April 23, 2023 Russia-Ukraine news

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and his US counterpart, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, don't plan to meet on the sidelines of the United Nations Security Council meeting Lavrov is chairing Monday, according to Russian officials.

Tensions continue to rise between Russia and the United States over Moscow's invasion of Ukraine and deepening diplomatic rows.

"There are no such plans. By and large, we do not have an agenda with the Americans for discussion at the ministerial level at the moment," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Sunday, according to Russian state news agency RIA Novosti.

Spat over visas: Moscow has ramped up its rhetoric in a diplomatic dispute with Washington leading up to the meeting.

Russia “will not forgive” the US for not issuing visas to Russian journalists to travel to the US and cover Lavrov's remarks, the foreign minister told journalists in an interview Sunday.

Russian state media indicated Moscow will take retaliatory steps against US reporters.

CNN has reached out to the US State Department for comment but has not heard back.

Russia and the UN: This month, Russia is head of the UN Security Council — the very body where members have slammed Moscow for its invasion of Ukraine — because of procedural rules that see each member state rotate through leadership of the council alphabetically.

While the leadership position doesn't allow Moscow to make unilateral decisions for the body, it has used its post to maneuver meetings on Ukraine and portray the US and other Western countries as making false accusations against Russia.

In addition to chairing Monday's meeting, Lavrov is set to meet with United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres in New York this week. The leaders are expected to discuss the Black Sea grain deal.

CNN's Richard Roth contributed to this report.

The son of Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov, Nikolai Peskov, claims he served in Russia's Wagner mercenary force in Ukraine.

"I considered it my duty ... I couldn't sit on the sidelines and watch friends and other people go there," Peskov said in an interview with Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda. "When I went there, I had to change my last name. Nobody really knew who I was."

He said he served for nearly six months and received the Medal for Courage.

CNN could not independently verify the claims. 

Why it's notable: Children of government figures and Russia's elite have received criticism in the past for failing to fight in Ukraine or go to the front lines.

More background: Nikolai Peskov's interview comes after the leader of Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin, said Friday that the Kremlin spokesperson's son had served as a gunner with his mercenary force.

Prigozhin did not specify what period of time he was talking about.

According to Prigozhin, Nikolai Peskov served with the Wagner Group for six months under false documents with a different last name, working as a loader of an ammunition supply vehicle. The Wagner chief said Peskov attended a three-week training at their base in Molkino and later "left for Luhansk." 

The outspoken Wagner boss has a track record of making unsubstantiated claims, often employing sarcasm, and CNN is unable to verify his claim.

CNN has reached out to Dmitry Peskov for comment but is yet to receive a response. 

Russia’s defense ministry has unveiled a new effort to bolster its forces fighting in Ukraine – an advertising campaign calling on Russians to become “real men” and highlighting the financial benefits of signing up. 

In the video, released on Telegram, three men are shown. 

The first is a security guard. “Is this the kind of defender you wanted to become?” the voiceover asks.

Next, a fitness trainer is seen, along with the caption: “Is your power really in this?”

Then, a taxi driver, with the question, “Is this kind of path you wanted to choose?”

Finally, all three men are shown in full military gear. The slogan, "You're a man. Be him," appears. 

Key context: Russia is known to have difficulties recruiting for its war.

President Putin signed laws making it harder to evade conscription earlier this month. During Russia’s partial mobilization last September, men dodged the draft by leaving their registered addresses, not signing for draft letters and warning their family to do the same.

Putin's move to block such loopholes has spurred fears in Russia that more citizens may soon be mobilized to fight in Ukraine.

Britain’s Ministry of Defence alluded to the new Russian video campaign in its latest update, saying it was “highly unlikely” the campaign would attract the 400,000 volunteers Russia is reportedly seeking. 

Six Leopard 2 tanks left Spain and are set to reach Ukraine in less than a week, Spanish Minister of Defense Margarita Robles said this weekend. The United States, meanwhile, will start training Ukrainian forces on its Abrams tanks next month, seeking to get them on the battlefield against Russia before the end of the summer.

But even with shipments and training underway, the fighting vehicles donated by NATO allies to Ukraine will not have an immediate impact on its war with Russia, experts warn.

Steep learning curve: Modern main battle tanks are complicated pieces of weaponry. Looking formidable and rugged on the outside, much of their effectiveness on the battlefield comes down to sophisticated electronic and computer systems at their core. Those systems find targets and train the tank’s main gun on them.

Maintaining the tanks, repairing them and supplying the parts necessary requires detailed training all the way from the crews in the vehicles to the logistics trail supporting them, hundreds or maybe thousands of miles from the front lines in eastern Ukraine.

Logistical challenges: In addition to the time needed to train fighters, the tanks need to be maintained, officials said, which means managing the supply chain.

Because the Abrams is American-made, for example, it has “a very long logistics tail stretching back to the US,” said Drew Thompson, visiting senior research fellow at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore.

Key components that wear out or are damaged in battle will need to be replaced with US parts, which would have to be sent to a repair depot in Ukraine or possibly Poland, which is in the process of acquiring its own fleet of Abrams.

Thompson said the Pentagon is good at solving difficult logistical issues, “but the risk is high to both the US and Ukraine.”

“Being able to support Leopards from a European logistics base is definitely preferable,” Thompson said, referring to the model of tanks employed in 13 European countries.

The sheer number of Leopards available makes the support process easier, according to Drummond, who is an adviser to the manufacturer of the German tanks. More than 4,000 of the tanks are in service, and that means “spare parts are readily available from multiple sources,” he said.

CNN's Al Goodman, Duarte Mendonca, Haley Britzky and Heather Chen contributed reporting to this post.

Residents remain sheltered underground in the southeast Ukrainian city of Orikhiv, facing a constant Russian onslaught that makes it too dangerous to return to the surface.

CNN's chief international security correspondent Nick Paton Walsh and his team narrowly escaped a missile strike while reporting in the area this week.

The crew was leaving Orikhiv after receiving a warning of incoming strikes. As they drove, a missile landed between the armored car carrying Paton Walsh and a trailing vehicle with his producer.

After a few tense moments, the two teams were able to communicate via radio and left the area safely.

Escape from Russia's onslaught isn't a practical reality for many Ukrainians, however. Paton Walsh and his team visited an underground shelter where residents had access to the only electricity and running water in town.

Fighting could only intensify near Orikhiv if Ukraine launches an expected counteroffensive this spring. It's a key territory for potentially cutting off Crimea — which Russia has claimed as annexed since 2014 — from the rest of Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has repeatedly vowed to take back Crimea from Russian rule.

For Yulia Laputina, Ukraine’s minister of veterans affairs, a visit to Arlington National Cemetery was a deeply moving experience.

“I really appreciated this incredible memorializing and respect for the people who defended your country,” Laputina, who is a veteran herself, told CNN Thursday.

Ukraine plans to draw inspiration from Arlington as the country works to create its own version of a memorial and military cemetery in its capital city of Kyiv, she said.

On Thursday, the mayor of Kyiv, Vitali Klitschko, announced the city council had “started the procedure for establishing the National Military Memorial Cemetery,” and had allocated land for its creation. According to his post on Facebook, the cemetery is nearly 250 acres.

Ukraine’s creation of a military cemetery is just one initiative that the war-torn nation plans to undertake to honor and support its veterans – a population that will grow immensely due to Russia’s war in Ukraine. There are expected to be around four million veterans and family members by the time the war comes to an end, Laputina said.

About 80% of the half million veterans that were registered with the veterans affairs office when the most recent conflict began have gone back to the battlefield, she told CNN.

The minister came to Washington, DC, to discuss best practices and to urge specific funding from the US government to help support her office’s efforts.

The United States has given billions of dollars in direct budgetary support to Ukraine, but none of the money is specifically allocated for veterans affairs, Laputina said.

Read more here.

Russia continued its bombardment of Ukrainian towns and cities along the length of the war’s front line overnight Saturday into Sunday, Ukrainian officials said.

Missile, artillery and drone attacks reached from Kharkiv in the northeast to Odesa in the southwest, according to the officials.

In Odesa, the Ukrainian military’s southern command said Russia aimed self-detonating drones at the city’s air defenses. No casualties were reported.

Over 70 artillery attacks in Zaporizhzhia left at least one man hurt and 10 houses destroyed, according to Yurii Malashko, head of the region's military administration.

A Russian attack destroyed a nine-story building in Vuhledar, of the eastern Donetsk region, according to the regional leader Pavlo Kyrylenko. Russia suffered a shambolic defeat near Vuhledar earlier in the year.

Further north, Russia hit the city of Kharkiv and broader Kharkiv region with missile attacks, destroying homes and private property, according to Ukrainian authorities.

This map shows the latest picture of the situation on the ground:

More than 3,000 people were evacuated Saturday from residential buildings in the Russian city of Belgorod after a bomb was found close to the area accidentally bombed by Russia’s air force earlier this week, Russian state media reported.

Explosives specialists assessed the device and said there was no danger of explosion, according to TASS.

Late on Thursday, a Russian warplane dropped a bomb on Belgorod – a city of more than 400,000 people close to the border with Ukraine – leaving a large crater, blowing a car onto a roof and damaging nearby buildings.

Two people were reported injured in the explosion, local officials said.

State media blamed an “accidental” or “emergency” drop of munition for the incident.

Read more here.

Six Leopard 2 tanks bound for Ukraine have left the Spanish port city of Santander in northern Spain and are en route to their destination, the Spanish Minister of Defense Margarita Robles says.

Robles told journalists the tanks left Santander “along with 20 heavy transport vehicles” and the trip by sea would take from five to six days.

Some context: Ukraine has been reliant on outdated Soviet-era tanks throughout the Russian invasion and has appealed to the West for modern battle tanks to bolster Kyiv’s forces.

Spain is only the latest Western power to send tanks, but as we have previously reported they are unlikely to be an immediate game-changer on the battlefield.