Russia invades Ukraine

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

In the early morning hours on Sunday in Ukraine, these are the latest developments in the war:

Putin appoints new commander for Ukraine: Russian President Vladimir Putin has named Army Gen. Alexander Dvornikov – commander of Russia’s Southern Military District – as theater commander of Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine.

Dvornikov’s appointment comes as Putin’s military shifts plans after a failure to take Kyiv, according to a US official and a European official. 

A new theater commander with extensive combat experience could bring a level of coordination to an assault now expected to focus on the Donbas region, instead of multiple fronts.  

Zelensky thanks UK for sending more lethal aid including anti-ship missiles, armored vehicles: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked the United Kingdom and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Saturday for providing military support to Ukraine. 

In his nightly address posted to social media, Zelensky said, “Boris was among those who didn’t doubt for a minute whether to support Ukraine. The leadership of Great Britain, in providing our country help in defense and also leadership in the sanctions policy, will always be in history.”
“Ukraine will always be grateful for this to Boris and Britain,” Zelensky said. 

Russia’s departure from northern Ukraine shows evidence of non-combatants being targeted, UK Military Intelligence says: Russia’s departure from northern Ukraine shows evidence of non-combatants being disproportionately targeted, according to a Saturday UK military intelligence update.

The evidence includes mass graves, the fatal use of hostages as human shields and mining of civilian infrastructure, the update said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has appointed a new general to direct the war in Ukraine as his military shifts plans after a failure to take Kyiv, according to a US official and a European official. 

The officials told CNN Army Gen. Alexander Dvornikov, commander of Russia’s Southern Military District, has been named theater commander of Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine   

A new theater commander with extensive combat experience could bring a level of coordination to an assault now expected to focus on the Donbas region, instead of multiple fronts.  

Dvornikov, 60, was the first commander of Russia’s military operations in Syria, after Putin sent troops there in September 2015 to back the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. During Dvornikov’s command in Syria from September 2015 to June 2016, Russian aircraft backed the Assad regime and its allies as they laid siege to rebel-held eastern Aleppo, bombarding densely populated neighborhoods and causing major civilian casualties. The city fell to Syrian government forces in December 2016.  

Russian forces have used a similarly heavy-handed approach in parts of Ukraine, striking residential buildings in major cities and demolishing much of the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol.  

“We will see how effective that proves to be,” the European official said. “The Russian doctrine, the Russian tactics remain pretty much as they’ve been since Afghanistan.” 
“They do things in the same old way,” the official added. 

Military analysts and US officials familiar with intelligence assessments have speculated Russia’s generals have a goal of presenting Putin with some tangible battlefield progress ahead of Victory Day on May 9, when Russia observes the defeat of Nazi Germany and traditionally marks the occasion with a parade in Moscow’s Red Square.   

The European official described it as a “self-imposed deadline,” that could lead the Russians to make additional mistakes. 

But it could also potentially lead Russian forces to commit more atrocities, as allegedly happened in the Kyiv suburb of Bucha while under Russian occupation. “The stench of these war crimes is going to hang over these Russian armed forces for many years,” the official said. 

Former UK ambassador to Russia Sir Roderic Lyne told Sky News on Saturday Moscow has appointed a new general with a “pretty savage track record in Syria to try to at least gain some territory in Donetsk that Putin could present as a victory.”  

Assigning a new overall commander for Russia’s war in Ukraine may be an attempt to create a more cohesive strategy. CNN previously reported that Russia had no theater-wide commander for Ukraine operations, meaning units from different Russian military districts have been operating without coordination and sometimes at cross purposes, according to two US defense officials.  

The US has previously assessed Putin would likely name a general whose forces have been operating in Ukraine’s south because that is where the Russians have taken and held more territory, as opposed to the Russian bid to encircle Kyiv and cities in northern Ukraine, an effort that recently ended with a withdrawal. 

Ukraine’s General Staff said Friday Russian forces had completed their withdrawal from Ukraine’s northern Sumy region, while continuing a buildup of forces in the country’s east.  

Russia’s departure from northern Ukraine shows evidence of non-combatants being disproportionately targeted, according to a Saturday UK military intelligence update.

The evidence includes mass graves, the fatal use of hostages as human shields and mining of civilian infrastructure, the update said.

“Russian forces continue to use IEDs to inflict casualties, lower morale, and restrict Ukrainian freedom of movement,” the update read.

The update added Russian forces “continue to attack infrastructures with high risk of collateral harm to civilians, including a nitrate acid tank at Rubizhne, Ukraine.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked the United Kingdom and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Saturday for providing military support to Ukraine. 

In his nightly address posted to social media, Zelensky said, “Boris was among those who didn’t doubt for a minute whether to support Ukraine. The leadership of Great Britain, in providing our country help in defense and also leadership in the sanctions policy, will always be in history. 

“Ukraine will always be grateful for this to Boris and Britain,” Zelensky said. 

Johnson met with Zelensky in a surprise Saturday visit to Kyiv to outline the UK’s plan to provide further financial and military support. 

UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss tweeted the UK is sending additional “lethal aid” to Ukraine, including 120 more armored vehicles; new anti-ship missile systems; and $130 million in high-grade military equipment.

“The other democratic Western countries should follow the example of the United Kingdom,” Zelensky said.

Later on Saturday in his nightly address, Zelensky said: “Boris Johnson was today very specific also in his responses to my questions, as always. And we have already established with him what help Great Britain will provide for rebuilding Ukraine after the war. The British are ready to lead the restoration of Kyiv and Kyiv region.” 

If you’re just joining us, here’s what you need to know about where things stand with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Foreign leaders travel to Kyiv to meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky:

Some diplomatic operations begin resuming in Kyiv:

The European Union announced Saturday that it would resume diplomacy out of the capital. Italy also announced it would move back its embassy to Kyiv from Lviv, where it had relocated as Russian aggression escalated in the country. Slovenia reopened its embassy in Kyiv on March 28, according to Slovenia’s Foreign Ministry.

Radiation levels in Chernobyl:

Petro Kotin, the head of Ukraine’s state nuclear power operator Energoatom, visited one of the sections of the so-called Red Forest in Chernobyl’s exclusion zone along with specialists and observed “abnormally high” radiation in areas where the Russian troops dug trenches and tried to build fortifications.

Based on data, a statement said, “all the occupiers who were based in and entrenched in the Red Forest, in almost 30 days, should expect radiation sickness of varying degrees of severity.”

An update on casualties:

All the people injured in the railway station strike on Friday have been evacuated from the city, with most moved to the regional center of Dnipro, and some to Kyiv, a local hospital official in Kramatorsk told CNN. A total of 80 adults and 19 children were injured, with 20 of the injured in serious condition. Ukrainian officials have said 52 people were killed in the strike.

At least 176 children have died and more than 324 have been injured as a result of Russian aggression, the Ukrainian Parliament, Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, said in a tweet on Saturday. The figures are not final as destruction in hard-hit areas continues to be assessed, it added.

Petro Kotin, the head of Ukraine’s state nuclear power operator Energoatom, visited one of the sections of the so-called Red Forest in Chernobyl’s exclusion zone along with specialists and observed “abnormally high” radiation in areas where the Russian troops dug trenches and tried to build fortifications.

In a statement on Telegram, Energoatom said, “abnormally high rates of radiation were recorded” in the area.

Indications of external irradiation were 10-15 times higher than normal, and that possible internal radiation received from contact with the soil surface could be 160 times more than the norm, he added.

“Another factor of internal irradiation is Alpha pollution formed as a result of fragments of irradiated nuclear fuel, graphite masonry scattered on this section of the Red Forest” after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster,” the statement read. “These fragments are now located at a depth of 40-80 centimeters, while the occupiers dug deeper. When inside the human body, this type of radiation has an effect tens and hundreds of times more powerful than that from gamma and beta radiation.”

In a separate statement, Energoatom said Russian troops who occupied the territory of the Chernobyl plant “also looted and destroyed the offices and laboratory of the Institute for Nuclear Safety. They took away computers, office equipment, smashed or destroyed laboratory equipment and measuring devices, and looted garages with vehicles used to deliver scientists to research sites.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is calling for “even more pressure” on Russia with assistance to Ukrainians in “defense, as well as sanctions.” 

Zelensky made the comments during a joint news conference with UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson following their meeting in Kyiv after the latter traveled to Kyiv on a surprise visit.

Other countries should follow the example of the United Kingdom, Zelensky said, adding it is time “to impose a full embargo on Russia’s energy sector, to increase the provision of weapons to Ukraine.”

“We need to further strengthen our anti-war coalition. We hope that London will play a key role in this process,” he said.

Zelensky said the two leaders also talked about rebuilding of Ukraine.

“Together, we will be rebuilding our country and our cities,” he said.

All the people injured in the railway station strike on Friday have been evacuated from the city, most moved to the regional center of Dnipro, and some to Kyiv, a local hospital official in Kramatorsk told CNN.

A total of 80 adults and 19 children were injured. 20 of the injured are in serious condition.

Ukrainian officials have said 52 people were killed in the strike.

The “Stand Up for Ukraine” global pledging event and campaign aimed to help Ukrainians fleeing the Russian invasion has raised more than €10 billion since its launch on March 26, the European Commission said in a statement Saturday. 

From the total funds, €1 billion come from the European Commission and €1 billion in a loan from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development to cover the needs of the people displaced by the violence in and outside Ukraine, according to the statement. 

The “Stand Up For Ukraine” online pledging event concludes a broader social media campaign launched by the European Commission and the government in Canada that “answers a call for support launched by the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky,” according to the statement. 

“The solidarity of countries, companies and people worldwide offers some light in this dark hour,” EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in the statement. “We will continue providing support. And once the bombs have stopped falling, we will help the people of Ukraine rebuild their country. We will continue to Stand up for Ukraine.”

“Whether it’s food, water, shelter, or medical aid – we will continue to have your backs and provide the assistance you need at this time. We are standing up for Ukraine,” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in the statement. 

Ukrzaliznytsia, Ukraine’s state railway, will leave seat number 52 vacant on trains across the country in memory of the 52 people killed in in a Russian missile strike on a train station in Kramatorsk, it said in a statement Saturday.

“The brutal murder of 52 Ukrainian civilians by a Russian missile at the Kramatorsk railway station cannot be forgotten,” the statement read. “Today, April 9, Ukrzaliznytsia is leaving seats No. 52 empty in several trains across the country in memory of those killed in Kramatorsk. Instead of passengers, flowers will go in their places today.”

An Ukrzaliznytsia official said earlier Saturday the railway had evacuated 3.5 million people since the beginning of the Russian invasion.

Russian forces had hit a storage tank holding “remnants” of nitric acid, sending up a plume that he said was not a threat to the local population, Serhii Haidai, the head of Ukraine’s Luhansk regional military administration, said Saturday.

“There were some remnants of nitric acid — around three tons,” he said in televised remarks. “The local population is not under threat, as the impact zone around the acid tank is not more than 550 meters. Thank God, there wasn’t that much acid left.” 

A video posted on Haidai’s official Telegram channel showed an orange plume in the sky from the site of the shelling. 

Haidai also reported heavy Russian shelling of communities of Rubizhne, Popasna and Hirske.

Ukrainian authorities were continuing evacuations of civilians, one day after a Russian missile strike on a train station where Ukrainian civilians had assembled to evacuate from the eastern Donbas region, he added.

“We have changed the railway stations for evacuation, I’m not going to name those, but we have changed them and the evacuation is ongoing,” he said. 

“It’s difficult to say how many people are still staying, because there is constant shelling and people are hiding in the shelters,” Haidai said. “But in total, only 30% of population of all region has stayed.”

The Ukrainian military’s Office of Strategic Communications posted a photo Saturday that purports to show dead Russian servicemen left behind in a common grave after fighting in Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region.

“The myth is that the Russians do not leave their dead,” the statement read. “When clearing the settlement of Vilkhivka, a common grave of the occupiers was discovered by soldiers the 92nd Mechanized Brigade near Kharkiv.” 

CNN could not immediately verify the authenticity of the photo, which shows at least 10 bodies in Russian uniform.

“We don’t leave ours behind” is one of the unofficial slogans of the Russian war in Ukraine. 

The statement claimed that soldiers of the 92nd Mechanized Brigade and volunteer detachments near Kharkiv destroyed two Russian battalion tactical groups on March 30. 

Fighting has continued in the region of the northeastern city of Kharkiv.

It was “being shelled practically all day long” and a Russian offensive was expected in Kharkiv region, from direction of Izium, Vadym Denysenko, an adviser to the Interior Minister of Ukraine, had said in remarks on national television Saturday.

“Russians continue to build up the forces on this direction,” he said. “We understand that one of the key tasks of RF [Russian forces] is to reach Donbas, Donetsk region, or to be more specific Slovyansk and Kramatorsk from Izium side. So this is one of the most difficult directions as of today.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky welcomed British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on Saturday, the Press Service of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine said on its official Twitter account Saturday. 

Johnson “is one of the most principled opponents of the Russian invasion, a leader on sanctions pressure on Russia and defense support for Ukraine. Welcome to Kyiv, my friend!,” Zelensky is quoted as saying in the caption. 

The press service also released several photos from the unannounced visit showing the two leaders holding a meeting. 

Johnson also tweeted about the meeting on Saturday, saying the meeting with Zelensky in Kyiv was “a show of our unwavering support for the people of Ukraine.”

“We’re setting out a new package of financial & military aid which is a testament of our commitment to his country’s struggle against Russia’s barbaric campaign,” Johnson said in a post that features a photo of the two leaders shaking hands.

Austria’s Chancellor Karl Nehammer also traveled to Kyiv and met with Zelensky on Saturday. 

On Friday, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and EU’s top diplomat Josep Borrell also traveled to Ukraine to meet with Zelensky and Ukrainian officials.

Austria’s Chancellor Karl Nehammer said Saturday his country is military neutral, “but we understand we have to help where injustice and war crimes take place.”

Austria supports European Union sanctions against Russia and the bloc is ready to implement more sanctions, Nehammar said at a joint news conference Saturday in Kyiv with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Nehammer will visit the town of Bucha on Saturday, which he called “a place of war crimes.”

“We have to make those war crimes known to the UN and international justice must begin investigating and fight these crimes,” he said. 

Zelensky thanked him for the support Ukraine has received so far and reiterated his call for more sanctions on Russia. 

At least 176 children have died and more than 324 have been injured as a result of Russian aggression, the Ukrainian Parliament, Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, said in a tweet on Saturday. 

“These figures are not final, as work is underway to establish them in places of active attacks, in the temporarily occupied and liberated territories,” the Parliament said.

CNN cannot independently verify these figures.

YouTube has terminated Russia’s State Duma [lower house of parliament] YouTube channel due to recent US government sanctions, Google confirmed to CNN on Saturday.

“Google is committed to compliance with all applicable sanctions and trade compliance laws,” a Google spokesperson said. “If we find that an account violates our Terms of Service, we take appropriate action. Our teams are closely monitoring the situation for any updates and changes.”

Russia’s telecom watchdog Roskomnadzor demanded that Google lift the restrictions and explain the reason behind them, Russian state news agency TASS reported on Saturday.

The watchdog demanded that Google “immediately restore access to the Russian State Duma’s ‘Duma TV’ YouTube channel”, adding that blocking it “impedes the free flow of information,” according to TASS.

In response to previous YouTube restrictions, Russia’s telecom watchdog banned Google advertising and access to Google services including Google Search and Gmail in Russia on Thursday, Russian state news agency RIA-Novosti reported Saturday.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv on Saturday.

“The Prime Minister has travelled to Ukraine to meet President Zelenskyy in person, in a show of solidarity with the Ukrainian people. They will discuss the UK’s long term support to Ukraine and the PM will set out a new package of financial and military aid,” a Downing Street spokesperson said. 

The Embassy of Ukraine to the UK tweeted a picture of Johnson sitting opposite Zelensky at a table.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen described what she saw during her visit to the Ukrainian town of Bucha as “horror” and reiterated her “admiration” for the Ukrainians who are fighting the Russian invasion.

“There are no words for the horror I’ve seen in Bucha, the ugly face of Putin’s army terrorizing people,” von der Leyen said during a global ‘Stand Up For Ukraine’ event in Poland’s capital of Warsaw on Saturday. “I have so much admiration for our brave Ukrainian friends fighting against this. They are fighting our war.”

“It’s our fight that they are in, because it’s not only Ukraine fighting for its sovereignty and integrity, but they’re also fighting for the question whether humanity will prevail, or whether heinous devastation will be the result,” von der Leyen said. 

She traveled to Kyiv on Friday along with EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and other Ukrainian officials. 

Zelensky and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also spoke at the ‘Stand Up For Ukraine’ event.

Zelensky praised the courage of his compatriots and reiterated his call for additional military and financial assistance.

“Russian leadership failed to account for one fact. The fact that it attacks the other largest country in the world, Ukraine, the largest by its courage. We are not afraid of massive missile strikes, Russian aircrafts and never-ending tank columns,” he said said. 

“We’re here today to answer President Zelensky’s call for the international community to ​mobilize in support for Ukrainian refugees and all Ukrainians,” said Trudeau. 

The European Union is resuming its diplomatic presence in Kyiv after moving it temporarily to Poland following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the bloc announced Friday. 

EU Ambassador to Ukraine Matti Maasikas “is returning to Kyiv to enhance EU presence and ensure support to our Ukrainian partners,” the bloc said on its official Twitter account Saturday. Maasikas expressed his own positive thoughts on Twitter.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell traveled to Ukraine on Friday to meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky and Ukrainian officials.

“With this visit, the European Union is returning to Kyiv,” Borrell tweeted Friday. “And I mean this literally: our Head of Delegation is back here, so that we can work even more directly and more closely with our Ukrainian partners, ensuring support for Ukrainians.”

Italy also intends to reopen its embassy in Kyiv after Easter, Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said Saturday. 

“Ambassador [Pier Francesco] Zazo and our embassy have never left Ukraine — it is in Lviv, in the west of the country. But now the time has come to give a big signal to the Ukrainians … and thank them for kicking out the Russian troops from Kyiv,” Di Maio said speaking to the press in Volla, near Naples.

The foreign minister said some Italian citizens have remained in Kyiv and “are safer thanks to the Ukrainian resistance.”

Slovenia has also reopened its embassy in Kyiv since March 28, according to Slovenia’s Foreign Ministry. 

A former New York governor is working with a Hungarian company to provide modular homes for internally displaced refugees in Ukraine.  

The first shipment of about 20 foldable units arrived on April 3 in Solomonovo in Zakarpattia Oblast, a village just across Ukraine’s border with Hungary and Slovakia.

The houses were set up near a factory that has served as a temporary shelter for more than 100 refugees, many of them women and children, former New York Gov. George Pataki told CNN. 

Pataki’s foundation, the George E. Pataki Leadership and Learning Center, paid Hungary-based company Continest to build, ship and set up the units which are designed to be easy to move and deploy.

“We don’t have the resources to provide the quite literally hundreds of thousands that are needed across Ukraine, but we’re gonna do everything we can to provide as many as we can,” Pataki said. “We’re providing the first step. We just hope that this serves as a model.”  

“In the factory, people are safe – they have heat, they have running water, but they don’t have any privacy,” said Vidor Kis-Márton, CEO of Continest. “This is what we can offer them.” He said another ten units from Continest will continue on to the town of Bucha.  

Housing crisis for displaced people

Pataki’s foundation has made repeated trips to Ukraine since Russia launched its invasion, delivering food and other supplies. He said they quickly realized there was an intense need for housing for displaced Ukrainians. 

The International Organization for Migration estimates that at least 7.1 million Ukrainians have been internally displaced by the conflict. More than 4.2 million people have left Ukraine since the invasion began in late February, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

Pataki expressed concern that charitable organizations and nonprofits are undertaking much of the work to house internally displaced people – and that humanitarian aid from the United States and other countries hasn’t yet played a sizeable role, at least in the regions he’s visited.  

Kis-Márton hopes the units will remain in place until serious efforts can begin to rebuild homes in Ukraine – something he doesn’t predict will happen overnight. In the meantime, he hopes the modular houses will offer Ukrainians safety and dignity while the country rebuilds. 

“We are already thinking about rebuilding,” Kis-Márton said. “The war is not over, but the rebirth of Ukraine has actually started.”

Images of trains overcrowded with passengers fleeing the war, sitting on the floor and sleeping in the aisles, shook people around the world after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in late February.

The trains have kept running ever since, despite heavy fighting in some parts of the country. Journeys often taken much longer than they normally would, with lights inside dimmed to avoid the trains becoming a target.

Ukrainian Railways said Saturday that 3.5 million people have used trains to flee their homes.

The state-owned company said that most people left from Kyiv, Kharkiv and the Donbas region and headed to Lviv and Uzhorod, two cities close to the border in the country’s west.

Nearly half a million people used trains to travel abroad, with the majority going to Przemyśl, Warsaw and Chełm in Poland, the company added. Foreign evacuation routes were also arranged to Slovakia, Hungary and the Czech Republic.

The company said efforts to evacuate more people are continuing, despite the strike on a train station in Kramatorsk on Friday, which left more than 50 dead.

Trains have been scheduled from Pokrovsk and Slovyansk in the Donetsk region and Novozolotarivka in Luhansk.

– CNN’s Nathan Hodge and Julia Presniakova contributed reporting.

About one quarter of Russian forces used in the invasion of Ukraine are “effectively inoperable,” according to a European official, following heavy losses, poor logistics and sustainment.

Russia had arrayed approximately 120 Battalion Tactical Groups (BTGs), around Ukraine ahead of the invasion, CNN reported at the time.

Six weeks into the war, approximately 29 of those are now out of commission, the official said.

Russian forces have tried to combine some of the remaining parts of the BTGs into coherent fighting units, using the remains of two or three BTGs to attempt to make one, the official added.

Some background: The comments come a day after Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov briefly admitted on Thursday that Russia had suffered “significant” losses of its troops in Ukraine, calling it “a huge tragedy” for the country in an interview with Sky News.

Asked whether the withdrawal of Russian troops from Kyiv and its region could be seen as “a humiliation” for the Kremlin, Peskov said using those words would be “a wrong understanding of the situation.”

“We have significant losses of troops and it’s a huge tragedy for us,” Peskov admitted, before claiming the reason for Russia’s withdrawal from the Kyiv and Chernihiv regions was “an act of goodwill during the negotiations between the Ukrainian and Russian delegations.” 

Peskov added that Russia did so to “lift tension from those regions in order to show Russia is really ready to create comfortable conditions for the continuation of the negotiations.”

CNN has been unable to verify how many Russian troops have been killed in Ukraine. Last month, pro-Putin Russian tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda reported the toll was 9,861 – multiple times higher than official figures from the Kremlin. The figure, which was attributed to the ministry and later retracted by the paper – which claimed it was hacked – was not confirmed by the Kremlin.

US and NATO officials estimated last month that Russian casualties range from between 3,000 to 10,000. Ukrainian officials have claimed the toll is even higher.

CNN’s Martin Goillandeau contributed reporting to this post.

Oleh Syniehubov, the head of the Kharkiv region military administration, said on Saturday that Russian forces have continued shelling of the regional capital of Kharkiv.

“During the past day, the occupiers inflicted about 50 blows from artillery, mortars, tanks and MLRS (multiple rocket launchers),” he said in a statement on Telegram.

“The infrastructure of (the districts of) Saltivka, Kholodna Hora, Oleksiyivka, XTZ (Kharkiv tractor plant district) was affected,” he added.

Some background: In recent days Ukrainian officials have warned of a possible major Russian offensive in the country’s east, describing an effort by Russian forces to advance from Izium in southern Kharkiv region toward the Donbas region.

Regional officials have also urged the evacuation of civilians from eastern Ukraine in advance of what they say may be heavy fighting in Donbas. 

On Thursday, Borys Filatov, the mayor of Dnipro – a regional capital south of Kharkiv region – called for women, children and the elderly to leave the city. 

Ukraine is bracing for a new onslaught by Russian forces in the country’s east, while still reeling from an attack on a railway station that killed at least 50 people on Friday.

Here’s the latest:

Zelensky expects ‘a firm, global response’ to Kramatorsk: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has vowed to hold to account everyone behind the missile strike on a railway station in Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine.

At least 50 people, including five children, were killed at the station which was being used by civilians trying to flee the fighting, Ukrainian officials said Friday.

Russia accused of war crimes: International leaders including the European Parliament President Roberta Metsola say the missile strike in Kramatorsk and other attacks on civilians in Ukraine constitute war crimes.

Speaking to CNN on Friday, Metsola said the attacks were: “International war crimes being committed against sovereign people who are simply fighting for democracy and for their country.”

Ukraine expects huge new onslaught: The military governor of the Luhansk region in eastern Ukraine said Russian forces are preparing for a “massive breakthrough” attempt in Donbas.

The UK’s Ministry of Defence said some of the Russian troops that have withdrawn from northern Ukraine will be transferred to eastern Ukraine to fight in Donbas but “many of the forces will require significant replenishment before being ready to deploy further east, with any mass redeployment from the north likely to take at least a week minimum.”

Ukrainian officials have urged residents of some cities in Donbas to evacuate in anticipation of what they say may be heavy fighting.

Rerouting evacuation corridors: The Ukrainian military said it was working to “adjust” routes for civilians following the strike in Kramatorsk.

Serhii Haidai, the military governor of Ukraine’s eastern Luhansk region, said the attack meant changes were being made to the routes, but stressed that efforts to get people out of the region will continue: “We are ready, we will continue to evacuate people.”

Odesa under curfew: Authorities in the southern region of Odesa have imposed a curfew for Saturday following the deadly strike in Kramatorsk. Residents have been told to stay home from 9 p.m. local time on Friday (2 p.m. ET) until 6 a.m. on Monday morning (11 p.m. ET Sunday night).

Russians still facing logistical issues: The US believes the Russian military has not solved “their logistics and sustainment problems,” a senior US defense official told CNN.

The official said those problems mean that they will be unlikely to be able to reinforce their forces in the eastern part of Ukraine “with any great speed.”

The military governor of Ukraine’s eastern Luhansk region said evacuation corridors for civilians were “being adjusted” following a Russian missile strike on Kramatorsk train station on Friday.

Speaking on national television, Serhii Haidai said: “Unfortunately, after yesterday’s disaster from Kramatorsk, our evacuation routes are being adjusted, but we are ready, we will continue to evacuate people.”

Haidai said shelling was continuing across the region.

“All settlements are being shelled,” he said. “The most difficult areas are Rubizhne, Popasna and Hirske community. The Hirske community is shelled from morning till night, constantly, the enemy has not stopped at all, they are fired on with all kinds of weapons, and by aircraft as well. Fighting continues in Popasna and Rubizhne.”

On Saturday, Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister, Iryna Vereshchuk, announced on Telegram that 10 evacuation corridors have been agreed.

In the Donetsk region, she said there would be one corridor from Mariupol to Zaporizhzhia for private vehicles.

In the Zaporizhzhia region, Vereshchuk said four corridors, from Berdiansk, Tokmak, Enerhodar and Melitopol to Zaporizhzhia would open for private vehicles and buses.

In the Luhansk region, Vereshchuk named five corridors to Bakhmut, coming from Severodonetsk, Lysychansk, Popasna, Rubizhne and the village of Hirske.

Some background: At least 50 people, including five children, were killed and almost 100 injured in a Russian missile strike on a train station used as an evacuation hub in the eastern city of Kramatorsk on Friday. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the strike was “another war crime of Russia, for which everyone involved will be held accountable.” 

Kramatorsk is a key railway evacuation point for civilians looking to flee heavy fighting in eastern Ukraine. Ukrainian officials have also warned that Russia is readying a major offensive in the eastern Donbas region. 

CNN’s Christiane Amanpour and Jo Shelley contributed reporting to this post.

Russia has complained to Turkish officials about the Ukrainian military using drones manufactured in Turkey.

Speaking at a media briefing on Friday, a Turkish official said Ankara had told Moscow that Turkish drone-maker Baykar Technologies is a private company and Ukraine’s purchase of the devices had been completed before the war.

According to CNN reporting, Ukrainian officials have been touting Baykar’s Bayraktar TB2 drones as one of the most effective weapons in their arsenal.  

Last week, CNN gained rare access to the Baykar production facility in Turkey for an exclusive interview with its chief technology officer, Selcuk Bayraktar.

Bayraktar, who is also the son-in-law of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said the drone was “doing what it was designed to do and upgraded to do.” 

Finland and Sweden could soon join NATO, moves that would likely infuriate Moscow and that officials say would further underscore Russia’s strategic error in invading Ukraine.

NATO officials told CNN that discussions about Sweden and Finland joining the bloc have gotten extremely serious since Russia’s invasion.

US senior State Department officials said the matter came up at this week’s NATO foreign ministerial, which was attended by the foreign ministers from Stockholm and Helsinki.

Officials said the discussions underline the extent to which Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion has only served to reinvigorate and unify the NATO alliance — the exact opposite of Putin’s stated goals before the war began.

Some context: The Russian President had demanded that NATO cease expanding east and admitting new members, accusing the bloc of threatening Russian security. Instead, NATO has increased its support to Ukraine and is preparing to welcome new members.

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The flags of member countries of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) are seen ahead of NATO Foreign Ministers meeting at NATO Headquarters in Brussels, Belgium on April 6, 2022.

Related article Finland and Sweden could soon join NATO, prompted by Russian war in Ukraine

President Joe Biden on Friday signed two bills levying further sanctions on Russia and Belarus, the White House announced.

The sanctions mark the administration’s latest move to punish the two countries for Russia’s ongoing deadly invasion of Ukraine — and the first time the sanctions in response to the war have come from Capitol Hill.

One bill suspends normal trade relations with Russia and Belarus, punishing the countries by paving the way for higher tariffs on imports from them. The other prohibits energy imports from Russia, including oil, coal and natural gas.

The Senate unanimously passed the two measures Thursday morning. While the House voted overwhelmingly to pass the legislation, the bills faced more opposition there.

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April 8, 2022 - Washington, DC, United States: President Joe Biden speaking at an event to mark the confirmation of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court. (Photo by Michael Brochstein/Sipa USA)(Sipa via AP Images)

Related article Biden signs sanctions bills targeting Russian oil and trade with Russia and Belarus

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called the Russian missile strike on a train station that killed at least 50 people a “war crime” and vowed that everyone involved would be held accountable.

Here are the latest developments on the war in Ukraine:

At least 50 people, including five children, were killed after Russian forces carried out a missile strike on a railway station in Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine, that was being used by civilians trying to flee the fighting, Ukrainian officials said Friday.

The eastern city was one of the first places to be targeted by the Russian military when the invasion of Ukraine was launched on Feb. 24.

Here’s what we know about the attack:

What Russia said:

“All the statements of representatives of the Kyiv nationalist regime about the alleged ‘missile attack’ by Russia on April 8 at the railway station in Kramatorsk are a provocation and absolutely do not correspond to reality,” the statement said.

Fact check:

Global response:

Russian forces killed 132 civilians in Makariv, in the Kyiv region, the town’s mayor said on Friday as Ukrainian officials continue to assess the extent of destruction around the capital and north of the country.

Local officials collected the bodies and said they had been shot by Russian forces, Mayor Vadym Tokar told Ukraine’s Parliament TV.

Nearly all of Makariv’s infrastructure has been destroyed, he said, adding that apartment complexes and other buildings were bombed and a hospital destroyed.

Makariv, he said, has been hit by a “medical catastrophe,” with all doctors having been evacuated.

He also warned that people in the town need to be careful as mines are scattered in the fields.

“Our deforested areas are heavily littered with mines, and so we will work first on demining these areas before we can begin the full-fledged restoration of our infrastructure,” he said.

The town has been receiving aid and citizens are going out into the streets and doing what they can to clear the rubble, the mayor said.

Before the invasion, about 15,000 people lived in Makariv, but now fewer than 1,000 remain. Tokar said residents are gradually returning and the town is slowly recovering.

According to preliminary estimates, about 45% of Makariv has been destroyed, Tokar said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said everyone behind the Russian attack on the Kramatorsk train station will be held accountable.

“This is another war crime of Russia, for which everyone involved will be held accountable,” he said in his nightly address on Friday, adding that Russian state propaganda tried to blame Ukrainian armed forces for the attack.

Zelensky confirmed previous reports from the head of Donetsk region military administration, that at least 50 people were killed in the attack, including five children.

“Like the massacres in Bucha, as well as many other Russian war crimes, the missile strike on Kramatorsk must be one of the charges at the tribunal, which is bound to happen,” he said.

The Ukrainian President said “all the efforts of the world” will be directed to establish minute-by-minute “who did what, who gave orders, where did the rocket come from, who was carrying it, who gave the order and how the strike was coordinated.”

“Responsibility is inevitable,” he said.

The sudden ear-piercing beep of a radiation meter fills the room as a Ukrainian soldier walks in. This is where Russian soldiers were living at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, and radiation levels are now higher than normal.

There’s no visible presence of the source of the radioactive material in the room, but Ukrainian officials say it’s coming from small particles and dust that the soldiers brought into the building.

CNN was given exclusive access to the power plant for the first time since it came back into Ukrainian control.

Officials at the plant explain the levels inside the room used by Russian soldiers are only slightly above what the World Nuclear Association describes as naturally occurring radiation. One-time contact would not be dangerous but continuous exposure would pose a health hazard.

It’s an example of what Ukrainian officials say was the lax and careless behavior of Russian soldiers while they were in control of the site of the 1986 nuclear disaster. The area around Chernobyl, namely the Red Forest, is still the most nuclear contaminated area on the planet, with most of the radioactive particles present on the soil.

Ukrainian officials have released drone footage of what they say were trenches dug by Russian soldiers in that area, which is particularly radioactive. At a safe location, on the edges of that area, CNN saw a Russian military ration box that exhibited radiation levels 50 times above naturally occurring values.

Russian soldiers held Chernobyl for a month and are thought to have been operating in contaminated areas most of the time.

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Signs warn against entering the Red Forest around Chernobyl, which is one of the most contaminated nuclear sites on the planet.

Related article Ukrainians shocked by 'crazy' scene at Chernobyl after Russian pullout reveals radioactive contamination

At least 50 people, including five children, were killed after Russian forces carried out a missile strike on a railway station in Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine, that was being used by civilians trying to flee the fighting, Ukrainian officials said Friday.

Pavlo Kyrylenko, the head of the regional military administration in Donetsk, where the attack took place, said that 98 wounded people —  16 children, 46 were women and 36 men — were taken to local hospitals.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said earlier that nearly 300 people were wounded in the strike.

In an address to Finland’s parliament on Friday, Zelensky said that the “Russian military hit the railway terminal,” adding: “There are witnesses, there are videos, there are remnants of the missiles and dead people.”
He said that “people (were) crowded waiting for the trains to be evacuated to the safe territory” at the station. “Why do they need to hit civilians with missiles? Why this cruelty that the world has witnessed in Bucha and other cities liberated by the Ukrainian army?” Zelensky asked lawmakers.

Read more here.