April 13, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

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

The Pentagon hosted the CEOs of the US military’s eight largest prime contractors Wednesday to figure out how to arm Ukraine faster, according to a readout of the classified meeting.?

The roundtable discussion, led by Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks, focused on the Pentagon’s objectives to keep supplying Ukraine with arms while also being able to maintain the readiness of US forces and support the defense of allies.

Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks.

Supply chain issues: On Tuesday, a defense industry official told CNN the major weapons manufacturers are facing severe supply chain issues and a lack of affordable labor. Manufacturing capacity could face additional challenges as Ukraine contracts compete with increased US defense spending for the current output, the official said.

The classified roundtable was meant in part to address those concerns in an ongoing series of discussions between the Pentagon and the largest weapons manufacturers.

Those included Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, General Dynamics and others.

Getting weapons in faster: But it was primarily focused on the goal of “accelerating production” of weapons for Ukraine, including systems that can be shipped quickly and used effectively with minimal training.

A senior defense official said Wednesday the massive shipments of weapons to Ukraine, including thousands of Javelin anti-armor missiles and Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, have not affected the readiness of US forces.

A Russian warship that was evacuated in the Black Sea on Wednesday was one of the vessels involved in the famous exchange at Snake Island in February, according to a Ukrainian presidential adviser.

The island was hit by Russian missile strikes after Ukrainian defenders responded to the threat of Russian invasion with the words:?“Russian warship, go f*** yourself.”

Some context: Conflicting reports have emerged from the Russians and Ukrainians about the incident onboard the Moskva on Wednesday. Russia said in state media the cruiser was evacuated after a fire onboard detonated ammunition. The Odesa state regional administrator claimed it was hit by Ukrainian missiles. CNN is unable to independently verify what took place.?

However, comments from Oleksiy Arestovych, adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenksy, suggest there is confusion over what occurred.

The ship is currently in the Black Sea basin, he added.

Regarding the February Snake Island incident, Arestovych confirmed the Moskva was involved. “Yes specifically this one, it was firing at the defenders. It’s the flagship of the (Russian) navy,” he said.

For the first time since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the US is providing Kyiv with the types of high-power capabilities some Biden administration officials viewed as too much of an escalation risk a few short weeks ago.

The?$800 million list?is driven not only by direct requests from Ukraine, but also in preparation for a new type of fight on the open plains of southeast Ukraine right next to Russia, terrain that plays into Russia’s natural military advantages.

The new weapons package represents the starkest sign to date that the war in Ukraine is shifting — and with it the weapons Ukraine will need if it hopes to continue to stymie a Russian military that has regrouped and resupplied after its initial failures in the opening weeks of the war.

What the package includes:

This package stands out from previous security assistance in part because this tranche includes more sophisticated and heavier-duty weaponry than previous shipments.

Read the full story:

Polish Mi-17 helicopters are seen during Dragon-17 military exercises at the military range near Drawsko Pomorskie, Poland, September 21, 2017. Agencja Gazeta/Cezary Aszkielowicz via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY. POLAND OUT. NO COMMERCIAL OR EDITORIAL SALES IN POLAND.

Related article Why the Biden administration is giving new, heavier weapons to Ukraine

A mother reacts as police members exhume the body of her son from a well in the town of Buzova, Ukraine, on April 10.

The heart-wrenching moment when?a?Ukrainian?mother’s worst fears come true — the discovery?of?her son’s lifeless body, dumped in?a?shallow well?after the retreat?of?Russian forces — has been documented on video.?

The distressing scene witnessed by journalists from?AFP on Sunday in the town Buzova,?a?liberated village near the capital, Kyiv, encapsulates the personal human tragedy?of?Russia’s war on Ukraine.?

Her sobs intensify?as she grasps?at the rubble?and dirt surrounding the pit.

The video shows police pulling her son’s body from the well and wrapping him in?a?white body bag.?

Upon seeing his body the woman tries to force past?a?makeshift cordon. Four men hold her back. “I won’t leave,” she cries out.?

One other male body was?also found in the well, which was located outside?a?razed gas station along the route?of?the Russian retreat in that area,?according to?AFP.?

Taras Didych, head?of?the Dmytrivka?community, said in the video that both men were residents?of?the village?and members?of?the Territorial Defense.?

How the men came to die was not immediately?apparent, but Didyich told Ukrainian television?another grave with dozens?of civilians was found last Saturday in the village?after the?area?had been occupied by Russian forces for several weeks, Reuters reported.

The total number?of?dead?is yet to be confirmed, he said.

A satellite image shows Russian warship the Moskva in the port of Sevastopol, Crimea on April 7.

Conflicting reports have emerged from the Russians and Ukrainians about an incident involving a Russian warship in the Black Sea.?

No evidence has emerged to support either claim and CNN is unable to independently verify what took place.?

What the Russians say: The Russian Defense Ministry claimed Wednesday that the warship Moskva was evacuated after a fire onboard detonated ammunition, seriously damaging the vessel, according to Russian state media.

What the Ukrainians say:?Hours earlier, Odesa state regional administrator Maxim Marchenko claimed in a post on Telegram that Ukrainian forces hit the ship with “Neptune” missiles causing serious damage to it.

Poor weather: Due to large storms over the Black Sea obscuring satellite imagery and sensory satellite data, CNN has not been able to visually confirm the ship has been hit. The Russian Defense Ministry has also not posted any official statement to its Telegram channel acknowledging the evacuation, or fire onboard.

Russian state media outlets TASS and RIA reported the ship’s crew was evacuated and that the cause of the fire was still being established. According to the Defense Ministry, the Moskva is a missile cruiser that was built and commissioned in 1982.

Satellite images from Maxar Technologies showed the ship just northwest of Sevastopol, Crimea on April 10.

US President?Joe?Biden told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday that the US was sending an additional $800 million worth of weapons, ammunition and other security assistance.

The new equipment includes “artillery systems, artillery rounds, and armored personnel carriers,” the statement from Biden read.?

The European Union also approved an additional 500 million euros ($544 million USD) for military equipment for the Ukrainian Armed Forces on Wednesday, according to a news release from the European Council of the European Union.????

The additional 500 million euros brings the total financial assistance from the European Union for the Ukrainian Armed Forces to 1.5 billion euros, the release states.

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

Colombian President Iván Duque speaks to media ahead of the closing bell ceremony at the New York Stock Exchange in Manhattan on April 11.

Colombia is ready to play a central role in helping supply Western countries with energy resources after the gaps caused by sanctions on Russia, Colombian President Iván Duque told CNN.

Duque listed three areas where Colombia would be ready to increase production: traditional oil and gas extraction, renewables such as clean hydrogen, and coal.

“Colombia today immediately can have an increase on coal. … We have some of the biggest resources in the world, and we don’t use it [for power production],”?Duque told Quest while he announced that Colombia will increase coal supplies to Germany — which recently approved plans to phase out Russian coal imports – following direct conversations between Duque and Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

Asked about US President Biden’s use of the world “genocide” to describe Russian actions in Ukraine, Duque told Quest he agreed with his US counterpart. “What is happening in Ukraine is a genocide. And it has to stop. … This is insane,” Duque told Quest.

Duque is in New York City on a three-day visit to promote foreign investment in Colombia and present his government’s actions on security and the war on drugs, the Colombian President’s office said in a statement.

He visited the New York Stock Exchange and participated in meetings at the UN Security Council on Monday and Tuesday, respectively.

US officials have internally had preliminary discussions about sending a high-ranking member of the administration to Ukraine, according to a source familiar with the talks.

While President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are unlikely to visit Kyiv anytime soon, officials have discussed sending Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin or Secretary of State Antony Blinken. But a decision is far from finalized and the visit could ultimately not materialize.??

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson made a surprise visit to Kyiv in recent days. US officials said afterward that Biden was not currently planning a trip of his own.?

Vladimir Nesterenko and his father Oleh, seen during happier times prior to Russia's invasion.

All Vladimir Nesterenko wanted to do when he grew up was to play basketball. The brown haired 12-year-old dribbled and shot hoops with his dad Oleh in the village where they lived in Ukraine’s southern?Kherson region. He idolized NBA legend Michael Jordan.

His mother Julia Nesterenko was happy to encourage the habit. “We even had a basketball hoop at home,” the 33-year-old told CNN as she described their first family home. It was their “nest,” she said, with a small garden and a vegetable patch.

When Russian forces captured the regional capital, also called Kherson, and its surrounding area soon after the invasion began, the family knew they could not stay, Julia said. Russian checkpoints, armed forces, and officers of the FSB intelligence agency were reportedly flooding the region at the same time as?disappearances and detentions?of local mayors, journalists, and civilians became rife, according to local officials and rights groups.

It was time “to get out of the occupied territories to safety… in order to survive,” Julia said. Russians had taken over their village, Verkhnii Rohachyk, and the Nesterenko family feared the consequences.

With nothing more than a backpack and their important documents, the family took what appeared to be the easiest route out to Ukrainian-held areas, she said. On April 7, the family of three and 11 other people boarded an evacuation boat, operated by a local resident, crossing the Dnipro River from the southern, Russian-occupied part of Kherson region to the Ukrainian controlled territory on the other side of the river. The Dnipro, one of Europe’s longest waterways, cuts through Ukraine and its Kherson region before flowing into the Black Sea.

The boat crossing, which began at the bank of the fishing village of Pervomaivka, should have been simple. It was the seventh evacuation trip via boat from the village to a Ukrainian-held area on the north bank of the Dnipro River since the war began, according to Oleksandr Vilkul, head of the military administration of Kryvyi Rih, in the neighboring region of Dnipropetrovsk.

Instead, it turned into a bloodbath, according to Julia, two other survivors, a friend of one victim and several regional officials. They described how Russian rockets and gunfire targeted the boat after it unintentionally drifted into the frontline.

Roman Shelest, head of the Kryvyi Rih Eastern District Prosecutor’s Office for Ukraine told CNN that the boat drifted into the frontline between Russian and Ukrainian forces, and was fired upon 70 meters from the shore.

One survivor, who declined to be named due to safety fears, explained that the boat got lost in a smoke screen, believed to have been created by the Russians. CNN has been unable independently to verify this claim.

One of the survivors also said he believed they were hit by Russian Grad rockets.

When the boat’s navigator indicated that the group had drifted close to the Russian-held village of Osokorivka, the morning’s silence was soon punctured with the sound of exploding rockets, the survivors said.

Four people were killed in the attack that day. Oleh was among three to die on the boat; Vladimir died shortly after at a hospital. Another victim was a lawyer who had travelled into Kherson region to rescue her son and deliver humanitarian aid, the lawyer’s friend, Tatyana Denisenko, told CNN.

Photos of the attack’s aftermath showed what looked like the remnants of a rocket on the shore, and bullet and shrapnel holes in the hull of the boat.

The remnants of what appears to have been a rocket, seen on the banks of the Dnipro river.

“Based on the shells and ammunitions we saw in the area and on the shoreline, we could see the direction of shooting – which demonstrates that (they) were coming from the southern direction, and that is the territory occupied at this time and under the control of the armed forces of the Russian Federation,” prosecutor Shelest, who is investigating the attack, told CNN.

CNN has reached out to the Russian Ministry of Defense for comment. Since the outbreak of war, Russia has repeatedly denied it targets civilians – a claim?disproven by attacks on civilians?and civilian targets that have been verified by CNN and other news organizations.

Read more.

The European Union has approved an additional 500 million euros ($544 million USD) for military equipment for the Ukrainian Armed Forces on Wednesday, according to a news release from the European Council of the European Union.??

The additional 500 million euros brings the total financial assistance from the European Union for the Ukrainian Armed Forces to 1.5 billion euros, the release states. The financial assistance was approved through the European Peace Facility, “an off-budget instrument that enhances the EU’s ability to act as a global security provider,” according to the website of the European Commission for the European Union.???

The 500 million euros will finance personal protective equipment, military equipment, fuel, and first aid kits, the release said.??

“The European Council demands that Russia immediately stop its military aggression in the territory of Ukraine,” the release stated.?

US President Joe Biden speaks to the media before boarding Air Force One at Des Moines International Airport in Des Moines, Iowa, on Tuesday, April 12.

US President Biden’s declaration that a genocide is underway in Ukraine won’t change US policy and shouldn’t be confusing to other world leaders, the White House insisted Wednesday.

Biden made the remark as observers gain greater access to devastated areas of Ukraine, and was speaking to “what we all see, what he feels as clear as day in terms of the atrocities happening on the ground,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said.

She was speaking a day after Biden made the remark in Iowa, first in passing during a speech about ethanol and later more directly on a tarmac.

Psaki said the legal process for determining whether genocide was underway would proceed. But she said Biden was voicing his views as the US president, not just a personal stance.

“He’s the?President and we are here to implement his views,” she said.

Psaki told CNN’s MJ Lee that fellow world leaders shouldn’t be confused by Biden’s statements, which often outpace official US designations — first on war crimes and now on genocide.

“I don’t think anybody is confused about the atrocities of what we’re seeing on the ground,” she said.

“President Putin is brutally targeting civilians and brutalizing a country right now. So the President — this President — was speaking to what those atrocities are,” she said.

She said even an official designation of genocide wouldn’t necessarily change US policy.

“It doesn’t change a policy,” she said. “There would be an international effort to explore that and an investigation at an international level. Those often take many years.”

Polish President Andrzej Duda speaks during a press conference with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky along with the presidents of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia following their talks in Kyiv on Wednesday, April 13.

Polish President Andrzej?Duda said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is “not war,” but “terrorism”, and said those who committed war crimes must be punished, after he and Baltic leaders met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv on Wednesday.???

“The perpetrators of these crimes, both direct and indirect, must be punished. Prosecutors collect evidence in places where mass murders took place. It is inconceivable that such things should happen in the modern world,” he added.??

“There is no dialogue with those who break all the rules”, he said. “I hope that Ukraine will soon become part of the European Union as a free and sovereign state making decisions about itself.”?

Poland has played a key role in helping the people fleeing the war — which has sparked Europe’s biggest refugee crisis since the second world war — taking in 2.68?million?Ukrainian refugees since Russia invaded on Feb. 24, according to figures from the Polish Border Guard on Tuesday.???

It marks a significantly warmer stance compared to its response to the last refugee crisis which began in 2015, when it subsequently resisted taking in an EU-proposed quota of migrants seeking refuge from predominantly war-torn Middle Eastern countries.???

“We are Ukraine’s neighbors not only literally, but also in the sense of the common history and understanding of the situation,” Duda said on Wednesday.

A top US State Department official said Wednesday that it is likely United States will ultimately determine that genocide has been committed in Ukraine.?

In an interview with CNN Newsroom, Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland said US President Joe Biden “spoke from his heart when he called what we’re seeing in Ukraine genocide by the Russian Federation and its forces.”

Nuland said that the US has “a process of collecting evidence over time” in order to make a formal government determination of genocide.

Asked why sanctions haven’t had a deterrent effect on Russian President Vladimir Putin, Nuland replied that it is because Putin “doesn’t care about his people or his country, he only cares about his own imperial ambition.”

“He doesn’t see that what he is doing is not only turning Ukraine into rubble, it’s also turning Russia into a prison,” she said.

The US Capitol is seen in the evening from the National Mall in Washington, DC on March 8.

Russia said Wednesday that it had imposed sanctions on 398 members of the US Congress in retaliation against Washington blacklisting hundreds of Russian lawmakers last month.?

Moscow’s “mirror sanctions” include “the leadership and committee chairmen of the lower house of the U.S. Congress,” the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement.?

The US Treasury Department on March 24 announced sanctions against 328 members of the 450-seat Russian State Duma — the lower level of the two-tiered Russian Parliament.?

“Further announcements of Russian countermeasures are planned in the near future,” including adding more Americans to the sanctioned list, Moscow said in Wednesday’s statement.

The commanders of two Ukrainian units defending the besieged port city of?Mariupol?issued a video statement saying they had been able to join forces, as Russia claimed advances in the city.

Their statement comes as Ukrainian forces remain blockaded inside Mariupol, which has been under weeks of relentless bombardment. The Russian military has repeatedly claimed to have taken strategic positions in the city, but has also faced stiff resistance from Ukrainian forces.

Denys Prokopenko, the commander of the Azov Regiment, said his unit had linked up with troops?from the 36th Marine Brigade, but acknowledged that some Ukrainian defenders had surrendered.?

“These are real men [of the 36th] who have chosen the path of war,” he said. “Do not make heroes out of deserters and fighters who voluntarily surrendered. They chose the path of shame, and shouldn’t be heroized in any case.”

Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych had said earlier on Wednesday that after a “risky maneuver” the last remaining defenders of the besieged port city of Mariupol have been able to join forces.

“This is what happens when officers do not lose their heads, but firmly maintain command and control of the troops,” Arestovych said.

CNN cannot independently confirm the details of the operation.?

Meanwhile, in a statement Wednesday, Russian Ministry of Defense spokesperson Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said Mariupol’s commercial seaport had been captured. CNN was not independently able to verify that claim.

International?sanctions may be starting to bite, his troops are seeing?“significant” losses in Ukraine?and US President Joe Biden just?called his war a genocide, but for Russian President Vladimir Putin, everything is still going to plan.

In remarks this week, Putin has shown no hint of introspection, spinning Russia’s pariah status on the international stage as a sort of victory.

Take his remarks in a virtual meeting on Russia’s development of the Arctic. Western oil companies may be abandoning ventures in Russia,?taking their technical expertise with them, Biden has slapped a?ban on Russian oil, gas and coal imports?and the EU, though far from going cold turkey, is?looking to decouple from Russian energy.

Putin’s take? The pain inflicted on European energy consumers is a good thing, and Russia will find other markets.

That sort of glass-half-full message may be meant to reassure uneasy Russians. But Putin is also presenting a blithe confidence about how the war in Ukraine is going, despite massive setbacks in the effort to “denazify” Ukraine — the Kremlin leader’s ugly shorthand for overthrowing the democratically-elected government of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and ending Ukrainian statehood as we know it.

Read the full analysis here.

At the request of Kyiv, France will provide Ukraine with a new round of military aid, French Minister for the Armed Forces Florence Parly said Wednesday.?

The minister did not say what the additional military aid would include.

French President Emmanuel Macron will speak with Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday, according to the élysée Palace.?

US President?Joe?Biden told his Ukrainian counterpart Wednesday that the US was sending an additional $800 million worth of weapons, ammunition and other security assistance.

The package will include both new types of weapons and the types of equipment the US has been providing to Ukraine for weeks.

The new equipment includes “artillery systems, artillery rounds, and armored personnel carriers,” the statement from Biden read.?

“I have also approved the transfer of additional helicopters,” he wrote.

The $800 million shipment brings to more than $3 billion the total amount of military assistance the US has provided to Ukraine.

“The steady supply of weapons the United States and its Allies and partners have provided to Ukraine has been critical in sustaining its fight against the Russian invasion. It has helped ensure that Putin failed in his initial war aims to conquer and control Ukraine. We cannot rest now,” Biden wrote in a statement.

The US President said he assured Zelensky that the “American people will continue to stand with the brave Ukrainian people in their fight for freedom.”

The Russian military in a statement Wednesday threatened to strike Ukrainian “decision-making centers” — including those in Ukraine’s capital — in response to what Russia said were “attempts of sabotage and strikes” on Russian territory.

Russia, earlier this month, accused Ukraine of mounting a helicopter attack on a fuel depot inside Russian territory. The Ukrainian Ministry of Defense has neither confirmed nor denied the attack.

US President Joe Biden spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky Wednesday to update him on ongoing US support for Ukraine, according to the White House.

They spoke from 11:41 a.m. ET to 12:39 p.m. ET, a White House official said.?

Zelensky tweeted about the call, writing that they “assessed Russian war crimes” and “agreed to enhance sanctions.”

See Zelensky’s tweet:

World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus speaks during a media conference in Brussels on February 18.

World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Wednesday urged Russia to work for peace “for the sake of humanity.”

“Tomorrow marks 50 days since Russia invaded Ukraine. In that time, 4.6 million refugees have left the country. Thousands of civilians have died, including children. There have been 119 verified attacks on health care. Health services continue to be severely disrupted, particularly in the east of the country,” Tedros said, during a news briefing in Geneva on Wednesday.?

Until then, evacuation corridors need to be established so that civilians can move to safety and medical supplies, food and water can be delivered, he said.?

WHO has verified nearly 120 attacks on health care since the invasion of Ukraine began.?

Tedros also noted that WHO has received almost 53% of its funding requirement for Ukraine for the first three months. He thanked countries and organizations for both timely contributions and for committing to additional support. However, additional resources will be needed to cover long-term needs, he said.?

US President Joe Biden?described the atrocities?in Ukraine as?“genocide”?for the first time Tuesday, adding “we’ll let the lawyers decide, internationally, whether or not it qualifies.”

In doing this, Biden made a “clear moral determination,”?Michael Carpenter, US ambassador to the?Organization?for?Security?and?Co-operation?in?Europe (OSCE), said Wednesday, adding that a legal review is underway and that is “going to take some time to be completed.”

Remember: The Geneva Convention defines genocide as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group” and lays out some examples of how that could be done.?

Carpenter pointed to increasing evidence that Russian President Vladimir Putin “is trying to wipe out the idea of being Ukrainian.” He cited images of Russians’ barbaric treatment of Ukrainian civilians, speeches by Russian government officials and Russian media reports that “deny Ukraine the right to exist as an independent state.”

The US is aware of reports of women and children being forcibly taken to Russia and enforced disappearances, Carpenter also said, adding that those reports will require “thorough investigation and follow up” since such action would be a violation of international law or crimes against humanity if they are systematic.

The Pentagon is examining options for how it can train more Ukrainian forces to use Switchblade drones that the US is providing to the Ukrainian military, according to a senior defense official.

Future trainings might occur with the US troops who have deployed to bolster NATO’s eastern flank over the past several months amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, the official told reporters Wednesday.

The Pentagon was looking at “a range of options” for training Ukraine on the Switchblade drones and other weapons systems, the official said, on top of the trainings that occurred with Ukrainians who already were in the United States for previously scheduled engagements.

One option would be the troops that are on NATO’s eastern flank, the official said, adding that no decisions had been made yet.

“We have absolutely added to our ability in these eastern flank countries,” the official said. “Soldiers with various sets of capabilities and various professional skills, whether it’s artillery, long-range missiles, air defense, infantry, armor — you name it. And so if there’s a need for additional training to be done on any systems that are provided to Ukraine, we will look at a range of options for how that training would have to be delivered.”

Additionally, the official said that the US continues to see “significant morale issues” anecdotally among Russian forces, a senior US defense official said Wednesday.

The US also has indications that Russian officers are “frustrated with their troops’ performance, frustrated with their colleagues’ performance,” said the official.

The official also reminded reporters on a background call that “almost half” of the invading Russian forces are “conscripts who don’t receive a lot of training.”

“So, there still are morale and unit cohesion problems that are bedeviling the Russians even as they now try to refit, resupply, and focus on a more concentrated geographic area,” the official said.

The Russian military is potentially preparing for a “large-scale offensive” in the east of Ukraine in the coming days, French military spokesperson Col. Pascal Lanni said on Wednesday.?

The spokesperson said that the Russian forces were carrying out air strikes and bombings in Ukraine not only “to weaken the coherence of the Ukrainian defense system, but also to disrupt Ukrainian logistical movements and capacity,” which explained the “total destruction” of Dnipro’s airport by Russian troops.?

He also noted that there were “no significant advances at this stage in terms of territorial gains for the Russian forces on the eastern front.”

Italy will continue its efforts to lower its dependency on Russian oil and gas as a response to the invasion of Ukraine despite concerns about rising fuel costs, Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio has told CNN.

“The cost of energy is our first worry at the moment,” but Italy “is not going to put up any veto to these sanctions that affects energy,” Di Maio said Wednesday.

Di Maio’s comments come after?Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi announced Monday that an initial deal had been struck to increase energy imports from Algeria after a meeting with the country’s President Abdelmadjid Tebboune in Algeria.

The European Union on Wednesday approved a further $543 million in military aid for Ukraine. In total, the EU has allocated $1.63 billion of aid to help the country defend itself against Russian forces.

The new package would finance the provision of equipment and supplies to the Ukrainian Armed Forces, which includes “personal protective equipment, first aid kits and fuel, as well as military equipment designed to deliver lethal force for defensive purposes,” the European Council said in a statement.

Finland's Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto present the report on changes in the foreign and security policy of?Finland, in Helsinki on Wednesday.

The Finnish government presented a report Wednesday to the country’s parliament on the fundamental security changes that have occurred following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The wide-ranging report included an assessment on whether Finland should purse closer cooperation with NATO and considered the effects of a possible NATO membership.

If Finland and Sweden become full NATO members, the report said “the threshold?for using military force in the Baltic Sea region would rise,” enhancing “the stability of the region in the long term.”?

Membership would include signing up to NATO’s founding principle of collective defense — commonly referred to as Article 5 — which means that an attack against one NATO ally is considered as an attack against all allies.

For Finland, the report outlined that “the most significant effect of its possible NATO membership would be that Finland would be part of NATO’s collective defence, and be covered by the security guarantees enshrined in Article 5.”

The deterrent effect of being a NATO member would be “considerably stronger than it is at present, as it would be based on the capabilities of the entire Alliance,” the report said, and “Finland would be prepared to support other NATO member countries in a possible Article 5 situation.”

The report outlined that possible membership in NATO “would significantly expand the area of the Alliance, double its land border with Russia, and move the Alliance closer to strategically important areas in Russia,” such as the Kola Peninsula and St. Petersburg.

Finland “would aim to continue to maintain functioning relations with Russia in the event it becomes a NATO member,” it added.

And the country would have to “strengthen its preparedness for becoming a target of wide-ranging hybrid influence activities,” it said.

The report added that “close cooperation between Finland and Sweden during possible accession processes would be important,” saying that a “simultaneous accession processes” from the two countries could also “facilitate preparation for and response to Russia’s possible reaction.”?

As part of accession talks to the alliance, the Finnish government said it would raise NATO’s military presence in the country, saying that “membership would not oblige Finland to accept nuclear weapons, permanent bases or troops in its territory.”

This, the report said, is similar to the agreement that Norway and Denmark have, which does not permit “permanent troops, bases or nuclear weapons of the Alliance in their territory during peacetime.”

Finland’s “contribution to the collective defence of the Alliance” would be negotiated during the accession process.

Austria’s Chancellor Karl Nehammer said on Wednesday he decided to go to Moscow to confront Russian President Vladimir Putin with what he saw in Ukraine.?

When asked about Putin’s mindset during the meeting, Nehammer said Putin was “very tough” and “clear” in his messages.

“In his point of view, he has to defend the Russian Federation, the Russians living in eastern Ukraine,” he said.

The Austrian chancellor went on to say that “it’s not easy for Putin to talk about war crimes,” adding that he?confronted Putin about war crimes and told him “it’s necessary to have international justice, the United Nations there.”??

Nehammer said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told him to tell Russian President Putin that evacuation corridors are needed in the besieged Ukrainian port city of Mariupol.?

Nehammer said Zelensky told him: “Please, if you go there, tell him that it’s now needed to have safe corridors, humanitarian corridors for the people in Mariupol. They don’t have water, no electricity. We have to think about the wounded there.”

Nehammer also said he consulted with Zelensky on whether it would be useful to visit Putin.?

“These were the messages I confronted to Putin,” Nehammer added.

In the days since Russian forces left the Sumy region of northeastern Ukraine, authorities say a growing number of bodies have been discovered.

“There are more than 100 dead among the civilians in the Sumy region. Unfortunately, this number is growing every day,” Dmytro Zhyvytskyi, head of Sumy regional military administration, said in a briefing Wednesday.

Zhyvytskyi alleged that “there are people who are held captive and there are daily negotiations for them to be exchanged or set free. A lot of people whose fate remains unknown as of today.”

Sumy saw widespread damage in the early days of the Russian invasion, with several confrontations between civilians and Russian soldiers in the region.?

This week, the Ukrainian cabinet allotted about $8 million to the Sumy region to begin the task of repairing housing, roads and utilities.

Switzerland has adopted the latest round of EU sanctions against Russia and Belarus, “in light of Russia’s continuing military aggression against Ukraine and reports of atrocities (committed by the Russian armed forces) in Bucha,” the Swiss government said Wednesday in a statement.

The Swiss Federal Department of Economic Affairs, Education and Research has also imposed financial sanctions and travel restrictions on a further 200 individuals, including two of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s daughters, the statement added.

“Switzerland’s list of sanctions now fully mirrors that of the EU,” the government said, adding that the relevant amendments will come into force at 6 p.m. local time (12 p.m. ET) on Wednesday.

The European Union approved on Thursday a fifth round of sanctions against Russia over its invasion of Ukraine.

Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer speaks with CNN on Wednesday.

Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer said that cutting off Russian gas right now is “not possible” and that the European Union must look at sanctions that hurt Russia more than the European Union.

“Austria is not alone with this argument against the gas embargo,” he said, citing Germany and Hungary’s positions. “And on the other side, Austria stands strong with the other EU member states with the sanctions against the Russian Federation. But sanctions must hurt Russia more than the European Union,” Nehammer told CNN’s Becky Anderson on Wednesday.

“Oil is already discussed now in the European Commission and in the EU Council. The gas question is separate, you know, it’s not only the Austrian position, it’s also this position of Germany, Hungary or Bulgaria, for example, because we depend on the gas. Our industries depend on the gas. And so we have to decide about sanctions who hurt Russia more than the sanctions hurt us,” the chancellor added.

Asked whether the question of gas embargo could fracture the EU, Nehammer said he doesn’t believe so.

“We decided to gather about the sanctions against the Russian Federation, and the sanctions already decided are really tough and strong. And we will decide about more sanctions against Russia, because, you know, we want to show that there is unity in the European Union, that this war has to end,” he said.

The EU last week agreed to phase out Russian coal imports as part of a new package of sanctions. Earlier today, German government spokesperson Wolfgang Büchner said that Germany has taken steps to reduce its dependence on Russian energy but at this time continues to reject an immediate ban on Russian gas or oil imports.

Nehammer had a face-to-face meeting with Putin on Monday, the first Western sit-down with the Russian President since he?launched his invasion in February. Nehammer said he raised alleged Russian atrocities in?Ukraine?during the “tough” and unfriendly meeting.

In this file photo, a Ukrainian service member carries an American-made?Javelin?missile system in a trench position north of Kyiv, on March 13.

The Pentagon is convening a meeting of its top weapons makers Wednesday to discuss the industry’s capacity to support Ukraine in a protracted war with Russia, according to a defense official and an industry official.

The meeting today at the Pentagon will be classified and chaired by Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks.?The attendees will represent Boeing, L3Harris, Raytheon, BAE, Lockheed Martin, Huntington Ingalls, General Dynamics, and Northrop Grumman, a US official tells CNN.?

The three main topics to be discussed are supplying Ukraine, re-supplying partners and allies as well as resupplying US inventories.

With regards to Ukraine, they will discuss more about immediate security needs of Ukraine but also look out two to four years at least.

The official says the assessment is even if the Russian troops somehow leave, there will still be enduring security concerns. They will also discuss that over time, some of what is being provided will be obsolete production and new versions will have to be supplied as replacements.

With regards to partners and allies, the participants will discuss what might be in production or going into production that is a reasonable backfill (especially the Patriot system). US production will become obsolete with new versions over time, and they will discuss if those are available and exportable.

More on the meeting: The meeting between the defense contractors and the Pentagon, first reported by Reuters, was organized just a few days ago, according to the defense industry official with direct knowledge of the arrangements.

The official said the contractors have been told the focus of the meeting is on the “capacity of the industry” to support Ukraine if the war goes on for several years.?

The sense of things, the official said, is the US is “assuming this is going to be a years long endeavor” in a scenario where, at a minimum, Ukraine will not able to safely manufacture weapons in its own country.?

But in the meeting, the official said,?the contractors are likely to bring up the serious challenges still facing defense manufacturing in the US including ongoing and severe supply chain issues and a lack of affordable labor.?

All of this continues to constrict defense manufacturing capacity right now, and could grow worse as increased defense spending in the budget and Ukraine contracts vie for manufacturing capacity, the official said.?

The issue of capacity is also impacting the manufacture of critical ammunition supplies, even though most of it is done in government-owned contractor-operated facilities.

The US has authorized more than $2.4 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since the beginning of the Biden administration, including more than $1.7 billion since the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24.

The US is expected to announce on Wednesday it is sending hundreds of millions of dollars in new military assistance to?Ukraine, three sources familiar with the package tell CNN.

President Joe Biden speaks to the media before boarding Air Force One at Des Moines International Airport, in Des Moines Iowa, Tuesday.

US President Joe Biden’s declaration that the atrocities now underway in Ukraine are a “genocide” is not expected to trigger any immediate changes to US policy toward the conflict, according to US officials familiar with the matter.

Biden made clear in Iowa he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin is committing genocide in Ukraine, but said he would “let the lawyers decide” to use that designation internationally.

That was a signal the US is not making a formal declaration of genocide in Ukraine, the officials said. The US has only made eight formal determinations of genocide, most recently labeling Myanmar’s persecution of the Rohingya minority a genocide.

Doing so would trigger legal obligation under the United Nations Genocide Convention, which would require countries to intervene to prevent the genocide from advancing.

Already, Biden’s use of the word genocide has drawn some blowback from a key US ally.

Russia’s response: The Kremlin responded Wednesday to Biden describing the invasion of Ukraine as “genocide,” calling it “unacceptable.”?

“We consider such attempts to distort the situation unacceptable,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters during?his regular conference call with journalists.??

“Moreover, this is hardly acceptable for the United States, a country that has committed well-known deeds in modern and recent history,” added Peskov, referring to US-led military activity overseas.??

This reiterates the Kremlin’s chosen rhetoric tactic of “whataboutism” when it comes to the US accusations. Commenting on Biden calling Putin a “war criminal” in March, Peskov said that the president of a country that dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki doesn’t have the right to make such statements.

Mass graves and horrific apparent executions have been uncovered in areas in Ukraine where Russian troops have withdrawn, particularly in the town of Bucha near Kyiv.

CNN staff contributed reporting to this post.

Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson speaks at a press conference in Stockholm, on April 13.

Sweden would make a decision on a possible NATO membership only after serious analysis of the situation and considering its best interest, Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson said Wednesday.

“The security landscape has completely changed” after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and “given this situation, we have to really think through what is best for Sweden and our security and our peace in this new situation,” Andersson said speaking alongside her Finish counterpart in Stockholm following a bilateral meeting.

A young man walks on a street of Mariupol, on April 12.

Up to 180,000 people are waiting to be evacuated from in and around the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol, Mayor Vadym Boychenko said Wednesday.

This comes as no evacuation corridors were operating Wednesday due to Russian forces blocking evacuation buses, Deputy Ukrainian Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk announced earlier.

A total of 150,000 people have been evacuated from Mariupol so far, Boychenko added, speaking during an online media briefing. Boychenko’s comments were interpreted in English via Ukraine’s government-supported Media Center.

The strategic port city is one of Russia’s main targets and has been destroyed by constant shelling throughout the war.?

The world’s top independent oil merchant Vitol Group will stop trading Russian oil by the end of the year, a source with knowledge of the situation confirmed to CNN

The move is expected to be completed by the end of 2022 and the company would not be entering into any new Russian crude and product transactions, the source added.

A CNN team witnessed intense shelling of the residential district of Saltivka, in Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv, with a local official saying they believed Russia was stepping up attacks?amid a new phase of military operations.

Ukrainian officials have warned for days that they expect a major offensive push by Russian forces in the eastern Donbas region, as Russia repositions troops and equipment following a failed push to take Kyiv, the capital.

The CNN team was on the ground in Saltivka, a district in the northeast of Kharkiv along the E40 highway, as shelling intensified. Incoming rounds and small-arms fire were heard before Ukrainian forces warned the team to move to a safer position.?

The shelling was evidence that a broad Russian military push was underway, mirroring recent remarks by top government officials in recent days, a representative of the regional Kharkiv Prosecutor General’s Office told CNN.

Russian forces had continued shelling Kharkiv and its environs, hitting residential areas around the region with fire from multiple rocket launchers, artillery and tanks, Oleh Syniehubov, the head of the Kharkiv regional military administration, said. A number of civilians have been killed and injured in those strikes.

“During the past 24 hours, 22 civilians were injured, including three children. Seven people died,” he added. “Unfortunately, the two-year-old boy died in the hospital.”

Syniehubov claimed Russian forces were also scattering landmines in the city in the areas of Forest Park and Saltivka.

The heaviest fighting, Syniehubov said, was around Izium in southeastern?Kharkiv?region.?

“This area remains the most tense in the?Kharkiv?region,” he said. “We will do everything to prevent the occupiers from entering the Donetsk and Luhansk regions from the direction of Izium.”

Syniehubov added that there were no grounds for the evacuation of the city of?Kharkiv.

In remarks on national television Monday, Vadym Denysenko, adviser to Ukraine’s Minister of Internal Affairs, said: “From my point of view, this big offensive [in the east] has already started. We have to understand it’s not going to be the repetition of Feb. 24, when the first airstrikes and explosions started and we said, ‘The war has begun.’ The big offensive de facto has already started.”

Some of the heavier fighting in Ukraine has been reported around Izium, a heavily contested area in southeastern Kharkiv region.?Russian troop movements are concentrated to the south and east of Kharkiv, according to the latest satellite imagery provided by Maxar Technologies and analyzed by CNN. Russian officials have said their objective is to win control of the Donbas — the regions of Donetsk and Luhansk.

CNN’s Maria Kostenko contributed reporting to this post from Chernivtsi.

A wooden cross stands near the site of a mass grave in Bucha, Ukraine, on Tuesday.

An expert report from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) found “clear patterns” of violations of international humanitarian law by Russian forces in Ukraine and detailed numerous incidents that it says could constitute war crimes.

The?report?says it found “credible evidence” suggesting violations of “even the most fundamental human rights (right to life, prohibition of torture and other inhuman and degrading treatment and punishment) have been committed, mostly in the areas under the effective control of Russia or entities under overall control of Russia.”

The 110-page report details reports of targeted killings, torture, forced disappearances, and notes that the fact-finding mission “received several reports, sometimes accompanied by photographic evidence, alleging the use by Russian troops of the red cross emblem to mark military non-medical vehicles, of Ukrainian flags, army or police uniforms or vehicles, white flags, civilian clothes, and OSCE symbols to facilitate their military operations.”?

It includes reports of a Ukrainian interpreter who was “held in captivity for nine days” by Russian forces. Left in an icy cellar, he was repeatedly beaten with an iron bar and rifle butts, tortured with electricity, deprived of food for 48 hours and subjected to a mock execution.

For many of the incidents, the report says they would constitute war crimes, but does not fully declare them as such. However, it calls the attack on the maternity hospital in Mariupol “a clear violation of (international humanitarian law) and those responsible for it have committed a war crime.”

“While it may be that one hospital was used by the defender for military purposes or destroyed by mistake, it is hardly possible that this is the case when 50 hospitals are destroyed,” the report states.

The report was the result of a three-weeks-long fact-finding mission by three OSCE experts, and covers the time period from the start of the war on Feb. 24 to April 1. The report notes that the experts faced a number of limitations – time and resource constraints, lack of access to Ukraine – so “a detailed assessment of most allegations of IHL violations and the identification of war crimes and crimes against humanity concerning particular incidents has not been possible.”

The report did not cover the time period when developments like the atrocities in Bucha came to light.

It acknowledged that “violations occurred on the Ukrainian as well as on the Russian side” but added that the violations committed by Russia “are by far larger in nature and scale.” Most of the reported violations by Ukraine are related to the treatment of Russian soldiers, it added.?

The report also notes that Russia did not participate in the fact-finding mission.?

The fact-finding mission that was used to produce the report was launched after 45 countries triggered the rarely-used Moscow Mechanism. It is a serious step, and according to the OSCE, it has been triggered only nine other times since its establishment in 1991.

It was most recently used in 2020 to investigate human rights abuses in Belarus.

At least seven people were injured in a Russian missile strike that damaged an apartment block in the?Cherkaske in the Donetsk region.

Russia’s “main tactic now is to kill and terrorize” civilians, in light of its military failure in Ukraine, said Pavlo Kyrylenko, head of Donetsk region military administration.?

Russia “over and over again” has reaffirmed that it is “incapable of waging a fair convention war, incapable of resisting the Armed Forces of Ukraine.”?Russian forces continue to fire on towns and villages along the entire front line, he claimed.

Two cities in the eastern region of Donetsk,?Avdiivka and Velyka Novosilka, have come under attacks targeting residential buildings, city infrastructure and a private home, on Wednesday, he added.

A railway worker walks among tank cars used carrying petroleum products refined from Russian oil, in Spergau, Germany, on April 12.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said “new windows of opportunity are opening up” elsewhere for the country’s energy exports, while the West faces “a real energy crisis.”

During a virtual meeting on Arctic development, Putin said the “refusal by a number of western countries to engage in normal cooperation, including with Russian energy resources,” was already “hitting millions of Europeans” and “being reflected also in the United States.”

More context: The EU?last week agreed to phase out Russian coal imports as part of a new package of sanctions and the bloc has confirmed that they’re already discussing Russian oil.

Putin also said that “unfriendly countries” have caused disruption in the Arctic supply chains and some companies are not fulfilling their contractual obligations.

“Some authority companies do not realize their contractual obligations, and that creates certain difficulties for us, but we have all resources and opportunities in order to find alternative solutions for this in long term to strengthen our independence from the external factors. That’s why all the institutions involved should rearrange their work. First of all, in order to provide the population of Arctic territories with food and medicines, fuel, building materials and equipment.”

Putin’s insistence that Russia can increase oil and gas consumption domestically, and also deliver supplies to other regions in the world, follows him seeking that “unfriendly” countries pay for gas in rubles.

Russian gas accounts for some 40% of Europe’s total consumption. EU gas imports from Russia this year have fluctuated between 200 million euros to 800 million euros ($880 million) a day.

The Pentagon is expected to announce the hundreds of millions in new security assistance to Ukraine today, according to a source familiar.?

CNN reported yesterday that the US was expected to announce the new package soon. ?

The final amount had not been finalized as of Tuesday but is expected to be close to $700 million.?

US President Joe Biden is expected to use his drawdown authority to authorize the new aid package for Ukraine.

If approved, the addition of approximately $700 million in security assistance would bring the total aid to Ukraine to more than $3 billion since the start of the Biden administration, including nearly $2.5 billion since the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Ukraine’s 2020 defense budget was only about $6 billion, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. In less than two months, the US has provided nearly half of that in security assistance to Ukraine, underscoring the pace at which the White House has worked to send in weaponry and equipment.

The United Kingdom is sanctioning 178 “Russian separatists” in breakaway regions?of eastern Ukraine, the?British?Foreign Office?said?Wednesday.

The new sanctions target oligarch family members, close associates, and employees, the foreign office said, bringing the total number of the sanctioned individuals to 206.?Individuals sanctioned include Alexander Ananchenko and Sergey Kozlov, self-styled prime minister and chair of government of the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republic.

Starting on Thursday, the UK government is “banning the import of Russian iron and steel, as well as the export of quantum technologies and advanced materials that Putin sorely needs. We will not rest in our mission to stop Putin’s war machine in its tracks,” Truss?said.

Journalists document as bodies are exhumed from a mass grave on the grounds of the Church of St. Andrew and Pyervozvannoho All Saints in the Ukrainian town of Bucha, outside of Kyiv on April 13.

Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin said the country?is expected to decide within weeks rather than months whether it will apply for membership to NATO, while her Swedish counterpart Magdalena Andersson said her country was still weighing up the decision.?

The decision could be a significant blow to Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose war has united the West against Moscow in ways that seemed unimaginable in January.

Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron declined to refer to Russian actions in Ukraine as “genocide,” saying: “I would be careful with such terms today because these two peoples [Russians and Ukrainians] are brothers.” His comment came the day after US President Joe Biden described the atrocities in Ukraine as “genocide” for the first time.

Ukrainian officials say nearly 200 children have been killed and more than 300 others injured since Russia’s invasion began.

Here are the latest developments on the war in Ukraine:

Finland is expected to decide within weeks rather than months whether it will apply for membership to NATO, the Finnish Prime Minister said Wednesday.

Speaking in Stockholm following a bilateral meeting with Swedish Prime Minister?Magdalena Andersson, Sanna Marin said it would be best to coordinate with Sweden to make similar security decisions.?

“We need to have a view on the future and we are using this time to analyze and also building common views on the future when it comes to security,” Marin said.

The Finnish parliament on Wednesday received a white paper?on changes to the nation’s security environment following its neighbor Russia’s attack on Ukraine. The report is expected to be signed off by lawmakers and made public later today.

Andersson didn’t go as far as Marin, saying Sweden was still weighing up the decision and pointing out that there are elections there in September.

Some background: When Russian President?Vladimir Putin?launched his invasion of Ukraine, his goals were clear. He wanted to bring his neighbor to heel, assert Russian authority in Eastern Europe and make the West think twice about expanding militarily and politically toward Russia’s borders.

But in one important respect, Putin’s plan appears to have failed: The war has united the West against Moscow in ways that seemed unimaginable in January.

Now, Finland and Sweden – nations that are officially non-aligned –?are edging ever closer toward joining NATO, the US-led military alliance.

BERLIN, GERMANY - MARCH 16: Finland's Prime Minister Sanna Marin addresses a press conference with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz before talks at the Chancellery on March 16, 2022 in Berlin, Germany. (Photo by John Macdougall - Pool/Getty Images)

Related article Putin's bullying backfires as Finland and Sweden edge closer to joining NATO

A frame from a video shared via Telegram shows an apparent use of cluster munitions in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on April 11.

A video shared to social media on Sunday shows what appear to be explosions from cluster munitions in a civilian area in the Kharkiv region.

At least four explosions, seconds apart, can be seen spanning about 90 meters (98 yards) along a road in Pisuchyn. An aerially dispensed submunition is seen falling on the street moments after and causes another blast.

Russian forces have been accused of regularly using cluster munitions against civilian targets in Ukraine. Last week, the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine said it had received credible allegations that Russian armed forces have used cluster munitions in populated areas at least 24 times.

A convention backed by more than 100 countries has banned the use of cluster munitions because of the widespread and indiscriminate damage they cause. Neither Russia nor Ukraine are state parties to the treaty, however.

“Cluster munitions pose an immediate threat to civilians during conflict by randomly scattering submunitions or bomblets over a wide area. They continue to pose a threat post-conflict by leaving remnants, including submunitions that fail to explode upon impact becoming?de facto?landmines,”?according to Human Rights Watch.

Such attacks “may amount to war crimes,” UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet told the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.

The German economy would take a big hit in the event of a Russian gas supply halt, German institutes have warned.

According to a joint economic forecast by five leading German economic research institutes, in the event of an immediate interruption to Russian gas supplies, a total of 220 billion euros ($238 billion) in German economic output would be at risk in both 2022 and 2023. This would be equivalent to more than 6.5% of Germany’s annual economic output.

“If gas supplies were to be cut off, the German economy would undergo a sharp recession,” said Stefan Kooths, vice president and research director for business cycles and growth at the Kiel Institute for the World Economy.

The institutes slashed GDP growth for 2022 to 2.7% from 4.8% due to the ongoing war in Ukraine and its economic ramifications and expect inflation to hit 6.1% in 2022, the highest figure in 40 years.

“In the event of an energy supply stop, it would even increase to 7.3 percent, a record-high in post-war Germany,” the press release reads.

At the end of March, Germany issued an “early warning” of possible?natural gas shortages over a?payments dispute with Russia?that could lead to energy rationing, urging all consumers to reduce their usage as much as possible.

“The recovery process in the German economy is once again being delayed. The economic picture is shaped by opposing forces, all of which are driving up prices,” said Kooths.

The Joint Economic Forecast was prepared by the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin), the ifo Institute (Munich), the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), the Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH), and RWI (Essen).

Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych has said that after a “risky maneuver” the last remaining defenders of the besieged port city of Mariupol have been able to join forces.

Arestovych said Wednesday that “in Mariupol, as a result of a risky maneuver, units of the 36th Independent Marine Brigade broke through to [join] the Azov regiment.”

Both units have been involved in a last-ditch attempt to resist a Russian offensive against the city that has lasted well over a month.

“This is what happens when officers do not lose their heads, but firmly maintain command and control of the troops,” Arestovych said.

CNN cannot independently confirm the details of the operation. Members of the Marine unit posted a video statement on Tuesday saying they would hold on “until the end,” despite being surrounded by Russian forces and running low on supplies.

On his Facebook account, Arestovych said that the Azov regiment had “received substantial reinforcements … the 36th brigade avoided defeat and received additional serious opportunities, in fact, gained a second chance.”

Arestovych claimed that “the defenders of the city, now together, seriously strengthened their defense area.”

The defenders of the city, where some 100,000 civilians remain trapped amid widespread devastation, have been fighting to hold parts of the port and Azovstal, a giant steel factory that lies on Mariupol’s eastern outskirts.

The Russian military claimed in a statement Wednesday that 1,026 Ukrainian Marines – including 162 officers and 47 women servicemembers – had surrendered in the vicinity of the Ilyich Iron and Steel Works in Mariupol, a claim that could not be verified.

Russia has focused an intense propaganda effort around the battle for Mariupol, claiming to have seized key positions in the city, even as Ukrainian forces have continued to hold out.

Some background: Independent analysis of the situation in Mariupol on Sunday published by the Institute for the Study of War assessed that the defense of Mariupol had reached a critical stage.?

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said?“tens of thousands” have died?in Mariupol, a figure that cannot be independently verified.

A view of a cross and coffin prepared for a funeral of a civilian killed by the confilict in Bucha, Ukraine, on April 12.

At least 1,892 civilians have been killed and 2,558 injured since the war in Ukraine started in February, according to the United Nations.??

The number of recorded deaths includes 478 men, 308 women, 30 girls, and 52 boys, as well as 71 children and 953 adults whose sex is yet unknown, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said in a statement Tuesday.

“Most of the civilian casualties recorded were caused by the use of explosive weapons with a wide impact area, including shelling from heavy artillery and multiple launch rocket systems, and missile and air strikes,” it said.

The actual casualty figures could be considerably higher due to a delay in reports from some locations, the OHCHR added. These include areas such as the besieged southeastern city of Mariupol, where “figures are being further corroborated.”

The Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine has reported a higher number of child fatalities. In a statement Wednesday, it said 191 children had been killed and more than 349 injured since the Russian invasion began.

A volunteer rests after loading plastic bags that contained corpses of civilians killed by Russian soldiers, in Bucha, located on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine, on April 12.

US President Joe Biden has described the atrocities in Ukraine as “genocide” for the first time, saying “it’s become clearer and clearer that (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is just trying to wipe out even the idea of being Ukrainian.”

French President Emmanuel Macron declined to refer to Russian actions in Ukraine as “genocide,” however, saying: “I would be careful with such terms today because these two peoples [Russians and Ukrainians] are brothers.”

Meanwhile, Ukrainian officials say nearly 200 children have been killed and more than 300 others injured since Russian’s invasion began.

Here are the latest developments on the war in Ukraine:

The Russian Embassy in Washington said statements by US State Department spokesman Ned Price about the possibility of Russia using chemical weapons in Ukraine were “provocative” and “idle,” in comments posted on Facebook late Tuesday.

The embassy said the Russian armed forces “do not and cannot have any chemical warfare agents at their disposal because our country eliminated all chemical weapons stockpiles back in 2017.”

The comments were in response to Price saying the US is “concerned” that Russia “may seek to resort to chemical weapons,” during a briefing on Tuesday.

French President Emmanuel Macron speaks at a campaign event in Strasbourg, France, on April 12.

French President Emmanuel Macron refused to describe Russian actions in Ukraine as “genocide” in a television interview with public broadcaster France 2.

Asked whether he, like US President Joe Biden, would use the term “genocide” for the killing of Ukrainians by the Russian military, Macron said: “I would be careful with such terms today because these two peoples [Russians and Ukrainians] are brothers.”

“What we can say for sure is that the situation is unacceptable and that these are war crimes. We are living through war crimes that are unprecedented on our soil — our European soil.”

The French President, who is currently running for re-election, also noted France’s cooperation with Ukraine to investigate the alleged war crimes.

Some context: Biden said Tuesday the atrocities being uncovered in Ukraine qualify as?genocide, saying “it’s become clearer and clearer that (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is just trying to wipe out even the idea of being Ukrainian.”

It was a dramatic rhetorical escalation in the US view of what is happening on the ground in Ukraine, which Biden has previously deemed war crimes.

The US designation does not carry any legal ramifications but does carry significant weight as Biden seeks to rally countries behind a strategy of isolating and punishing Moscow.

Other world leaders, such as the UK’s Boris Johnson and Poland’s Andrzej Duda, have also used the word “genocide” to describe Russian actions in Ukraine.

Editor’s Note:?A version of this story appeared in CNN’s Meanwhile in China newsletter, a three-times-a-week update exploring what you need to know about the country’s rise and how it impacts the world.?Sign up here.

Anonymous Twitter users are exposing the extreme nationalism and pro-Russian sentiment circulating online in China — and Beijing is not happy about it.

Scores of screen-grabbed posts from China’s most popular social media platforms have been translated and shared on Twitter in recent weeks, making revealing reading for Western audiences who typically don’t access these sites.

Among those posts: a prominent military blog falsely claiming a?Russian attack on a train station?in Kramatorsk was actually carried out by Ukraine, a well known media commentator dismissing the?atrocities in Bucha, and a vlogger with hundreds of thousands of followers?using a misogynistic term for Ukraine.

The posts appear courtesy of anonymous Twitter users who say their aim is to expose Western audiences to the true extent of pro-Russian or nationalistic content on China’s heavily censored platforms.

Read the full story:

China flag waving against clean blue sky, close up, isolated with clipping path mask alpha channel transparency

Related article Twitter users are exposing China's pro-Russian sentiment, and Beijing is not happy

There will be no evacuation corridors for civilians in Ukraine on Wednesday, the country’s Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said in a statement.

Vereshchuk blamed Russian troops for creating a dangerous situation along the routes.

Vereshchuk said Russian forces “not only disregard the norms of international humanitarian law, but they also cannot properly control their people on the ground.”

Rescuers search for victims in the rubble of two high-rise apartment buildings in?Borodianka on April 11.

Some 191 children have been killed and 349 others injured in Ukraine since the start of the Russian invasion on Feb. 24, Ukrainian prosecutors said in a news release on Wednesday.

The Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office?said several children have died in recent days due to shelling in northeastern and southern Ukraine

The burnt bodies of a 16-year-old girl and a 10-year-old boy had been found in the villages of Borodianka, northwest of Kyiv, and Korolivka, in western Ukraine, the statement added.

Children are also among the casualties from shelling in the northeastern city of Kharkiv, the statement said. A 15-year-old girl was also seriously injured when a munition hit a residential building in the southern Kherson region.

Deployment of troops and vehicles seen in the west of Soloti, Russia on April 11.

Satellite images captured by Maxar Technologies on Monday show Russian forces redeploying and moving into eastern Ukraine.

A number of military deployments were observed along a major highway and the corridor that leads from the towns of Soloti and Valuyki in western Russia’s Belgorod region, toward the Ukraine border.

The deployments consist of dozens of armored vehicles, troops with tents and support equipment, the images appear to show. They can be seen in the satellite images in fields and farms west of Soloti and near the Russian towns of Dubrovka, Biriuch and Leonovka, which is about 5 miles (8 kilometers) from the Ukraine border.?

A Russian military convoy is seen in Bilokurakyne, Ukraine on April 11.

Across the border in eastern Ukraine, several convoys of military equipment were seen along a highway near Vilkhuvatka. Additional military convoys were also seen on Monday in and near the Donbas region near the Ukrainian towns of Bilokurakyne and Kyslikva, according to Maxar.

A Russian military convoy is seen in Kyslivka, Ukraine on April 11.

Together, the convoys contain more than 200 vehicles and include tanks, armored personnel carriers, towed artillery and support equipment, Maxar said.

Some context: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has warned that Russia would launch full-scale combat actions in the east, but said: “We are ready.”?It comes as Russian troops pour into Ukraine, with a large column of military vehicles also seen heading in the direction of Donbas.

The presidents of the Baltic states and Poland are on their way to the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, to meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky.

The party includes Polish President Andrzej Duda, Lithuanian President Gitanas Naus?da, Latvian President Egils Levits and Estonian President Alar Karis, according to a Twitter post from Karis on Wednesday.

They will meet with Zelensky during their visit to “show strong support to Ukrainian people,” Karis said.

Key topics to be discussed in the meeting will be providing aid to Ukrainian civilians and defenders and the investigation of alleged war crimes, according to Estonia’s presidential office.

President Karis will return to Estonia on Thursday, his presidential office said in a statement.?

US President Joe Biden said Tuesday the atrocities being uncovered in Ukraine qualify as genocide, saying “it’s become clearer and clearer that (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is just trying to wipe out even the idea of being Ukrainian.”

Here’s how we got to this point:

What is genocide?

When has the US used the term before?

A priest and a relative of a civilian man exhumed from his yard react in Gostomel village, Kyiv on April 12.

US President Joe Biden described the atrocities in Ukraine as “genocide” for the first time Tuesday, saying “it’s become clearer and clearer that (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is just trying to wipe out even the idea of being Ukrainian.”

Here are the latest developments on the war in Ukraine:

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he cannot say with certainty if chemical weapons were used in the besieged city of Mariupol.

Zelensky warned other leaders to pay attention to the possibility of chemical weapons put in use.

“However, given the repeated threats of Russian propagandists to use chemical weapons against the defenders of Mariupol and its repeated use by the Russian army, such as phosphorus munitions in Ukraine, the world must respond now,” he cautioned. “React preventively. Because after the use of weapons of mass destruction, any response will not change anything. And it will only look like a humiliation for the democratic world.”

More context: Reports that chemical weapons were used in Mariupol have not yet been confirmed by the United States, State Department spokesperson Ned Price said in an interview with CNN Monday.

On Tuesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States could not confirm the use of chemical weapons in Ukraine but noted that they “had credible information that Russian forces may use a variety of riot control agents.”

CNN cannot independently verify that there has been any kind of chemical strike in Mariupol. CNN teams on the ground have so far not seen evidence of such an attack, or any imagery from Mariupol sources to verify this.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks during a video broadcast on Tuesday April 12.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky proposed swapping detained pro-Russian Ukrainian politician and oligarch Viktor Medvedchuk?for captured Ukrainian prisoners of war.

Zelensky also warned Russia that Ukrainian forces would capture more soldiers.

“We will establish the full truth about all these savages. No matter how much time and effort it takes, we will find them all. Let Medvedchuk be an example for you,” Zelensky said.

Medvedchuk was detained in a “special operation,” Zelensky announced Tuesday.

US President Joe Biden speaks to members of the media prior to boarding Air Force One in Des Moines, Iowa on April 12.

President Joe Biden said Tuesday the atrocities being uncovered in Ukraine qualify as genocide, a designation he’d previously avoided but that he now believes is warranted as scenes of devastation emerge from towns once overrun by Russian troops.

It was a dramatic rhetorical escalation in the US view of what is happening on the ground in Ukraine, which Biden has previously deemed war crimes. And it appeared to be the latest example of the President allowing his emotion-driven views of the war to outpace official US policy toward the conflict, even as he was voicing a position held by many Americans horrified by the scenes of brutality in Ukraine.

It garnered near-immediate praise from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who began accusing Russia of committing genocide inside his country last week.

“True words of a true leader @POTUS,” Zelensky wrote on Twitter. “Calling things by their names is essential to stand up to evil. We are grateful for US assistance provided so far and we urgently need more heavy weapons to prevent further Russian atrocities.”

Read more:

President Joe Biden and Rep. Cindy Axne, D-Iowa, listen as Jack Mitchell, regional vice president of POET Bioprocessing, gives a tour at POET Bioprocessing in Menlo, Iowa, Tuesday, April 12, 2022.

Related article Biden cites 'genocide' in Ukraine when talking about rise in gas prices

Viktor Medvedchuk, a pro-Russian Ukrainian politician and oligarch sits in a chair with his hands cuffed after a "special operation" was carried out in Ukraine on April 12.

Viktor Medvedchuk, a pro-Russian Ukrainian politician and oligarch, was detained in a “special operation,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Tuesday on Telegram.

Prior to Russia’s invasion, Medvedchuk had faced allegations of treason in Ukraine and had been under house arrest. His whereabouts had been unknown in the weeks following the invasion. Some observers speculated that Medvedchuk or one of his allies might be the Kremlin’s preference to lead a puppet government in Ukraine if the Feb. 24 invasion succeeded in toppling Zelensky.

Putin ties: Medvedchuk was sanctioned by the US in 2014 “for threatening the peace, security, stability, sovereignty, or territorial integrity of Ukraine, and for undermining Ukraine’s democratic institutions and processes.”

But the businessman also served as a go-between for Moscow and Kyiv after the outbreak of the Donbas conflict in 2014 by leveraging his personal ties with Putin. In a 2019 interview with filmmaker Oliver Stone, Putin acknowledged that he was godfather to Medvedchuk’s daughter.

“I would not say that we are very close but we know each other well,” Putin said. “He was [former Ukrainian] President [Leonid] Kuchma’s chief of staff, and it was in this capacity at the time that he asked me to take part in the christening of his daughter. According to Russian Orthodox tradition, you can’t refuse such a request.”

Medvedchuk also had notoriety in Ukraine for his role as the Soviet state-appointed defense attorney for the Ukrainian dissident poet Vasyl Stus, who died in a Soviet labor camp in 1985.

CNN was not immediately able to reach a legal representative for Medvedchuk.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, right, and his Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko on April 12.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that peace talks with Ukraine had hit “a dead end.”?

“Now, security requirements are one thing, and the issues of regulating relations over Crimea, Sevastopol and Donbas are taken out of the scope of these agreements. That is, we have again returned to a dead-end situation for ourselves and for all of us,”?he added, speaking alongside his Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko at a news conference.??

The Russian leader also dismissed the reports of atrocities in the Ukrainian town of Bucha as “fake” and compared them to “fake” reports about the use of chemical weapons in Syria by the Assad regime.???

“There were provocations in Syria, when the use of chemical weapons by the Assad government was planted. Then it turned out that it was fake, the same fake is in Bucha,” he said.???

CNN saw firsthand a?mass grave?while on the ground in the Kyiv suburb, and at least 20 bodies were seen on just one street.