resolution “will send a powerful message aimed on contributing to a breakthrough in humanitarian action on the ground.”

How Russia reacted at the UN: The Russian ambassador to the United Nations urged member countries in the General Assembly to block the Ukrainian-introduced humanitarian resolution that he said was submitted “against the backdrop of anti-Russian efforts or our western colleagues.”

Russian ambassador Vassily Nebenzia will separately re-introduce a Russian-backed humanitarian based resolution in the Security Council for a vote.

“If our western colleagues at the security council were really concerned about the humanitarian situation on the ground, then they have an opportunity to show this and vote for our humanitarian draft resolution at the security council,” he said during his speech.

Speeches are ongoing inside the General Assembly hall.

Ahead of US President Joe Biden’s trip to Brussels for urgent talks with NATO allies, the Pentagon provided the White House with a series of options for potential additional US troops in eastern Europe, according to a US official. 

Biden could announce changes to the force posture following his meetings Thursday, though any announcement would depend on conversations with allies and is not finalized. 

NATO leaders are expected to agree to strengthen NATO’s posture, including by undertaking increases to NATO forces in the eastern part of the Alliance, stepping up cyber defenses and scaling up NATO exercises.

White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Tuesday the administration believes that right now “they have effective posture today for what’s necessary today,” but added that Biden and NATO allies will discuss “longer-term adjustments to NATO force posture on the eastern flank.”  

The official said what options on forces turn into “deliverables” out of the summit remains to be seen because it requires conversation with the alliance, as well as individual countries where troops may be based. Elements of all of these options are because NATO partners are asking for troops, not the US is imposing them, the official added. 

The possibilities include:

Any use of chemical weapons by Russia would be flat-out unacceptable and “totally change the nature of the conflict” in Ukraine, NATO Secretary Jens Stoltenberg said Wednesday. 

Speaking ahead of a NATO summit in Brussels Thursday, the NATO chief warned that the use of chemical weapons would be a “blatant violation of international law and of far reaching consequences.”

Stoltenberg accused China of providing political support and of “spreading blatant lies and disinformation” and said Beijing’s role in the invasion would be addressed at the summit.

He said that China has questioned the right of independent nations to choose their own path, adding that the alliance is concerned that China could provide “material support for the Russian invasion.” 

Stoltenberg demanded that Belarus must also end its “complicity in Putin’s invasion,” and warned decisions taken at the summit tomorrow will have “far reaching implications.”

The Moscow Stock Exchange will partially reopen for trading in Russian stocks on Thursday, Russia’s Central Bank announced today.

The Central Bank of Russia said trading in 33 stocks will resume on March 24 between 9:50 a.m. and 2 p.m. local time. 

The Russian equities allowed to resume trading include big companies such as Gazprom, Lukoil, VTB Bank, Sberbank, Rusal and Rosneft.

The central bank said there will be a ban applied on short shelling for these shares. 

“The working hours of the Moscow Exchange for the following days will be announced later on the official website of the Bank of Russia,” it added.

The stock exchange has been closed for almost a month following a big sell-off due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Trading has been suspended since Feb. 28.

The first deliveries of the $800 million in new military aid that US President Joe Biden is sending to Ukraine have started to arrive in country, an administration official tells CNN.

Biden announced the new package last week after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky delivered an impassioned plea to Congress for more help. 

The US will continue to move the rest of the $800 million into Ukraine as quickly as possible, the official said, given it includes 800 Stinger anti-aircraft systems and 100 armed drones, among other assistance. Both are seen as critical to Ukraine’s defense. 

The US has nearly completed the delivery of most of the $200 million package Biden announced on March 12, including all of the Stinger anti-air systems and most of the Javelin anti-armor missiles. The remaining equipment from that package is expected to be delivered shortly, the official said, though they declined to offer an exact timeline.

The mayor of the southern Ukrainian city of Melitopol has accused occupying Russian forces of seizing businesses as living conditions for civilians deteriorate.

Mayor Ivan Fedorov was detained on March 11 but freed five days later as part of a prisoner exchange.

In comments on Wednesday, Fedorov said the “situation is difficult, because Russian soldiers have declared themselves as authorities but of course, they don’t care about people and their problems, they only care about taking the money from the businessmen, seize their businesses.”

The mayor said the city was sending requests to Russia every day to allow humanitarian aid to enter the city and people to evacuate. “So far, no reply,” he said. 

He also said Russian forces were intimidating the population and had detained a number of journalists.

Three Melitopol-based journalists, along with a retired newspaper publisher and his family, were detained by Russian forces on Monday and held for several hours before being released, according to Ukraine’s national journalists’ union.  

The four – former publisher Mykhailo Kumok, editor Yevhenia Boryan, and reporters Yulia Olkhovska and Lyubov Chaika – are all associated with the newspaper Melitopolskie Vedomosti. 

Food giant Nestle is suspending KitKat and Nesquik brands among others in Russia after criticism over the weekend by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky over its ties to Russia.

“Going forward, we are suspending renowned Nestlé brands such as KitKat and Nesquik, among others. We have already halted non-essential imports and exports into and out of Russia, stopped all advertising, and suspended all capital investment in the country. Of course, we are fully complying with all international sanctions on Russia. While we do not expect to make a profit in the country or pay any related taxes for the foreseeable future in Russia, any profit will be donated to humanitarian relief organizations,” Nestle said in a statement.

Nestle said its activities in Russia will focus on providing essential food, such as infant food and medical/hospital nutrition and not on making a profit.

“This approach is in line with our purpose and values. It upholds the principle of ensuring the basic right to food,” Nestle said. 

Some background: Over the weekend Zelensky called out Nestle for its continued relationship with Russia. 

“’Good food. Good life.’ This is the slogan of Nestlé. Your company that refuses to leave Russia,” Zelensky said Saturday during an address to the people of Switzerland. “Even now — when there are threats from Russia to other European countries. Not only to us. When there is even nuclear blackmail from Russia.” 

A Nestle spokesperson told CNN Wednesday, “We are focused on providing essential foods such as baby food and medical/hospital nutrition products. This means we will suspend the vast majority of our pre-war volume in Russia.”

The company said that is identifying solutions for its people and its factories in Russia. “We will continue to pay our people,” it said. 

It added that it will suspend the vast majority of categories, such as coffee and pet food.

Nestle announced on March 11 that it suspended exports of its products from Russia except for essential items like baby food. Nestlé also said it stopped importing Nespresso and other products into Russia, except for essential goods including baby food, cereal, tailored nutrition and therapeutic pet foods.   

US President Joe Biden warned Wednesday that the threat of Russia using chemical weapons in its ongoing attack of Ukraine was “real” as he departed the White House for a high-stakes trip to Europe to tout Western unity and support for Ukraine. 

Asked by CNN’s Jeremy Diamond about the threat of chemical warfare in Ukraine, Biden said, “I think it’s a real threat,” but declined to elaborate further before boarding Marine One. 

And asked his message to European partners, he said, “I’m going to say that to their face, I’m going to say all that I have to say, I’m going to say it when I get there. But I’ll be happy to talk to you guys when I get back.”

French authorities have frozen $800 million in assets belonging to Russian oligarchs as part of sanctions following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, French government spokesperson Gabriel Attal told journalists Wednesday. 

“These sanctions are being felt in Russia where the economy is teetering, The ruble is collapsing, the stock exchange is in large part still closed and the central bank is strongly impacted,” he said. 

“There will be no taboo if we need to go further,” Attal said about any additional sanctions.

The European Union’s latest round of sanctions in early March against Russia included measures targeting 160 oligarchs and Russian politicians. 

Russian forces have looted and destroyed a lab close to the abandoned Chernobyl nuclear power plant that was used to monitor radioactive waste, according to Ukraine’s government.

The site of the world’s worst nuclear disaster fell into Russian hands in the first week of Russia’s invasion, triggering fears that safety standards inside the exclusion zone could be compromised.

According to a Ukrainian government agency, the laboratory was part of a European Union-funded attempt to improve radioactive waste management through on-site analysis of waste samples as well as the packaging used to dispose of waste. 

The government agency also reported that samples of radionuclides — unstable atoms that can emit high levels of radiation — had been removed from the lab. It said it hoped Russia would use the samples to “harm itself, and not the civilized world.”

It is the latest scare to emerge from the infamous Ukrainian site that sits close to the border with Belarus.

More background on Chernobyl: Staff working there on the day it was captured at the end of February only recently had the chance to go home, three weeks after they were due to rotate with an incoming team. 

Local Slavutych Mayor Yuriy Fomichev spoke to CNN after the workers had been confined to the plant for 10 days, describing them then as “exhausted, both mentally and emotionally, but mainly physically.”

Fomichev said that more than 100 people were shift personnel who should have been relieved after 12 hours.

Earlier this month, the site was forced to get power from emergency diesel generators for several days before being reconnected to the national electricity grid after repairs to damaged lines.

And on Tuesday, Ukraine’s government also warned of several fires close to the plant, which it said had probably been triggered by Russian artillery or arson.

Anatoly Chubais, a Russian government insider for decades, is leaving his job as President Vladimir Putin’s special representative on the environment, Russian state news agency TASS reported Wednesday, citing an unnamed source.

Chubais is the highest-profile Russian official to quit since the war began.

Reuters reported that Chubais had left Russia and did not plan to return, also citing an unnamed source.

CNN is seeking comment from Chubais himself and has not independently confirmed that he has left Russia or the reason for his resignation.

Chubais had been in the environment job since December 2020, TASS said. He rose to prominence as Boris Yeltsin’s finance minister in the 1990s.

Eighty people have escaped towns in east Ukraine on Wednesday morning after another night of attacks by Russian forces, a regional official said. 

Authorities posted the addresses of collection points on Facebook, where people could pick up buses and small vans to drive them to railway stations and then onward to the west of Ukraine. 

The humanitarian corridor was one of nine announced by Ukraine’s government for Wednesday – others include the key link between Mariupol and Zaporizhzhia in the southeast. 

The head of the Luhansk region, which includes Rubizhne, has been reporting intense Russian assaults in his region for many days. 

Serhii Haidai said there were ongoing battles between Russian and Ukrainian forces for control of territory with Russian aircraft also targeting Rubizhne. 

Oleksandr Markushyn, mayor of the Kyiv suburb of Irpin, said the Ukrainian armed forces, territorial defense and police “have 80% of our city under control.”

Speaking on Ukrainian television, Markushyn said, “Our city is being constantly shelled by GRAD systems. Very massively. They are pounding the residential area, multi-story buildings.”

Despite mass evacuations in recent weeks, Markushyn, who said his own house had been destroyed on Wednesday, estimated that up to 6,000 people are still in Irpin and that small groups are being evacuated each day.

“Around 4,000 people do not want to leave the city at all. We help them with food and medical supplies,” he added.

The national police on Wednesday said they are resuming work in Irpin, much of which was occupied by Russian forces. It was another possible sign that Ukrainian security forces are regaining territory around the capital of Kyiv.

Irpin, a suburb located to the northwest of Kyiv, has seen weeks of fierce fighting and heavy shelling since Russia’s invasion was launched nearly four weeks ago.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has been invited to address the European Council at a summit this week, European Council President Charles Michel told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Wednesday. 

In an exclusive interview ahead of Thursday’s meeting, Michel confirmed that “we have proposed to him to address the summit.”  

He added that the European Council was the first assembly Zelensky addressed after the start of Russia’s invasion on Feb. 24.

During a sit-down interview in Brussels, Michel told Amanpour: “We must make sure that Putin will be defeated. It must be the common goal.”
“This is a question of security, for the future of Europe and for the future of the world.”

Michel said he has spoken with Zelensky and the Russian president multiple times since Russia invaded Ukraine, hoping to help them reach “a ceasefire and to make possible a sincere track in order to negotiate.”

“It’s extremely difficult, because we are not certain that the Russian government is sincere,” he added. “We are not naïve – we think that they are trying to attack military in order to strengthen their positions in the negotiation talks.”

“But on the other hand, we must change the balance of power in order to give to President Zelensky a better position in those direct talks with Russia,” Michel said.

The European Council meeting is scheduled to run from March 24-25, with Ukraine as the main topic on the agenda. US President Joe Biden is confirmed to attend Thursday to discuss Ukraine and transatlantic cooperation. 

Michel also discussed sanctions, saying the European Union “must be intelligent” on sanctions against Russia.

“We have decided unprecedented sanctions” against Russia, he said, adding “we are targeting oligarchs, we are targeting the economic sectors in Russia.” 

However, “we do not have exactly the same situation in Europe and in the United States,” the European Council President acknowledged. “The oil or the gas sector, for instance. We are much more dependent in Europe in comparison with the situation in the United States.”

“It’s why we must be intelligent. The goal is to target Russia, the goal is to be painful against Russia. The goal is not to be painful for ourselves,” he said.

When pressed on Europe’s reliance on Russia for its energy supplies, Michel conceded that “we are too much dependent on Russian gas.” However, he added this was not a recent realization, pointing to the 2020 European Green Deal as one long term solution to over-reliance on Russia.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked Japan for its immediate support of his country and urged Tokyo to apply “more pressure on Russia to help restore peace” in a video address to Japanese lawmakers on Wednesday.

“Japan helped us immediately, and we thank them from the bottom of our heart,” Zelensky said in a virtual speech in front of members of the Diet, Japan’s parliament.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, Ministers for Foreign Affairs and Defense, and Ukrainian envoy to Japan Sergiy Korsunsky were among the attendees.

Zelensky said Japan was the first Asian country to apply pressure on Russia, adding that “continued pressure on Moscow would help restore peace.”

He also warned Japanese lawmakers of reports that Russia was preparing a chemical weapons attack against Ukraine.

Zelensky’s online address marked the first time the Ukrainian President has addressed an Asian legislature, but also the first address by a foreign leader at the Japanese Diet, a spokesman for the House of Representatives told CNN.

His speech was delivered in two separate rooms of an office building of the House of Representatives (the lower house of the National Diet of Japan), not in the Diet’s plenary session hall, the spokesman added.

As Russia’s invasion of Ukraine approaches the one-month mark, fighting is raging across major cities with defending forces trying to take back some areas, according to a US official.

Russian warplanes have struck another blow against Chernihiv, destroying a bridge on one of the last remaining routes to Ukrainian-held territory, the city’s regional head Vyacheslav Chaus announced Wednesday morning.

Chernihiv, which is about halfway between Kyiv and the Russian border, has seen some of the most intense shelling since Russia invaded Ukraine four weeks ago. Among the more recent deadly attacks was one on a line of people lining up for bread, in which officials said at least 10 people died.

But on his Telegram page, Chaus struck a defiant note, promising supplies to the city would continue.

“This does not prevent us from delivering humanitarian aid to Chernihiv. We will provide the city with food and everything needed,” he said. 

“Secondly, we will definitely build a new bridge. A much better one. It was an old bridge. A city like Chernihiv, a hero city, deserves a new, cool, modern bridge, and we will definitely build it after our victory,” he said.

In another possible sign that Ukrainian security forces are regaining territory around the capital of Kyiv, national police say they are resuming work in the suburb of Irpin, much of which had been occupied by Russian forces.

Ihor Klymenko, head of the National Police of Ukraine, said Wednesday on Facebook that “police resume work in Irpin! Soldiers of the special police regiment in Kyiv region are ready to perform their police functions in this city.”

“The area is being cleared of saboteurs, but the main task now is to help civilians and to evacuate those who are still in Irpin,” Klymenko added.

Irpin is to the northwest of Kyiv and has seen weeks of fierce fighting and heavy shelling.

“Special forces work closely with Ukrainian military units and help restore the work of local authorities in the city,” he said. 

Klymenko added: “The Russian occupiers continue to mercilessly shell Irpin,” a sign that they continue to hold territory to the north of the suburb.

CNN reported Tuesday on advances by Ukrainian forces to the west and north of Kyiv.

Russia’s war in Ukraine is approaching the one-month mark, and its troops’ advancement on some key cities, including the capital of Kyiv, appears to have slowed.

So where is this war going? Here are five things to watch out for in coming weeks.

1. Russia could intensify its bombing campaign

Experts are warning that the more Russia takes a hit on the ground, the more likely it is to intensify its aerial bombing campaign and the use of other “standoff” weapons that put Russian soldiers in less danger.

There is little reliable information coming out of either Ukraine or Russia on death tolls, but a report in a Russian tabloid on Monday suggested that the Russian side had lost nearly 10,000 soldiers and that another 16,000 had been injured.

The Komsomolskaya Pravda website removed the numbers later in the day, claiming the numbers only appeared in the first place because it had been hacked. CNN could not verify the numbers, but the death toll is closer to what US intelligence agencies have been reporting.

Such losses, if proven to be true, would explain both the stall in ground movement and the uptick in aerial bombing of key cities and other standoff attacks.

2. While there’s focus on Kyiv, Russia may try to encircle Ukrainian fighters in the east

There is much talk about the Russian war effort stalling, but whether or not that’s true comes down to what Moscow’s objectives were in the first place.

It’s likely that Russia is, at the very least, trying to absorb parts of eastern Ukraine. Areas like Donetsk and Luhansk, which make up the Donbas region, have been controlled by Russian-backed separatists since 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea, and while Russia’s ambitions may stretch beyond Donbas, it’s still likely a central focus, experts say.

“The Southern Military District – in Donetsk, Luhansk, Mariupol, Berdyansk, Melitopol – these are the best troops in the Russian army. And they always work. They’re designed to fight NATO,” Sam Cranny-Evans, a research analyst with the Royal United Services Institute, told CNN.

3. There will be more talk about talks

One scenario is that the Ukraine war could become a protracted conflict. It’s likely that Russia has lost a significant number of soldiers, weapons and equipment in the war, and while it has engaged in long-running conflicts in the past, it won’t want to leave this one with its military totally destroyed.

“The negotiations are the one area where things are looking a little promising because both Russia and Ukraine have said in the last week that they’re moving towards an actual substantive discussion, instead of Russia just laying down an ultimatum,” Keir Giles, a Russian expert at the UK-based think tank Chatham House, told CNN.

Russian officials have said that their demands include Ukraine dropping its pitch to join NATO and to demilitarize and adopt a “neutral” status, like Austria and Sweden have. But the conditions for what that means for Ukraine would have to be negotiated.

4. There could be wholesale “deportations” of Ukrainians into Russia. That’s worrying

Russia has been telling residents of the southern city of Mariupol to leave as it carries on an aggressive aerial bombardment that has torn the city to pieces. Its forces have opened what they call “humanitarian corridors” to allow civilians to flee, but tens of thousands of them have been transported to Russia.

Russian state media organization RIA Novosti reported that nearly 60,000 residents of Mariupol had reached Russian territory “in complete safety.” Russian media has shown lines of vehicles apparently heading east to the border, some 25 miles (40 kilometers) from Mariupol.

But Mariupol council accused Russia of forcing residents to go to Russia against their will.

Mariupol mayor Vadym Boichenko has said that “what the occupiers are doing today is familiar to the older generation, who saw the horrific events of World War II, when the Nazis forcibly captured people.”

5. Millions more Ukrainians could flee, leaving a nation in pieces

The fate of the war is one thing, but the fate of Ukraine is another.

Already, more than 3.5 million Ukrainians have left the country. Most are women and children, meaning families are also being torn apart. The war has triggered the biggest movement of refugees Europe has seen since World War II. Those numbers are increasing at a rate of around 100,000 people a day.

If you include the number of people internally displaced, 10 million Ukrainians have now left their homes. That’s nearly a quarter of the country’s population.

Read more here:

Gutted cars following a night air raid in the village of Bushiv, 40 kilometers west of Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, March 4, 2022. Russia's war on Ukraine is now in its ninth day and Russian forces have shelled Europe's largest nuclear power plant, sparking a fire there that was extinguished overnight. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

Related article 5 things that could happen in Ukraine next | CNN

The deployment of a NATO peacekeeping mission to Ukraine would be “very reckless” and “extremely dangerous,” according to Moscow.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told journalists on Wednesday: “Any possible contact between our military and NATO military can lead to quite understandable consequences that are difficult to repair.”

Some context: Last week, Poland’s Deputy Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski called for an international peacekeeping mission to be sent to Ukraine following a meeting with the leaders of Poland, Slovenia, the Czech Republic and Ukraine.

Poland plans to submit its proposal for a peacekeeping mission in Ukraine at a NATO summit in Brussels on Thursday.

Polish Ambassador to the United States Marek Magierowski recently told CNN’s Jake Tapper that NATO needs to consider “all possibilities” in Ukraine to send a “very clear signal to the Kremlin.”

Magierowski said any peacekeeping mission would take place “without engaging Russia in direct military confrontation because this is not the intent.”

Russian troops are attempting to envelop Ukrainian forces in the east as they advance westward “from the direction of Kharkiv in the north and Mariupol in the south,” an intelligence update from the UK Ministry of Defense said on Wednesday.

The battlefield across the northern part of Ukraine “remains largely static with Russian forces likely conducting a period of reorganization before resuming large-scale offensive operations,” according to the update. 

As far as southern Ukraine is concerned, the Russian forces are still “attempting to circumvent Mykolaiv as they look to drive west towards Odesa,” it added.

Some context:

A senior US defense official said Ukrainians are fighting to push Russian forces from the northeast of Mykolaiv, forcing them to reposition south of the city.

On Monday, Mariupol rejected terms to surrender. The city is a strategic port that lies on a stretch of coast connecting the eastern region of Donbas with the Crimea peninsula, both of which have been under Russian control since 2014. Russian forces appear to be trying to take full control of the area to create a land corridor between the two regions, squeezing Mariupol with brutal military force.

Last week, Russian warships in the Black Sea shelled the Ukrainian coast in areas close to the key southern city of Odesa, according to Ukraine’s armed forces.

According to a statement posted on the Ukrainian armed forces’ Facebook page, the villages of Lebedivka, Sanzheika, Zatoka and Bilenke, all of which lie about about 18 miles (30 kilometers) south of the port city, had been shelled. 

Odesa is Ukraine’s third largest city and regarded as a key target of Russia’s campaign. 

The Russian military said Wednesday it had struck a military arsenal in northwestern Ukraine with sea-launched missiles.

CNN was not immediately able to verify that claim, but such an attack would continue an apparent campaign against targets closer to Ukraine’s western border.

“On the evening of March 22, sea-based high-precision long-range weapons targeted an arsenal in the village of Orzhiv, 14 kilometers (about 8.6 miles) northwest of the city of Rivne,” said Russian Ministry of Defense spokesperson Igor Konashenkov.

“As a result of the strike, a large arsenal of weapons and military equipment of Ukrainian troops, including those received from Western countries, was destroyed.”

On Monday, the Russian military said it fired air-launched cruise missiles at what was described as a Ukrainian military training center in Nova Lyubomyrka, located in Ukraine’s northwestern Rivne oblast.

Vitalii Koval, head of the Rivne regional administration, confirmed that two Russian missiles had struck the territory of a military training ground.

When Mykhailo “Misha” Golod stepped off the plane at Orlando International Airport in Florida on March 11, it marked the end of a marathon journey the 15-year-old and his mother had undertaken to escape the war in his homeland of Ukraine.

But his arrival in the US from Kyiv – while it assured his safety – came at a price.

Golod’s mother would soon return to Ukraine to be with his dad, who had to remain due to martial law that bans males aged 18-60 from leaving the country, and his grandparents. Although Golod thinks his grandparents and mother will travel to the US, he’s unsure when he’ll next see his father.

Although he appreciates his safety, having the majority of his family back in Ukraine in the midst of Russia’s invasion of the country has weighed heavily on him.

“It’s very devastating, but thankfully, they all have Wi-Fi and a source of internet, food, water, and I can still talk to them and make sure they’re safe,” he told CNN.

“And I know that once everything is over, I’ll definitely bring them here to be with me.”

Golod added: “My father will only be able to leave once the martial law ends. And otherwise, he’ll have to stay in there and we’ll hope for the best.”

Golod is one of the best young golfers in Ukraine and has participated in competitions around the world. After his grueling, 5,000-mile journey, it was a visa he had obtained from playing in a tournament in the US that helped him re-enter the country and find safety.

Read more about Golod’s escape from Ukraine here and watch his interview with CNN here:

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China has said no member of the G20 has the right to “expel another country” amid reports the US and its Western allies are assessing whether Russia should remain in the group of leading economies following its invasion of Ukraine.

“Russia is an important member [of the G20],” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin told reporters Wednesday, adding that Russia belonged to the world’s major economies “brought together” by the G20.

Wang also said that the G20 should “practice true multilateralism” and “strengthen solidarity and cooperation.”

Also on Wednesday, Russia’s Ambassador to Indonesia Lyudmila Vorobieva said President Vladimir Putin “wants to go” to the G20 leaders’ summit in Bali at the end of this year.

Vorobieva said Putin’s attendance would “depend on many, many things, including the Covid situation, that is getting better.”

Speaking to reporters in Jakarta, Vorobieva said she hoped “that the Indonesian government will not give in to the horrible pressure that’s being applied not only to Indonesia, but so many other countries in the world by the West.”

Indonesia currently holds the rotating chair of the G20.

“G20 is not only a summit. G20 is a process. There are a lot of meetings that were held by Indonesia both online and offline and Russia is actively participating in these meetings,” Vorobieva added.

A temporary ceasefire was expected to come into force at 9 a.m. local time Wednesday to allow civilians to flee the Luhansk region of eastern Ukraine, according to local Ukrainian administrator Governor Serhiy Gaidai on social media.

The post detailed gathering places where civilians could arrive before getting on trains taking them away from Luhansk, which sits in the disputed Donbas region.

“Attention!! A humanitarian corridor has been agreed: residents of Rubizhne, Lysychansk, Severodonetsk, Hirska Community (specifically, Nizhne) will be evacuated today,” Gadai wrote.  

Some context: Fierce fighting has gripped the Luhansk region including the alleged Russian shelling of an elderly care home, killing 56 people on March 11. On Monday, the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs accused Russian forces of forcibly deporting 2,389 children from Donetsk and Luhansk region in an incident the US Embassy labeled “kidnapping.” Russia said 16,434 people, including 2,389 children, were evacuated a day earlier of their own volition.

Protesters in the Turkish port of Bodrum tried to block “My Solaris,” a yacht with reported ties to Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, from docking on Monday.

The reported members of the Odessa Children and Youth Sailing School — commonly referred to as the Optimist Sailing Club — were carrying Ukrainian flags and signs reading “No war.”

“It was the whole team’s decision to block the approach of the yacht of the Russian oligarch Abramovich,” team coach Pavlo Dontsov told CNN.
“We raise the flag of our country at many international competitions. We just want to show everyone who Ukraine is.”

According to Marine Traffic, “My Solaris” did dock in Bodrum on Monday evening. 

The conviction Tuesday of Russian opposition figure and Kremlin critic Alexey Navalny on “new trumped-up charges” shows Moscow is intensifying its crackdown on dissent at home while it fights its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, Human Rights Watch said Wednesday.

“This verdict is apparently intended not only to silence Navalny but to serve as a warning to Russian civil society and anyone who dares to stand up to the Kremlin’s policies,” Hugh Williamson, Europe and central Asia director at Human Rights Watch said in the statement.

Already serving a two-and-a-half-year sentence, Navalny was found guilty of embezzling money from his own Anti-Corruption Foundation and sentenced to a further nine years in prison. He was also fined the equivalent of $11,200.

Navalny was detained in February 2021 upon arrival in Moscow from Berlin, Germany, where he had spent several months recovering from poisoning with nerve agent Novichok — an attack he blames on Russian security services and on President Vladimir Putin himself.

“The cases against Navalny are part of the Kremlin’s grim landscape of repression against Russia’s civil society and peaceful dissent, which has drastically intensified since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine,” Williamson said.

Russian authorities have detained thousands of protesters against the war since it began on Feb. 24.

“The Kremlin seems determined to isolate Russian society from the outside world to cut Russians off from uncomfortable facts, including about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine,” Williamson said.

When Russian armed forces launched an unprovoked assault on Ukraine last month, Beijing appeared to side with Moscow, accusing the United States and its NATO allies of inviting conflict by allowing their security bloc to expand eastward.

Now, as China faces pressure from the West to condemn the Russian invasion, it’s ramping up similar rhetoric to talk about America’s footprint in Asia.

In recent days, senior Chinese Foreign Ministry officials and influential Communist Party publications have accused the US of seeking to build a NATO-like bloc in the Indo-Pacific, with one official warning of “unimaginable” consequences if it does.

At a conference in Beijing on Saturday, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Le Yucheng said the Ukraine crisis could be used as a “mirror” to view the security situation in the Asia-Pacific region.

Le didn’t name the US, but he explicitly referred to the Indo-Pacific strategy — a plan the Biden administration detailed last month to strengthen America’s role in the region, such as through supporting democracy and bolstering its alliances and partnerships, including with Taiwan.

Read the full analysis:

SOUTH CHINA SEA (July 27, 2021) Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 211 (VMFA-211) conducts flight deck operations onboard the Royal Navy aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth (R 08) in the South China Sea on July 27, 2021. VMFA-211 is attached to the United Kingdom's Carrier Strike Group 21, a UK-led international strike group including support from the U.S. Navy Arleigh Burke guided-missile destroyer USS The Sullivans (DDG 68) and The Royal Netherlands Navy HNLMS Evertsen (F 805). A free and open Indo-Pacific region that is peaceful and stable is vital to ensuring greater prosperity for the region and the world.

Related article What China really means when it talks about NATO's eastward expansion | CNN

President Joe Biden departs Wednesday on one of the highest-stakes presidential trips in recent memory, a moment for the US President to assume leadership of a newly united West.

The trip could still underscore the alliance’s limits in ending the bloodshed in Ukraine, with Western leaders struggling to find ways to halt Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war. 

So far, the punishing Western sanctions haven’t stopped Putin; it’s unclear whether the new steps expected this week, including sanctions on hundreds of members of Russia’s lower legislative body, will be different.

Emergency summits in Brussels, Belgium, of NATO, the European Union and the G7 will focus on displays of cooperation in punishing Russia and providing support to Ukraine as it comes under fire. A stop afterward in Poland is meant to highlight the massive refugee crisis that’s followed Russia’s invasion as well as to reassure allies on NATO’s eastern edge.

For Biden, the last-minute talks are a venue to demonstrate the foreign policy credentials he promised as a candidate when he vowed to restore American leadership and repair broken alliances.

Read the full story:

WASHINGTON, DC - MARCH 16: U.S. President Joe Biden speaks on Ukraine during an event in the South Court Auditorium at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building near the White House on March 16, 2022 in Washington, DC. President Biden delivered remarks on U.S. assistance to Ukraine. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Related article Biden heads across the Atlantic to rally the West at a pivotal moment for Ukraine -- and his presidency | CNN Politics

Russia has begun firing on the besieged city of Mariupol from the Sea of Azov, a senior US defense official said, as a Ukrainian counteroffensive appears to be pushing back Russian forces from around the capital, Kyiv.

Here are the latest developments in the war:

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said sooner or later Russian pilots will be held responsible for killing civilians.

“I would like to repeat this again to all Russian pilots, they are not thinking about the orders they are fulfilling. Because killing civilians is a crime. And you will be responsible for this whether it is today or tomorrow, this is inevitable,” he said during an address posted to the Ukrainian government’s Facebook page. 
“Especially we are talking about a bomber plane over Mariupol, and that will happen to everyone who is killing our civilians, in our peaceful land,” he said.

Without offering evidence, Zelensky claimed that Ukrainian Armed Forces took down a Russian plane near Chornobaivka, in Kherson.

Ukrainian forces have been trying in the last few days to regain territory from the Russians, according to a senior US defense official, who described them as “able and willing” to do so.

Here’s the situation on the ground:

Counterattacks near the capital: A Ukrainian counterattack north and west of Kyiv appeared to have made some headway, jeopardizing Russian efforts to encircle the capital and threatening the ability of Russian forces to resupply the forward units that are exposed to the north of the city.  

Makariv: One such area is Makariv, a strategic town 30 miles (48 kilometers) west of Kyiv. After days of fighting, Ukrainian forces regained control of the town, the Armed Forces of Ukraine said in a Facebook post Tuesday. CNN could not confirm the claim. Makariv had sustained significant damage from ongoing Russian airstrikes, with video showing widespread devastation. If Ukrainian forces consolidate their control of Makariv, it would become more difficult for Russian forces to secure the western approaches to Kyiv and then push further south.

North of Kyiv: There are also indications that Russian forces have suffered setbacks to the north of Kyiv in areas they have held almost since the beginning of the invasion. A brief video geolocated by CNN showed Ukrainian troops walking in the town of Moschun, about 20 miles (35 kilometers) north of the capital. Ukrainian drone video geolocated during the weekend showed the destruction of Russian armor in the same area.  

Flooding of Irpin River: Satellite images from Monday showed growing flooding from the Irpin River. CNN previously reported that a dam along the Dnieper River was flooding the Irpin River basin and its tributaries. The river is critical to the Russian advance toward Kyiv; if the Russians cannot cross it, they can’t take Kyiv from the west. It’s unclear how the dam began flooding: whether the gates were opened on purpose by the Ukrainians, or it was hit by a military strike. 

Borodyanka: Some 12 miles (20 kilometers) north of Makariv is the town of Borodyanka, which has been held by Russian and Chechen forces since early in the campaign. If the Ukrainians were to take Borodyanka, forward Russian units could be cut off. The battlefield is fluid, and the Russians could reverse recent losses. But if the Ukrainians hold Makariv and extend their control over the area, Russian positions between the town and Kyiv would become vulnerable, further impeding their goal of pushing south beyond the main east-west highway to encircle the capital.

Kherson and Mykolaiv: A senior US defense official said Ukrainians are fighting to take back the southern city of Kherson, as well as pushing Russian forces from the northeast of Mykolaiv, forcing them to reposition south of the city. The official cautioned that the US cannot say whether these moves are part of a “larger operational plan” by the Ukrainians or not, but called the Ukrainian defense “nimble” and “agile.”

US President Joe Biden plans to slap sanctions this week on hundreds of Russians serving in the country’s lower legislative body, an official familiar with the announcement said.

The move is expected to kick off a slew of new steps to punish Russia for its war in Ukraine. 

Biden is expected to unveil the new sanctions on members of the Duma while in Europe for a series of snap summits this week. The US had already sanctioned some members of the body, but this week’s announcement will expand the list. 

Earlier, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan previewed sweeping sanctions enacted together with US allies that are set to be announced Thursday. 

He said the steps would ensure individuals aren’t able to evade sanctions already imposed by the West. 

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s chief spokesman has conceded that Russia has yet to achieve any of its military goals in Ukraine and refused to deny that Moscow could resort to the use of nuclear weapons.

In an interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Tuesday, Dmitry Peskov repeatedly refused to rule out that Russia would consider using nuclear weapons against what Moscow saw as an “existential threat.” When asked under what conditions Putin would use Russia’s nuclear capability, Peskov replied, “if it is an existential threat for our country, then it can be.”

Putin has previously hinted at using nuclear weapons against nations that he saw as a threat to Russia. Back in February, the Russian President said in a televised statement, “No matter who tries to stand in our way or all the more so create threats for our country and our people, they must know that Russia will respond immediately, and the consequences will be such as you have never seen in your entire history.”

He then said in a televised meeting with Russian defense officials that “officials in leading NATO countries have allowed themselves to make aggressive comments about our country, therefore I hereby order the Minister of Defense and the chief of the General Staff to place the Russian Army Deterrence Force on combat alert.”

The spokesman also claimed that the “special military operation” — the Kremlin’s official euphemism for Russia’s invasion in Ukraine — was “going on strictly in accordance with the plans and the purposes that were established before hand.”

Peskov also repeated Putin’s demands, saying that the “main goals of the operation” are to “get rid of the military potential of Ukraine,” to ensure Ukraine is a “neutral country,” to get rid of “nationalist battalions,” for Ukraine to accept that Crimea — annexed by Russia in 2014 — is part of Russia and to accept that the breakaway statelets of Luhansk and Donetsk “are already independent states.”

Read more:

Related article Putin spokesman refuses to rule out use of nuclear weapons if Russia faced an 'existential threat'

The US and NATO believe that Belarus could “soon” join Russia in its war against Ukraine, US and NATO officials tell CNN, and that the country is already taking steps to do so.

It is increasingly “likely” that Belarus will enter the conflict, a NATO military official said on Monday. “(Russian President Vladimir) Putin needs support. Anything would help,” the official explained.

A Belarusian opposition source said that Belarusian combat units are ready to go into Ukraine as soon as in the next few days, with thousands of forces prepared to deploy. In this source’s view, this would have less of an impact militarily than it will geopolitically, given the implications of another country joining the war.

A senior NATO intelligence official said separately that the alliance assesses that the Belarusian government “is preparing the environment to justify a Belarusian offensive against Ukraine.”

Russia has launched its attack on Ukraine in part from Belarus’ territory, and thousands of Russian troops amassed in Belarus ahead of the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine last month, which the two countries had claimed was for training exercises. US and European sanctions in response to the war have targeted both Russian and Belarusian officials, including Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.

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Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko.

Related article Belarusian military could 'soon' join war in Ukraine, US and NATO officials say

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Tuesday urged “more sanctions, more pressure” against Russia as the war keeps on ravaging Ukraine.

“Ukraine to Russian forces is the wall that separates them from Europe. But barbarians must not pass,” Zelensky told Italian lawmakers during a virtual address.

“We need more sanctions, more pressure so that Russia looks not for reserves of mercenaries in Libya, but so that Russia looks for peace, so that that one man seeks peace,” he added.

The Russian invasion “will ruin more lives, more families, and the full-scale war will continue. Unfortunately, Russian missiles artillery is not stopping the bombing of our cities, all of the some of them have been almost destroyed completely,” he said, adding that in Mariupol there is nothing left, “just ruins like armageddon.”

“You know who brought war to Ukraine you know them very well. You know who is ordering war and who is promoting it. Almost all of them use Italy as a holiday resort. So do not be a resort for them. Block their properties, seize their accounts, their yachts from Scheherazade to the smallest one.”

It’s been nearly a month since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, deploying tens of thousands of troops into an offensive against its neighbor from three sides.

While Ukraine’s military is much smaller, its forces have mounted a fierce resistance that has managed to hold off Russian advances in some parts of the country. A senior NATO intelligence official said Monday signs were pointing to a stalemate emerging in Russia’s offensive, with Russian ground forces remaining stalled and Russian combat aircraft unable to achieve air superiority.

Precisely how many Russian troops have been killed in their campaign thus far is unclear.

On March 2, a Russian Defense Ministry spokesman put the number of dead Russian military personnel at 498. But that number has not been updated by officials since then.

Then on Monday a pro-Putin Russian tabloid published — then later removed — a report with an updated toll of 9,861 Russian armed forces deaths in the war in Ukraine, citing the Russian Defense Ministry.

The report from the tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda originally read: “According to the Russian Defense Ministry, during the special operation in Ukraine, the Russian Armed Forces lost 9861 people killed and 16153 wounded.”

CNN analyzed the website’s HTML code, which indicated that the article was published on Monday at 12:09 a.m. Moscow time.

Seconds after CNN read the original article — at 9:56 p.m. Moscow time, according to the HTML code – the story was updated and all references to the death count were removed. That update on the outlet’s website came shortly after the article began to get attention from social media posts, which referenced the death count.

The original report from the tabloid is in line with US Department of Defense estimates that there have been up to 10,000 Russian military deaths. Ukraine has put the number even higher.

CNN is not able to independently verify any of these figures.

After the update, Komsomolskaya Pravda, published a statement saying that “access to administrator interface was hacked” and that “a fake insert was made into a publication.”
They claimed that “inaccurate information was immediately removed.” CNN analysis showed that the update came after 21 hours.

The Kremlin dodged questions on the course of the war in Ukraine, which were put to the Defense Ministry on Tuesday. The ministry said it “does not have the authority” to publicize a count of Russia’s military deaths while the “military operation” is still ongoing.

CNN’s Natasha Bertrand, Paul P. Murphy, Vasco Cotovio and Nathan Hodge contributed reporting to this post.