Japan readopts hard-line stance on territorial dispute with Russia

Tokyo has returned to a hard-line stance in its decades-long territorial dispute with Moscow following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, stating in its annual foreign policy report released Friday that four northern islands are "illegally occupied" by Russia.

The wording on the status of the islands, off Japan's northernmost main island of Hokkaido, used in the 2022 Diplomatic Bluebook appeared for the first time since the 2003 report, highlighting Tokyo's departure from a conciliatory approach toward Moscow.

The dispute over the islands -- Etorofu, Kunashiri, Shikotan and the Habomai islet group -- stems from their seizure by the Soviet Union, Russia's predecessor state, in the weeks following Japan's World War II surrender on Aug. 15, 1945. It has prevented the two nations from signing a peace treaty.

The bluebook also said the islands, called the Southern Kurils in Russia and the Northern Territories in Japan, are an "inherent" part of the territory of Japan, a description that had been absent since the 2011 report.

"The Northern Territories are islands over which Japan has sovereignty, and are an inherent part of the territory of Japan, but now are illegally occupied by Russia," the bluebook said.

Calling the Russian invasion of Ukraine "an outrage that undermines the foundation of the international order not only in Europe but also in Asia," the report said the current circumstances leave the prospects for an outcome in the territorial talks uncertain.

The Japanese government strongly demands that Russia heed the criticism of the international community, withdraw its troops from Ukraine and comply with international law, the report states. Japan has imposed economic sanctions in line with Western nations since the invasion began on Feb. 24.

The administration of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe hoped that progress in negotiations on the territorial issue would lead to the return of some of the islands based on a 1956 bilateral treaty.

During his tenure from December 2012 through September 2020, Abe met with Russian President Vladimir Putin over 20 times without a breakthrough.

Under the 1956 pact, the Soviet Union agreed to return some of the islands upon the conclusion of a peace treaty.

Biden meets with Polish President Duda; Russia's signals of shifting goals in Ukraine met with skepticism

Russia's military goals in Ukraine have been hazy since it began its invasion more than a month ago, and new statements suggest Moscow may consider claiming victory without completely overthrowing the Ukrainian government or capturing Kyiv.

Western analysts and leaders were skeptical of the Friday statements, where the deputy chief of the Russian general staff said his forces had largely achieved the "main objectives" of a first phase of the conflict. The power of the Ukrainian military has been "considerably reduced," freeing up troops to "focus on the main efforts to achieve the main goal, liberation of Donbas," said Col. Gen. Sergei Rudskoi.

The implications of the statement are difficult to determine, according to Stephen Biddle, a professor of international and public affairs at Columbia University who has studied U.S. wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.

"It's plausible that they’re basically trying to ratchet their perceived war aims down to something they’ve already accomplished," he said.

The pronouncement of shifting goals comes as President Joe Biden is in Warsaw Saturday to confer with Polish President Andrzej Duda, meet Ukrainian refugees in Warsaw and deliver what the White House is billing as a major speech before he departs for the U.S.

Before the invasion, portions of the Donbas in southeastern Ukraine were already controlled by Russian-backed forces.

Similarly skeptical, French President Emmanuel Macron said “it’s too soon to say” whether the Russians have changed their approach.

But what does appear clear: In the face of fierce Ukrainian resistance, the progress of Russian forces has largely stalled. Kyiv — while battered — remains under the control of the Ukrainian government.

Meanwhile, the humanitarian crisis caused by the war continues. A Russian airstrike last week on a Mariupol theater that was being used as a shelter killed about 300 people, Ukrainian authorities said Friday. That would make it the deadliest known attack on civilians in the war yet.

Latest developments

►President Joe Biden, who is in Warsaw, on Friday expressed support for Poland's efforts in helping Ukrainian refugees. More than 2 million Ukrainians have fled to Poland since the start of Russia’s invasion of their country.

►The U.N. human rights office said it has been challenging to confirm fatalities in Mariupol given the organization's strict methodology for counting the number of civilian deaths in conflict. The office says at least 1,035 civilians have been killed in Ukraine and 1,650 injured, but acknowledges that is an undercount.

► The governor of the Kyiv region says that Russian forces have entered the city of Slavutych in northern Ukraine and seized a hospital there.

Biden arrives for meeting with Duda

With pomp and fanfare, President Joe Biden arrived at the Presidential Palace in Warsaw on Saturday for a meeting with Polish President Andrzej Duda on how allies are responding to the humanitarian crisis sparked by the war in Ukraine.

Biden’s limousine pulled into the palace courtyard shortly after 12:30 p.m. local time.

Duda greeted the president as he stepped out of the car. The two chatted briefly, shook hands with a line of dignitaries and then participated in a formal arrival ceremony that included the playing of each country’s national anthem and a military procession.

– Michael Collins

Russian troops enter city of Slavutych, seize hospital

LVIV, Ukraine -- The governor of the Kyiv region says that Russian forces have entered the city of Slavutych and seized a hospital there.

Slavutych is located north of Kyiv and west of Chernihiv, outside the exclusion zone that was established around the Chernobyl nuclear power plant after the 1986 disaster. It is home to workers at the Chernobyl site.

Governor Oleksandr Pavlyuk said Saturday that the Russians also kidnapped the city’s mayor, but some media reported later in the day that the mayor was released swiftly. Neither claim could be verified independently .

The governor said that residents of Slavutych took to the streets with Ukrainian flags to protest the Russian invasion.

“The Russians opened fire into the air. They threw flash-bang grenades into the crowd. But the residents did not disperse, on the contrary, more of them showed up,” Pavlyuk said.

- Associated Press

Death toll of children reaches 136

In the month since the Russian invasion began, 136 children have been killed.

Reuters reported that 64 of the children were killed in the Kyiv region and 50 were killed in the Donetsk region. An additional 199 children have been wounded.

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human rights said Thursday, the civilian death toll in Ukraine has exceeded 1,000 since the start of the war.

- Ana Faguy

Top Ukrainian officials to attend Biden speech in Warsaw

A pair of top Ukrainian officials will be on hand in Warsaw Saturday when President Joe Biden delivers a speech on holding Russia accountable for its month-long war against Ukraine.

Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov said in a message on Twitter that he and Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba will attend the president’s address.

Biden started the final day of his four-day trip to Europe by dropping by a meeting between Reznikov and Kuleba and their U.S. counterparts – Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. Reznikov tweeted a photo of the meeting – sans Biden – and said they were discussing “current issues & cooperation in political & defense directions.”

“In the evening we’ll also be present at @POTUS speech on the Russian war against Ukraine,” Reznikov wrote.

Biden will deliver his remarks at the Royal Castle in Warsaw.

– Michael Collins

100,000-plus flee Ukraine on Friday

More than 100,00 people left Ukraine Friday, the State Border Guard Service Ukraine said.

Two-thirds of those who left crossed Ukraine's western borders with EU countries as well as Moldova. The State Border Guard Service estimated 45,000 left Friday night alone.

Meanwhile, many men are returning to Ukraine to defend the country, the Ukrainian government said. 21,000 people arrived in Ukraine Friday night. The State Border Guard Service said more than 420,000 Ukrainians have returned since Russia first invaded.

The United Nations estimates that 10 million people have fled Ukraine since the conflict began last month. Friday's flow of refugees was significantly higher than in recent days. On Wednesday, about 43,000 fled and around 62,000 fled Thursday, according to government figures.

- Ana Faguy

Ukraine president Zelenskyy makes surprise appearance at Doha Forum

DOHA, Qatar — Ukraine's president made a surprise video appearance Saturday at Qatar's Doha Forum, calling on the energy-rich nation and others to boost their production to counteract the loss of Russian energy supplies.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on the United Nations and world powers to come to his aid, as he has in a series of other addresses given around the world since the start of the war Feb. 24. He compared Russia's destruction of the port city of Mariupol to the Syrian and Russian destruction wrought on the city of Aleppo in the Syrian war.

"They are destroying our ports," Zelenskyy said. "The absence of exports from Ukraine will deal a blow to countries worldwide."

The loss of Ukrainian wheat already has worried Mideast nations like Egypt, which relies on those exports.

Zelenskyy called on countries to increase their exports of energy — something particularly important as Qatar is a world leader in the export of natural gas.

Zelenskyy criticized Russia for what he described as threatening the world with its nuclear weapons, raising the possibility of tactical nuclear weapons being used on the battlefield.

"Russia is deliberating bragging they can destroy with nuclear weapons, not only a certain country but the entire planet," Zelenskyy said.

He also noted that Muslims in Ukraine would have to fight during the upcoming holy fasting month of Ramadan.

"We have to ensure this sacred month of Ramadan is not overshadowed by the misery of people in Ukraine," he said.

– Associated Press

President Biden to meet with refugees, deliver speech

President Joe Biden on Saturday will cap his European trip talking to Ukrainian refugees in Poland and delivering a speech on holding Russia accountable for its invasion and upholding democratic values.

Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser, previewed Biden’s remarks as a major address that will “speak to the stakes of this moment, the urgency of the challenge that lies ahead, what the conflict in Ukraine means for the world, and why it is so important that the free world sustain unity and resolve in the face of Russian aggression.”

Biden will also put the war in historical context and describe where he sees it going from here, Sullivan said.

Before delivering those remarks at the Royal Castle in Warsaw, Biden will meet with Polish President Andrzej Duda at the Presidential Palace

“The suffering that is taking place now is at your doorstep,” Biden told Duda on Friday at a meeting in Rzeszów, where the influx of refugees is the largest. “You're the ones who are risking, in some cases, your lives and risking all you know to try to help. And the American people are proud to support your efforts.”

On Thursday, Biden announced the U.S. will take in up to 100,000 Ukrainians and provide more than $1 billion in humanitarian assistance.

Poland has taken in more than 2 million refugees, and the numbers continue to grow.

“We have never experienced anything like that throughout our history,” Duda told Biden.

On Saturday, Biden will meet with refugees at the National Stadium in Warsaw. The stadium is a processing center where refugees are issued identification cards allowing them to work, live, go to school and get social benefits.

“I'm here in Poland to see firsthand the humanitarian crisis,” Biden said Friday, expressing his disappointment that he can’t cross the border into Ukraine for security reasons.

Biden has been in Europe since Wednesday, meeting with NATO allies and other European and world leaders.

The U.S. and its allies announced new sanctions on Russia, additional help for Ukraine, and discussed beefing up force presence in Eastern Europe in the near and longer-term.

– Maureen Groppe

UK sees Russians reluctant to enter urban war

LONDON — Britain's Defense Ministry says Russia continues to besiege a number of major Ukrainian cities including Kharkiv, Chernihiv and Mariupol.

A daily update says Russian forces are proving reluctant to engage in large scale urban infantry operations, rather preferring to rely on the indiscriminate use of air and artillery bombardments in an attempt to demoralize defending forces.

The assessment says it is likely Russia will continue to use its heavy firepower on urban areas as it looks to limit its own already considerable losses, at the cost of further civilian casualties.

– Associated Press

Zelenskyy: Ukraine will not cede territory to end Russian invasion

Zelenskyy has again appealed to Russia to negotiate an end to the war, but says Ukraine would not agree to give up any of its territory for the sake of peace.

In his nightly video address to the nation Friday, Zelenskyy appeared to be responding to Col. Gen Sergei Rudskoi, deputy chief of the Russian general staff, who said Russian forces would now focus on “the main goal, the liberation of Donbas.”

Russian-backed separatists have controlled part of the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine since 2014, and Russian forces have been battling to seize more of the region from Ukraine, including the besieged city of Mariupol.

Rudskoi’s statement also was a suggestion that Russia may be backing away from trying to take Kyiv and other major cities where its offensive has stalled. Zelenskyy noted that Russian forces have lost thousands of troops but still haven’t been able to take Kyiv or Kharkiv, the second-largest city.

Ukraine destroys Russian vessel; Moscow taps troops in Georgia

Ukrainian forces destroyed a Russian transport ship in the port city of Berdyansk that appeared to be on a resupply mission, a senior Defense official said Friday.

The attack on Thursday blew up a tank-landing ship at its pier, said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence assessments. The Russians have 22 warships in the Black Sea.

Russian combat power in Ukraine, which dipped below 90% for the first time this week, is now between 85% and 90%, the official said. For the first time, Russia appears to be drawing reinforcements from its troops based in Georgia. Combat power includes troops, tanks, armored vehicles, artillery, warplanes, warships and ballistic missiles.

Russia has also drawn down its stockpile of precision-guided weapons and is relying more on so-called dumb bombs to bombard cities, the official said. Russia has used about 50% of its air-launched cruise missiles. Russia’s cruise missiles have at times failed to launch or hit their targets.

– Tom Vanden Brook

Poll shows Americans support Russian sanctions, think Biden should be tougher

A majority of Americans are supportive of the harsh sanctions on Russia but believe Biden needs to be tougher on the Kremlin after its invasion of Ukraine, according to a poll commissioned by the Associated Press and NORC released Thursday.

The poll, which surveyed 1,082 U.S. adults from Thursday to Monday, found 56% of Americans believe Biden's response to Russia hasn't been tough enough, including a majority of 53% of Democrats. A very small percent, about 6%, said they thought Biden had been "too tough," the poll shows.

Across the board, Americans of both political parties were supportive of the harsh economic blows to Russia. The poll showed 68% were supportive of economic sanctions in general with 70% saying they supported the recent banning of oil imported from Russia, which in turn caused gas prices to rise.

— Christal Hayes

U.S. soldiers alive, despite Russia 'fake news' report, U.S. military says

Three current and former members of the Tennessee National Guard falsely identified in a Russian media report as mercenaries who were killed in Ukraine are in fact alive and well, the Tennessee National Guard said on Thursday.

President Joe Biden ordered the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Ukraine prior to Russia's invasion of the country as part of a broader effort to avoid a direct confrontation with the nuclear-armed adversary.

But the report published in Russia's Pravda newspaper identified the Americans by name and gave military ranks for each of them, citing information from pro-Russian militia in Ukraine's Donetsk.

The report even offered an intricate explanation for how the three were identified, using items from a backpack "near the remains of one of the militants" -- including a Tennessee state flag.

"The Tennessee Guard is aware of the fake news coming out of Russia," said Tracy O'Grady, a spokesperson for the larger U.S. National Guard.

The Tennessee Guard said in a statement: "They are accounted for, safe and not, as the article headline erroneously states, U.S. mercenaries killed in Donetsk People's Republic."

A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said two of the men were still in the Tennessee National Guard and in Tennessee. The other man had left the service was but was alive and accounted for -- and not in Ukraine, the official said.

The National Guard speculated the militia picked the three men while reviewing official imagery associated with a 2018 deployment by Tennessee's 278th Armored Cavalry Regiment to Ukraine, suggesting all three had been in Ukraine.

"All members of the Tennessee National Guard returned safely to their home state in 2019 after a successful mission," it said.

Russia on Sunday attacked the main base where, prior to Biden's pullout, the U.S. military had long trained Ukrainian forces. It fired air-launched cruise missiles from Russian airspace at the Yavoriv International Centre for Peacekeeping and Security.

The base is located just 15 miles (25 km) from the Polish border.

Pence fine tunes a message for 2024: Pro-Trump, to a point

In the past five weeks, former Vice President Mike Pence has broken with former President Donald Trump in more ways and more times than at any point in the previous five years.

That’s no coincidence.

The once loyal number two has been carefully uncoupling himself from Trump as he girds for a potential presidential bid in 2024. Speaking to Republican donors last weekend as Russian President Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked attack on Ukraine ravaged the democratic nation, Pence said, “There is no room in this party for apologists for Putin.” That unmistakable swipe at Trump — who had recently called Putin’s tactics leading up to the invasion “genius” — came after an even more direct condemnation.

“President Trump is wrong,” he said in a speech last month, responding to Trump’s argument that Pence could have overturned the 2020 election results by refusing to certify the electors.

It’s a marked shift from Pence’s deferential posture as vice president, when he was so wary of appearing out of step with his boss that he’d review speech drafts submitted by his aides and edit in Trump’s name with a Sharpie to be sure the president was getting enough credit, according to a former administration official.

But if Pence enters the 2024 presidential race, he’d need a rationale that distinguishes him from others, including Trump, a possible candidate himself. Some Pence allies say, and his recent moves suggest they're right, that Pence is settling on an a la carte approach: embracing parts of Trump’s record while rejecting others.

“He’s doing a good job of highlighting the successes of the [Trump] administration and, when it comes to Jan. 6, and, more recently, comments on Putin, he’s drawing that line,” a person close to Pence said, requesting anonymity to discuss private deliberations. Pence’s argument, this person said is, “If you like the policies of the Trump administration but not the rest of the stuff, then I’m the guy who’s going to fight for it.”

Pence has been giving speeches across the country since leaving office, mixing pointed attacks on President Joe Biden with a defense of the Trump administration’s efforts to cut taxes, reduce regulations and safeguard the southern border. He got a laugh from an audience at Stanford University last month when, as a prank, a student asked him about the location of the nearest bathroom. "Hey, this is a real thing,” Pence said. "President Harry Truman said, ‘Don’t ever pass up the opportunity to use the restroom.’” At the same time, he’s drawn his sharpest contrasts with Trump yet over Russia and a 2020 election the ex-president continues to falsely insist he won.

Another way Pence may differentiate himself in a presidential race is by reverting to a more traditional Republican platform, a second person close to him said. Under Trump, the GOP took a different turn as the former president courted authoritarian leaders and considered withdrawing from NATO, the military alliance that has been a bulwark against Russia for decades. Pence would champion more classic GOP positions while stressing the value of democratic governance, this person said. Firming up his foreign policy credentials, Pence last week met with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and also toured the Poland-Ukraine border with his wife, Karen.

"It's going to be OK," Pence told a Ukrainian refugee carrying a small child, according to a video of his comments.

Making repeated appearances in early presidential primary states, Pence looks and sounds like a candidate-in-waiting. South Carolina, which typically holds the first presidential primary in the South, is becoming something of a home base. Pence is scheduled to give a commencement address in the state at the end of April and return in the first week in May to deliver a keynote speech at a Christian pregnancy center. South Carolina’s large evangelical population is a natural constituency for the former vice president, who describes himself as a Christian first, a conservative second and a Republican third.

The presidency is “not something that he’s thinking about, but if that time comes, then he’s said he and Karen will consider it and will pray on it,” said an aide for Advancing American Freedom, an issue advocacy group Pence founded, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Still, Pence's positions of late show “he is moving inexorably toward running in 2024 and maybe has already made that decision,” John Bolton, former national security adviser who served with Pence in the White House, said in an interview.

In doing so he risks making a permanent enemy of Trump, if he hasn’t already. But he appears to be on the right side of public opinion, including among the GOP. A Quinnipiac poll last month suggested that 52 percent of Republicans believed that Pence’s view that he had no authority to overturn the 2020 election results was closer to their own view than Trump’s, which was that Pence did have such power.

As for Russia, Trump still faces criticism for an interview he gave last month in which he said Putin showed “genius” and “savvy” for recognizing two Moscow-backed breakaway regions in the eastern part of Ukraine as independent, a step that was quickly followed by troops moving into those regions ahead of a full-scale invasion.

"He was wrong, pretty obviously," Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said in an interview.

Praise for Putin appears out of step with both American voters and Republican Party leaders who sympathize with Ukraine’s plight. A Reuters/Ipsos poll earlier this month found the vast majority of Americans favored aggressive measures to help Ukraine fend off the Russian attack. Nearly three-quarters said the U.S. and its allies should set up a no-fly zone in Ukraine, an escalatory step that the Biden administration has refused to take.

“Anyone who associates themselves with any positive comments about Putin isn’t being very smart, if you look at how everyone is aghast at what’s going on in Ukraine,” said John Kelly, Trump’s longest-serving White House chief of staff.

The midterm elections in November present a fresh opportunity for Pence to move out from under Trump’s huge shadow and expand his own political network. His advocacy group announced last week it was pumping $10 million into an ad campaign aimed at 16 different Democratic House members that urges them to expand domestic oil production, among other actions. The ad buy could help him win the gratitude of Republican lawmakers in tough re-election fights. More ads will be coming, the aide to the group said.

It is unclear how much money Trump plans to invest in midterm campaigns from the $120 million-plus war chest he’s amassed. One national GOP strategist worried that it would be too little, too late.

“No one is banking on that $120 million coming in,” the strategist said, speaking on condition of anonymity to talk more freely. “It’s not something that people are assuming is going to be there.”

Trump has made a slew of endorsements as he looks to oust sitting Republican officials he has deemed disloyal. The gambit has the potential to backfire if his endorsed candidates don’t win. In the Georgia governor’s race, for example, Trump has endorsed former Sen. David Perdue, who’s running against incumbent Brian Kemp in the Republican primary. Kemp angered Trump by upholding the 2020 election result in which Trump lost the state. By contrast, Pence has vowed to support all incumbent Republican governors, even if they’re challenged by candidates Trump has endorsed. Kemp was leading Perdue by 11 points in a recent Fox News poll.

In a Republican National Committee podcast, chair Ronna McDaniel asked Trump what he planned to do to help Republicans recapture the House and Senate in the midterm elections. Trump mentioned that he would be holding rallies — his favorite forum. A spokesman for Trump did not respond to a request for comment.

Pence is “making decisions completely separate from what Trump is doing,” the second person close to Pence told NBC News.

Pence seldom revealed his thinking in meetings and waited instead until he was alone with Trump, former officials have said. Now he is writing two books that will help reintroduce himself to voters on his terms. One will focus on his work in the conservative movement over the years; another will be devoted to his vice presidency.

“I’m sure it will tell stories previously untold,” the Pence advocacy group aide said. “But it will also pull back the curtain on the many successes the Trump-Pence administration had, and his involvement in them.”

Other ex-officials who ran afoul of Trump, such as former Attorney General William Barr and former press secretary Stephanie Grisham, have come out with books that have had a retaliatory flavor.

It’s not Pence’s style to write a tell-all, but “the person who could give Donald Trump the most headaches could be Mike Pence,” a third person close to him said.

Airstrikes near Lviv come as Russian forces expand west

The Russian airstrikes on a military base near the northwestern city of Lviv come as Russian forces have been expanding their offensive in Ukraine to the west.

On Friday, Russian forces attacked airports in the far west of the country, which had previously been spared from the conflict.

There was substantial damage to the airport at Lutsk in northwestern Ukraine, some 70 miles from the Polish border. The Governor of Volyn region said four missiles had been fired from a Russian bomber and two people were killed Friday. Plumes of smoke also rose from the military airfield at Ivano-Frankivsk, western Ukraine, which was struck by missiles. 

Lviv is a cultural hub of Ukraine and the city's historic center is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is also a waypoint for those displaced by war, with thousands of people pouring into the city to escape bombarded towns and cities across the country or to make their way to the Polish border about 43 miles (70 kilometres) away. 

Russia intensifies strikes around Kyiv as it warns US against arming Ukraine

The Russian assault across Ukraine raged Saturday as explosions were heard in Kyiv and fighting intensified around the capital. Hours later, Russia warned the United States that it would fire on weapon shipments to Ukraine, raising the risk of direct confrontation between Moscow and a NATO country.

A number of major cities are under pressure as Russian strikes hit civilian structures. Smoke rose east of the river in Dnipro early on Saturday where CNN journalists felt at least two explosions and saw the cloudy remnants of what looked like anti-aircraft fire.

A large swath of Makariv, a village 30 miles west of Kyiv, has sustained significant damage from apparent Russian airstrikes.

CNN geolocated and verified the authenticity of photos, posted to social media Saturday, which show major damage to apartment complexes, schools and a medical facility. One of the more stark images from Makariv shows a large hole in the northern wall of an apartment building from a military strike. Many of the buildings in the photos have sustained damage on their northern facades, evidence that points to military strikes that hit them as being Russian.

In Chernihiv, some 100 kilometers north of Kyiv, local landmark Hotel Ukraine was hit overnight. "I am here now. There is no hotel anymore," Vyacheslav Chaus, head of Chernihiv region administration, said Saturday.

The northern city, which is close to the Belarus border, has been surrounded by Russian forces for more than a week and video from the city showed the collapsed floors of the hotel as well as widespread damage from missiles and airstrikes.

Chaus said civilians were dying from the strikes, which brought down the city's electricity network. "Many people are being injured. The enemy shells civilian infrastructure, where there is no military," he said, saying the city has "no electricity, almost no water, gas, and heat."

The Russian Ministry of Defense has repeatedly claimed that Russian forces are not targeting civilians.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a Saturday address the whole country was now a front line. "A few small towns just don't exist anymore. And this is a tragedy. They are just gone. And people are also gone."

Zelensky said negotiations to end Russia's invasion of Ukraine "must begin with a ceasefire," adding that Ukraine has lost about 1,300 troops as of Saturday. CNN has been unable to independently verify these numbers.

Later Saturday, Zelensky said that he was grateful for international support but urged allies to provide more aid.

"I keep reiterating to our allies and friends abroad; they have to keep doing more for our country, for Ukrainians and Ukraine. Because it is not only for Ukraine, but it is for all of Europe," he said. "The evil which purposefully targets peaceful cities and ambulance vans and explodes hospitals will not stop with just one country if they have the strength to keep going."

The US and NATO say they're taking steps to help Ukraine defend itself against Russian troops, and they have continued to provide Ukraine with security assistance, including anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons. But the US and NATO have also tried to avoid being drawn into an outright conflict with Russia. US President Joe Biden emphasized that point on Friday, that the US will not send ground troops into Ukraine, which is not a member of NATO. 

"We will not fight the third world war in Ukraine," Biden said after reiterating the US' full support to its NATO allies and promising that the US will defend "every inch" of NATO territory.

"I want to be clear though, we are going to make sure that Ukraine has the weapons to defend themselves from an invading Russian force. And we will send money and food aid to save Ukrainians' lives," he added.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov on Saturday warned the US against transferring weapons to Ukraine, saying convoys with foreign weapons would be considered "legitimate targets."

"We warned the United States that pumping Ukraine with weapons from a number of countries orchestrated by them is not just a dangerous move, but these are actions that turn the corresponding convoys into legitimate targets," Ryabkov said Saturday on the Russian state-run Channel One, according to state-owned RIA Novosti news agency.

Determined resistance

In Ukraine, Russia has faced defiance from the public in the past two weeks. On Saturday, several hundred people swarmed the city hall in the southern Ukrainian city of Melitopol following the detention of its mayor, Ivan Fedorov, by armed men the day before.

Shortly after Fedorov's detention, the Russian-backed Luhansk regional prosecutor claimed Fedorov had committed terrorism offenses, allegations that Zelensky called a "crime against democracy" on Saturday.

The Zaporozhye regional administration said Saturday a new mayor had been installed. Galina Danilchenko, a former member of the Melitopol city council, was introduced as the acting mayor on local TV, according to a statement from the regional administration posted on Telegram. In her televised statement, Danilchenko said that her "main task is to take all necessary steps to get the city back to normal."

She claimed there were people still in Melitopol who would try to destabilize "the situation and provoke a reaction of bad behavior."

"I ask you to keep your wits about you and not to give in to these provocations," she said. "I appeal to the deputies, elected by the people, on all levels. Since you were elected by the people, it is your duty to care about the well-being of your citizens."

In Kyiv, Russia's advance has faced stiff resistance from Ukrainian forces. On Saturday, the UK's Ministry of Defence's latest intelligence assessment said the bulk of Russian ground forces were about 25 kilometers (15.5 miles) from the center of the Ukrainian capital.

Maxar satellite imagery taken on Thursday showed that the 40-mile Russian column northwest of Kyiv had largely dispersed and regrouped. But the intelligence assessment warned, "this is likely to support a Russian attempt to encircle the city. It could also be an attempt by Russia to reduce its vulnerability to Ukrainian counter attacks, which have taken a significant toll on Russian forces."

The north and northeastern cities of Chernihiv and Sumy, the eastern city of Kharkiv, and Mariupol in the south, remain encircled by Russian forces, the ministry added.

A senior Ukrainian official in the southern region of Kherson, now in Russian control, has said that the "occupiers" are pressing the regional council to agree to a referendum on the area's "independence" from Ukraine. There's been no word from the Russian side about any referendum plans.

Similar referendums were held after Russian-backed separatists took control in 2014 of parts of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions. People's Republics were later declared in both regions.

Ukraine's state-operated nuclear energy company said Saturday that Russian officials had arrived at Ukraine's largest nuclear power plant, Zaporizhzhya, demanding to take control of the facility. 

Zaporizhzhya has been occupied by Russian forces for more than a week now, with Energoatom previously claiming its employees had been forced to work at "gunpoint." Chernobyl nuclear power plant is also under the control of Russian forces.

Despite the onslaught, Zelensky claimed on Saturday that Ukrainian forces are inflicting the "biggest blow to Russia's army in decades," saying that 31 Russian tactical battalion groups had lost capability, and more than 360 Russian tanks have been lost.

Zelensky added that groups of Russian troops were surrendering to Ukrainian forces, but that Russia is now recruiting fighters, reservists, conscripts, and mercenaries to "outnumber" Ukrainian forces.

Russia's losses include Major General Andriy Kolesnikov, the third Russian general to have been killed by Ukrainian forces, a Western defense official confirmed on Friday. He was commander of the Eastern Military District, according to the Russian Ministry of Defense's website, and the Western official noted for context that three Russian general staff officers were killed during the whole Syrian conflict. 

Deteriorating conditions

As Russia sustains losses, its bombardment of the country continues to degrade living conditions in several areas. Officials are now racing to send aid and evacuate citizens from encircled cities.

Ukrainian officials announced a fresh attempt to secure at least 13 evacuation corridors from different cities, despite reporting that only a few civilians could leave the previous day.

Addressing the besieged city of Mariupol, Zelensky said Saturday that Ukrainian forces would guarantee a ceasefire along an evacuation corridor so supplies could enter, and civilians can leave.

With relatively clear skies over Mariupol, new satellite imagery taken Saturday morning from Maxar showed the extent of the damage there, including some caused by military strikes reported earlier in the week.

In Mariupol's western neighborhood of Zhovteneyvi, a large -- still smoldering -- crater was seen near the Okko gas station. Smoke appeared to be rising from an apartment complex across the street. The roofs of warehouses down the street also appeared to have large holes from military strikes.

Within the apartment complex, several buildings seemed to have sustained significant damage. A debris field was seen surrounding some of the buildings with a large smoke plume.

Just northwest of the gas station, an additional satellite image showed impact craters dotting a snow-covered field. Vehicle tread marks were also seen. Just more than a mile south, in an industrial area in the Primorskyi neighborhood, a large fire was seen raging.

There was some good news amid the destruction. A pregnant woman, whose rescue from the Mariupol maternity hospital this week was captured in a viral AP photo, gave birth to a baby girl, her family told CNN.

Mariana Vishegirskaya was among a number of women at the Mariupol maternity hospital who survived the shelling.

Her aunt Tatiana Liubchenko said the baby was named Veronica but she was worried about the situation in the city. "We got the information that the water and food of the people there are running out and we are very worried, because the green corridor is not opened and the Russians do not allow, the food does not come. And it's so cold there right now so they can't get warm," Liubchenko said.

The fighting has displaced around 2 million Ukrainians in the country, the UN said Friday, and 2.5 million people have fled its borders.

Russia strikes near Ukraine's capital; mosque reported hit

Russian forces pounding the port city of Mariupol shelled a mosque sheltering more than 80 people, including children, the Ukrainian government said Saturday as fighting also raged on the outskirts of the capital, Kyiv.

There was no immediate word of casualties from the shelling of the elegant, city-center mosque. Mariupol has suffered some of the greatest misery from Russia's war in Ukraine, with unceasing barrages thwarting repeated attempts to bring in food and water, evacuate trapped civilians and to bury all of the dead.

The Ukrainian Embassy in Turkey said 86 Turkish nationals, including 34 children, were among the people who had sought safety in the mosque of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent and his wife Roksolana. Opened in 2007 and modeled after a mosque in Istanbul, Turkey, the white-walled mosque and its towering minaret were proudly advertised as a popular scenic draw by city authorities before Mariupol became a target of Russian barrages.

Around Kyiv, artillery barrages in multiple areas sent residents scurrying for shelter as air raid sirens rang out across the capital region. Britain's Defense Ministry said Russian ground forces massed north of Kyiv for most of the war had edged to within 25 kilometers (15 miles) of the city center.

The massive column of Russian fighters also has spread out, likely to support an attempt to encircle Kyiv, the British ministry said.

Ukraine's military and volunteer forces have been preparing for a feared all-out assault. Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko has said that about 2 million people, half the population of the metropolitan area, have left and that “every street, every house … is being fortified.”

As artillery pounded Kyiv’s northwestern outskirts, two columns of smoke – one black and one white -- rose southwest of the capital after a strike on an ammunition depot in the town of Vaslkyiv caused hundreds of small explosions. A frozen food warehouse just outside the capital also was struck in an apparent effort to target Kyiv’s food supply.

Russia's slow and grinding tightening of a noose around Kyiv and the bombardment of other population centers with artillery and air strikes mirror tactics that Russian forces have previously used in other campaigns, notably in Syria and Chechnya, to crush armed resistance.

Mariupol, with its strategic Black Sea port, has seen some of the greatest suffering. As of Friday, the death toll in Mariupol passed 1,500 during 12 days of attack, the mayor’s office said. A strike on a maternity hospital in the city of 446,000 this week that killed three people sparked international outrage and war-crime allegations.

The ongoing bombardment forced crews to stop digging trenches for mass graves, so the “dead aren’t even being buried,” the mayor said. An Associated Press photographer captured the moment when a tank appeared to fire directly on an apartment building, enveloping one side in a billowing orange fireball.

Russian forces have hit at least two dozen hospitals and medical facilities since they invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, according to the World Health Organization. Ukrainian officials reported Saturday that heavy artillery damaged a cancer hospital and several residential buildings in Mykolaiv, a city 489 kilometers (304 miles) west of Mariupol.

The hospital’s head doctor, Maksim Beznosenko, said several hundred patients were in the facility during the attack but no one was killed.

The invading Russian forces have struggled far more than expected against determined Ukrainian fighters. But Russia's stronger military threatens to grind down the defending forces, despite an ongoing flow of weapons and other assistance from the West for Ukraine's westward-looking, democratically elected government.

A senior Russian diplomat warned that Moscow could target foreign shipments of military equipment to Ukraine. Speaking Saturday, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Moscow has warned the United States "that pumping weapons from a number of countries it orchestrates isn’t just a dangerous move, it’s an action that makes those convoys legitimate targets."

Russia's troops are likely to see their ranks bolstered soon from abroad. Denis Pushilin, the Russia-backed head of a separatist region in eastern Ukraine, said Saturday that he expects “many thousands” of fighters from the Middle East to join the rebels and fight “shoulder-to-shoulder” against the Ukrainian army.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu’s said Friday that Russian authorities have received request from over 16,000 people from the Middle East who are eager to join the Russian military action in Ukraine. He added that many of those people have previously fought together with Russia against the Islamic State group.

Thousands of soldiers on both sides of the war in Ukraine are believed to have been killed along with many civilians. At least 2.5 million people have fled the country, according to the United Nations refugee agency.

The Ukrainian chief prosecutor’s office said Saturday at least 79 children have been killed and nearly 100 have been wounded since the start of the war. most of the victims were in the Kyiv, Kharkiv, Donetsk, Sumy, Kherson and Zhytomyr regions, the office said, noting that the numbers aren’t final because active fighting continues.

On the ground, the Kremlin’s forces appeared to be trying to regroup and regain momentum after encountering tough resistance and amassing heavy losses over the past two weeks.

“It’s ugly already, but it’s going to get worse,” said Nick Reynolds, a warfare analyst at Royal United Services Institute, a British think tank.

Russian forces were blockading Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, even as efforts have been made to create new humanitarian corridors around it and other urban centers so aid can get in and residents can get out.

Ukraine’s emergency services reported Saturday that the bodies of five people - two women, a man and two children - were pulled from an apartment building that was struck by shelling in Kharkiv,

The Russians' also stepped up attacks on Mykolaiv, located 470 kilometers (292 miles) south of Kyiv, in an attempt to encircle the city.

New commercial satellite images appeared to capture artillery firing on residential areas that stood between the Russians and the capital. The images from Maxar Technologies showed muzzle flashes and smoke from big guns, as well as impact craters and burning homes in the town of Moschun, 33 kilometers (20.5 miles) from Kyiv, the company said.

On the economic and political front, the U.S. and its allies moved to further isolate and sanction the Kremlin. President Joe Biden announced that the U.S. will dramatically downgrade its trade status with Russia and ban imports of Russian seafood, alcohol and diamonds.

The move to revoke Russia's “most favored nation” status was taken in coordination with the European Union and Group of Seven countries.

“The free world is coming together to confront Putin,” Biden said.

With the invasion in its 16th day, Putin said Friday that there had been “certain positive developments” in ongoing talks between Russian and Ukrainian negotiators. He gave no details.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy appeared on video to encourage his people to keep fighting.

“It’s impossible to say how many days we will still need to free our land, but it is possible to say that we will do it," he said from Kyiv.

Zelenskyy also accused Russia of kidnapping the mayor of one city, Melitopol, calling the abduction “a new stage of terror.” The Biden administration had warned before the invasion of Russian plans to detain and kill targeted people in Ukraine. Zelenskyy himself is a likely top target.

American defense officials said Russian pilots are averaging 200 sorties a day, compared with five to 10 for Ukrainian forces, which are focusing more on surface-to-air missiles, rocket-propelled grenades and drones to take out Russian aircraft.

The U.S. also said Russia has launched nearly 810 missiles into Ukraine.

Until recently, Russia's troops had made their biggest advances on cities in the east and south while struggling in the north and around Kyiv. They also have started targeting areas in western Ukraine, where large numbers of refugees have fled.

Russia said Friday it used high-precision long-range weapons to put military airfields in the western cities of Lutsk and Ivano-Frankivsk “out of action.” The attack on Lutsk killed four Ukrainian servicemen, the mayor said.

Russian airstrikes also targeted for the first time Dnipro, a major industrial hub in the east and Ukraine’s fourth-largest city, with about 1 million people. One person was killed, Ukrainian officials said.

In images of the aftermath released by Ukraine’s emergency agency, firefighters doused a flaming building, and ash fell on bloodied rubble. Smoke billowed over shattered concrete where buildings once stood.

The United Nations political chief said the international organization had received credible reports that Russian forces were using cluster bombs in populated areas. International law prohibits the use of the bombs, which scatter smaller explosives over a wide area, in cities and towns.

Mike Pence knocks Trump and lays the groundwork for possible presidential run

Former Vice President Mike Pence has spent the past week outmaneuvering Donald Trump, his old boss and potential 2024 primary opponent.

Shortly after the plane Trump was flying on last weekend was forced to land due to an engine failure, Pence flew to Israel on the private jet of the GOP’s most prized donor, Miriam Adelson. And while Trump was avoiding criticizing Russian President Vladimir Putin in a call-in interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity, Pence and his wife, Karen, flew to the border between Ukraine and Poland to distribute relief aid to refugees.

In perhaps the most telling indication that the political dynamic between the two men has shifted, Pence implicitly hit Trump at a Republican National Committee speech last Friday, saying the GOP should not include any “apologists for Putin.”

“Welcome to the front end of the Pence boomlet,” said veteran Republican pollster Michael Cohen, who has no relation to the former Trump lawyer. “Who had a better week or past few weeks than Pence? I mean, it’s not even close.”

When Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine, he not only resolidified the old Western alliances formed in the wake of World War II, he also shook up the Republican Party’s power dynamics, at least temporarily.

The longtime center of power on the right, Trump has been struggling to garner attention for himself after six years of almost unilaterally controlling the national stage. And Pence, who’s best known for being stiff, boring and deferential to the former president, has walked into the center of the vacuum created by Trump's absence.

Pence has even grabbed prime slots on Fox News, making news in an interview with one of Trump’s favorite hosts, Maria Bartiromo. Bartiromo pressed Pence repeatedly on his plans for 2024, and whether he would run against Trump if the former president enters the race. But Pence played coy, brushing away the questions.

“I’m confident the Republican Party will nominate a candidate who will be the next president of the United States of America, and at the right time, my family and I will reflect and consider how we might participate in that process,” Pence said.

The burst of attention for Pence comes after more than a year of laying groundwork behind the scenes, making campaign-style trips to early-voting states like New Hampshire and Iowa and courting Republican donors who have bankrolled successful White House bids.

Trump remains the leader in early polls for the 2024 party nomination, but despite his popularity with the Republican grassroots, a number of GOP lawmakers are mulling runs of their own. All are trying to develop their own unique brands, whether through Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s culture-war broadsides or Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton’s appeal to unite the pre- and post-Trump wings of the GOP.

Yet despite his very public falling out with Trump, Pence's backers see him as a figure uniquely suited to bring together the warring factions within the GOP. An evangelical Christian originally elected to Congress in 2000, he steadily climbed the ranks of the House Republican caucus. In 2012, Indiana voters elected him governor, a position he left to become Trump’s running mate and shore up the erstwhile TV host’s conservative bona fides.

Since the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol insurrection, in which Trump-backed rioters threatened to hang Pence for not helping the then president overturn the 2020 election results, Pence has been slowly and steadily hitting the campaign trail — even though he has yet to announce his intentions for 2024. A Pence spokesman did not respond to Yahoo News’ request for comment.

But the real break in the dam seemed to come almost immediately after Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine. Trump and his backers, who just days earlier had been touting Putin’s “genius,” suddenly looked outdated and perhaps out of touch with the GOP.

“The McCain wing of the GOP is back and stronger than ever, truth-telling about Mr. KGB,” said longtime Republican strategist Scott Reed, who ran Bob Dole’s campaign for president in 1996.

But Republican operatives, like the candidates they advise, are still trying to game out whether the turn from Trump-style populism, at least in matters of foreign policy, is permanent or merely a passing fluke.

“It’s too soon to tell, but I still think Americans don’t want U.S. troops over there, and a lot don’t want to even send money there,” said former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski. “This could be an issue in the midterms.”

Pence, meanwhile, is doing what he has always done, plodding forward steadily and waiting for his moments to grab the spotlight.

Russia to block Instagram over ‘death to invaders’ posting rule

Moscow also opens criminal case into Instagram’s owner, Meta, for allowing posts calling for violence against Russian forces.

Russia has announced plans to block access to Instagram and launched a criminal case against its owner, Meta Platforms Inc, after the company said it would allow posts that call for “death to the Russian invaders”.

Friday’s move is the latest in Russia’s confrontation with United States-based social media platforms that has escalated since its invasion of Ukraine.

Moscow has already limited access to Twitter and blocked Facebook, which is also owned by Meta.

Russia’s communications and media regulator, Roskomnadzor, said it was restricting access to hugely popular Instagram because of the platform is spreading “calls to commit violent acts against Russian citizens, including military personnel”.

The ban will come into effect on Monday, it said, allowing active Instagram users “time to transfer their photos and videos to other social networks and notify their followers”.

In response, Meta’s Global Affairs President Nick Clegg defended what he described as a temporary decision “taken in extraordinary and unprecedented circumstances”.

“I want to be crystal clear: Our policies are focused on protecting people’s rights to speech as an expression of self-defense in reaction to a military invasion of their country,” he said in a statement.

“The fact is, if we applied our standard content policies without any adjustments we would now be removing content from ordinary Ukrainians expressing their resistance and fury at the invading military forces, which would rightly be viewed as unacceptable.”

He noted that the policy only applies in Ukraine and the company hasn’t changed its policies against hate speech targeting Russian people.

‘Illegal calls’

But Russia’s Investigative Committee, which probes major crimes, had already said it was launching an investigation of Meta, and prosecutors pushed for the Silicon Valley giant to be branded “extremist”.

“A criminal case has been initiated … in connection with illegal calls for murder and violence against citizens of the Russian Federation by employees of the American company Meta, which owns the social networks Facebook and Instagram,” said the committee, which reports directly to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

It was not immediately clear what the consequences of the criminal case might be.

Meta’s Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp services are all popular in Russia, with 7.5 million, 50.8 million and 67 million users last year respectively, according to researcher Insider Intelligence.

Russia’s RIA news agency, citing a source, said the legal moves will not affect WhatsApp as the messaging app is considered a means of communication not a way to post information.

Meta’s relaxing of its rules had met with controversy almost immediately, and the United Nations voiced alarm, warning it could lead to “hate speech” against Russians.

UN Rights Office Spokeswoman Elizabeth Throssell said that the policy lacked clarity, which “could certainly contribute to hate speech directed at Russians in general”.

Contrasting views

Meta, which boasts billions of users globally across its apps, has previously struggled with what it would allow people to post in moments of upheaval.

In July 2021, the firm temporarily allowed posts calling for “death to Khamenei,” referring to Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, during protests that rocked the country.

Tech platforms have had to navigate a slew of thorny issues related to the war in Ukraine, such as when US Senator Lindsey Graham called for the assassination of Russian President Vladimir Putin in a televised interview and on Twitter.

“The only way this ends is for somebody in Russia to take this guy out,” says Graham’s tweet from March 3, which Twitter has not taken down.

Meta’s decision drew sharply contrasting views.

“The policy regards calls for violence against Russian soldiers,” said Emerson Brooking, a disinformation expert at the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab.

“A call for violence here, by the way is also a call for resistance because Ukrainians resist a violent invasion,” he added.

But some expressed deep concerns, like Lehigh University Professor Jeremy Littau, who tweeted: “‘We don’t allow hate speech except against certain people from a certain country’ is one hell of a can of worms.”

Facebook and other US tech giants have moved to penalize Russia for the attack on Ukraine, and Moscow has also taken steps to block access to the leading social media network as well as Twitter.

Russia thus joined the very small club of countries barring the largest social network in the world, along with China and North Korea.

Since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine last month, Russian authorities have also stepped up pressure against independent media, though press freedoms in the country were already rapidly waning.

Moscow blocked Facebook and restricted Twitter the same day last week that it backed the imposition of jail terms on media publishing “false information” about the military.

Ukraine says shelling damaged cancer hospital

LVIV, Ukraine — Ukrainian officials accused Russia damaging a cancer hospital and several residential buildings in the southern city of Mykolaiv with shelling from heavy artillery.

The hospital’s head doctor, Maksim Beznosenko, said several hundred patients were in the hospital during the attack but that no one was killed. The assault damaged the building and blew out windows.

Russian forces have stepped up their attacks on Mykolaiv, located 470 kilometers (292 miles) south of Kyiv, in an attempt to encircle the city.

Ukrainian and Western officials earlier accused Russia of shelling a maternity hospital in the southern city of Mariupol on Wednesday. Three people died in that attack.

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LVIV, Ukraine — Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russia on Friday of kidnapping the mayor of the city of Melitopol, equating it to the actions of “ISIS terrorists.”

“They have transitioned into a new stage of terror, in which they try to physically liquidate representatives of Ukraine’s lawful local authorities,” Zelenskyy said in a video address Friday evening.

Kirill Timoshenko, the deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office, posted a video on the social media site Telegram which he said showed a group of armed men carrying the mayor, Ivan Fedorov, across a square.

Russian forces captured the southern port city of Melitopol, with a population of 150,000, on Feb. 26.

The prosecutor’s office of the Luhansk People’s Republic, a Moscow-backed rebel region in eastern Ukraine, said on its website that there was a criminal case against Fedorov. The prosecutor’s office accused Fedorov of “terrorist activities” and of financing the nationalist militia Right Sector to “commit terrorist crimes against Donbass civilians.”

The office said it was looking for Fedorov and called for anyone with information about his whereabouts to contact them.

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SAVANNAH, Ga. — U.S. soldiers are continuing to deploy to Europe, joining thousands already sent overseas to support NATO allies amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

About 130 soldiers from the 87th Division Sustainment Support Battalion, 3rd Division Sustainment Brigade gathered Friday at Hunter Airfield in Savannah, Georgia and departed on a chartered flight.

The soldiers are in addition to the estimated 3,800 soldiers from the Army’s 3rd Infantry Division who deployed recently from nearby Fort Stewart.

A division commander said that soldiers are being told to prepare for about six months overseas. The Pentagon has ordered roughly 12,000 total service members from various U.S. bases to Europe.

The soldiers’ mission is to train alongside military units of NATO allies in a display of force aimed at deterring further aggression by Russia. The Pentagon has stressed U.S. forces are not being deployed to fight in Ukraine.

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LVIV, Ukraine — Ukrainian authorities have warned of a humanitarian catastrophe in the port city of Mariupol, which has been encircled by Russian forces and cut off from deliveries of food and medicine.

Mariupol officials said Friday that 1,582 people had been killed in the 12 days since the siege began.

“There is a humanitarian catastrophe in the city and the dead aren’t even being buried,” Mariupol’s mayor’s office said in a statement Friday, calling for Russian forces to lift the siege.

Ukrainian authorities have accused Russian forces of shelling evacuation routes and preventing civilians from escaping the city of 430,000 people.

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BERLIN — Ukraine told the International Atomic Energy Agency on Friday that technicians have started repairing damaged power lines at the decommissioned Chernobyl power plant in an effort to restore power supplies, the U.N. nuclear agency said.

On Wednesday, Ukrainian authorities said that Chernobyl, the site of the 1986 nuclear disaster, was knocked off the power grid, with emergency generators supplying backup power.

The Ukrainian nuclear regulator said Friday that workers repaired one section of the lines, but there still appears to be damage in other places, the IAEA said. Repair efforts would continue despite “the difficult situation” outside the plant, which was taken by Russian forces early in the invasion, it said.

The Ukrainian regulator said additional fuel was delivered for generators, but it remains important to fix the power lines as soon as possible. The IAEA reiterated that the disconnection “will not have a critical impact on essential safety functions at the site.”

The Vienna-based U.N. nuclear watchdog said that it still isn’t receiving data from monitoring systems installed to monitor nuclear material and activities at Chernobyl, but transmission from the Zaporizhzhia plant — Ukraine’s biggest, which Russian forces seized last week — has been restored after being lost earlier this week.

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PARIS — Interpol is restricting Russia’s ability to input information directly into the global police organization’s vast network, deciding that communications must first be checked by the general secretariat in Lyon, France.

The French Foreign Ministry said Friday that the beefed-up surveillance measures follow “multiple suspicions of attempted fraudulent use” of the Interpol system in recent days, but it did not elaborate.

Interpol stressed in a statement Thursday that it is maintaining its pledge of neutrality amid war between two of its members, triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But it said that “heightened supervision and monitoring measures” of Moscow’s National Central Bureau were needed “to prevent any potential misuse of Interpol’s channels” like targeting individuals in or outside Ukraine.

The ministry noted that Interpol’s decision has multiple impacts from communications, to putting out so-called “red notices” for criminals on the loose or even feeding data on lost or stolen documents — all of which must now get compliance checks from Interpol headquarters.

Interpol, which has 195 members, said it had received calls to suspend Russia from the network, along with calls by law enforcement leaders looking for continued cooperation to better fight crime.

“In addition to the tragic loss of life, conflicts invariably lead to an increase in crime,” as organized crime groups try to exploit desperation, Interpol said. Risks include human trafficking, weapons smuggling and trafficking in illicit goods and medicines.

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BOSTON — YouTube announced Friday that it has begun blocking access globally to channels associated with Russian state-funded media. It had previously blocked them — specifically RT and Sputnik — across Europe.

YouTube, which is owned by Google, announced the move in a Twitter post and said that while the change is effective immediately, “we expect our systems to take time to ramp up.”

YouTube also said it was now removing content about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine that violates its policy that “minimizes or trivializes well-documented violent events.” The Kremlin refers to the invasion as a “special military operation” and not a war.

YouTube previously paused YouTube ads in Russia. Now, it is extending that to all the ways it makes money on the platform in Russia.

Ukraine’s digital transformation minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, predicted in his Telegram channel that the Kremlin would soon move to block YouTube in Russia. “It’s a question of time.”

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ANTALYA, Turkey— With the Ukrainian refugee crisis, European countries that had previously been reluctant to share the burden for refugees have found themselves seeking solidarity and burden-sharing, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said Friday.

Grandi spoke at a diplomacy forum near the Turkish Mediterranean city of Antalya as the number of refugees fleeing Ukraine passed 2.5 million.

“European countries, including countries that have been rather hesitant in the past to any notion that you should share that responsibility, now find themselves … in the situation to hold hundreds of thousands,” Grandi said. “And what do they do? They ask for that international solidarity and sharing, which means financial assistance.”

Grandi said: “I think that we need to capitalize on what is happening now to restate this notion, that if refugees move, everybody should share responsibility.

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WARSAW, Poland – Ukraine’s president and NATO chief remotely joined Poland’s leaders and lawmakers Friday for a session marking Poland’s 23 years in the defensive military alliance at a time when neighboring Ukraine is fighting Russian invasion.

In a video link to the gathering in Poland’s parliament, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy thanked Poland for supporting his nation’s struggle against the aggressor and also for opening its borders to refugees fleeing the war. Over 2.3 million people have fled Ukraine since the Feb. 24 invasion. Over 1.5 million of them have made their way to Poland.

In a veiled way Zelenskyy said he hopes Ukraine will eventually receive Soviet-designed MiG-29 fighter jets from Poland. The delivery implications of the jets recently led to an apparent misunderstanding between Warsaw and the U.S. administration.

“I am grateful for the efforts you are taking to allow us to protect Ukraine’s skies,” Zelenskyy said. “I trust that we will be able to arrive at a result that is very important to us.”

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Poland is safer for being a member of the alliance, and stressed the task is now to make sure the armed conflict does not spread but comes to an end.

Poland’s President Andrzej Duda condemned Russia’s bombings of Ukraine’s cities and housing areas as “war crimes.”

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UNITED NATIONS — The United Nations human rights office has received “credible reports” that Russian forces are using cluster munitions in Ukraine, including in populated areas which is prohibited under international humanitarian law, the U.N. political chief said Friday.

Undersecretary-General Rosemary DiCarlo told a U.N. Security Council meeting that residential areas and civilian infrastructure are being shelled in Mariupol, Kharkiv, Sumy and Chernihiv and “the utter devastation being visited on these cities is horrific.”

Most of the civilian casualties recorded by the U.N. human rights office — 564 killed and 982 injured as of Thursday — “have been caused by explosive weapons with a wide impact area, including heavy artillery and multi-launch rocket systems, and missile and air strikes,” she said.

“Indiscriminate attacks, including those using cluster munitions, which are of a nature to strike military objectives and civilians or civilian objects without distinction, are prohibited under international humanitarian law,” DiCarlo said. “Directing attacks against civilian and civilian objects, as well as so-called area bombardment in towns and villages, are also prohibited under international law and may amount to war crimes.”

As of Thursday the U.N. World Health Organization has verified 26 attacks on health facilities, health workers and ambulances, including the bombing of the Mariupol maternity hospital, which caused 12 deaths and 34 injuries, DiCarlo said.

All alleged violations of international humanitarian law must be investigated and those found responsible must be held accountable, she said.

DiCarlo stressed that “the need for negotiations to stop the war in Ukraine could not be more urgent.”

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Footage recorded on the outskirts of Kyiv by Radio Free Europe on Wednesday shows Ukrainian soldiers with rifles and rocket-propelled grenade launchers slung over their shoulders traversing snow-dusted fields and woods and expressing disdain toward the Russians.

One unidentified soldier called their adversaries “orcs,” a reference to the monstrous and malevolent foot soldiers in the “Lord of the Rings” series.

Another soldier said they planned to kill all their enemies over the bombing of Mariupol.

“We’ll multiply them by zero,” the unidentified soldier said.

Gunfire and explosions erupt during the 3-minute, 30-second clip. At one point in the woods, shots split the air near the group, and soldiers drop to their stomachs in an instant and return fire. The assailants are not visible in the clip, but the crack-crack-crack from the gunfire exchange carries on for 15 seconds in one part of the clip.

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The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has opened an online portal to gather evidence of war crimes in Ukraine, as he renewed his call to combatants to abide by the laws of war.

Prosecutor Karim Khan said in a written statement Friday that he is “closely following the deeply troubling developments in hostilities.” There have been reports in recent days of Russian strikes on civilian infrastructure in Ukrainian towns and cities, including the deadly strike on a maternity hospital in Mariupol earlier this week.

Khan notes in a written statement that “if attacks are intentionally directed against the civilian population: that is a crime. If attacks are intentionally directed against civilian objects: that is a crime. I strongly urge parties to the conflict to avoid the use of heavy explosive weapons in populated areas.” He says there is no legal justification or excuse “for attacks which are indiscriminate, or which are disproportionate in their effects on the civilian population.”

Khan also said that two more of the global court’s member states, Japan and North Macedonia, have formally requested him to investigate in Ukraine, bringing the number of so-called state party referrals to 41.

The information will bolster evidence gathered by an investigative team Khan sent to the region last week to begin gathering evidence.

Neither Russia nor Ukraine is an ICC member state, but Kyiv has recognized the court’s jurisdiction, allowing Khan to investigate war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.

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BELGRADE, Serbia — A flight from Belgrade to Moscow was reverted and evacuated following a bomb alert, Serbian police said Friday.

The Belgrade airport received an email saying that an explosive device has been planted on the Air Serbia flight to Moscow, police said in an email.

The plane was then turned back shortly after take-off, and is being checked by police, the statement said. No other details were immediately available.

Serbian media said there were more than 200 passengers and crew on the plane.

Air Serbia carrier is the only one in Europe that still flies to and from Russia as Serbia has refused to join Western sanctions against its traditional ally over Ukraine.

Air Serbia has increased the number of flights to Russia amid high demand.

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ATHENS, Greece — The leader of Greece’s Orthodox Church has contacted the Orthodox Church of Ukraine to offer support in housing refugees fleeing the war-torn country.

Archbishop Ieronymos, who heads the Greek church, said in a statement on Friday that he had telephoned Metropolitan Bishop Epiphanius of Kyiv, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church leader, and promised “full support” for Ukraine, adding that parishes across Greece had been sent a request to provide assistance.

Only several thousand refugees from Ukraine have traveled to Greece so far — out of the 2.5 million that have fled the country — but Greek authorities expect that number to increase in the coming weeks.

The Greek church has recognized the independence of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine despite strong opposition from the Russian Orthodox Church.

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ISTANBUL — Turkey on Friday evacuated its embassy in Kyiv, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said.

Tanju Bilgic said staff at the mission would move to Chernivtsi near the Romanian border for security reasons, state-run Anadolu news agency reported.

The order to leave Kyiv came as Russian forces fanned out around the city and appeared likely to step up artillery and rocket attacks. Many countries ordered diplomatic staff to leave Kyiv before Russia launched its invasion on Feb. 24.

Turkey has close ties to both Ukraine and Russia and has been seeking to mediate between its warring Black Sea neighbors.

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VERSAILLES, France — German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is underlining the importance of keeping in contact with Russian President Vladimir Putin, but is stressing that “we will not make decisions for the Ukrainians.”

Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron, who has spoken frequently with the Russian leader, together spoke to Putin on Thursday. After a European Union summit on Friday, Scholz said “it is absolutely necessary that we do not let the thread of talks break.”

The Elysee said Friday that Macron and Scholz would speak again with Putin on Saturday.

Scholz stressed that he and Macron are consulting closely among themselves and with the Ukrainian leadership — and that a cease-fire is the top priority. Scholz said it’s good that there are talks, but they shouldn’t just drag on while “weapons every day destroy people’s lives, buildings, infrastructure and dreams.”

The chancellor said that there is “one very clear principle: we will not make decisions for the Ukrainians. They must know themselves what from their point of view is the right thing for their country in this threatening situation.”

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BELGRADE, Serbia — Germany’s foreign minister has urged Serbia, which has not imposed sanctions on traditional ally Russia over the war in Ukraine, to align policies with the European Union if it wants to join the bloc.

Annalena Baerbock said Friday in Serbia’s capital Belgrade that “we all must have a clear position” over the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, Baerbock said, launched a “shameless campaign of destruction” that is targeting “maternity wards, schools, (people’s) homes.”

While Serbia has criticized the attack on Ukraine and voted in the United Nations for the condemnation of the attack, Belgrade has refrained from joining Western sanctions against Moscow.

Historically considered a friendly nation, Russia remains popular among the Serbs, particularly because of Moscow’s support for Serbia’s opposition to the Western-backed independence of the breakaway former Kosovo province.

Baerbock praised Serbia’s U.N. vote and the offer to host Ukrainian refugees. But she added that “joining the European Union means readiness to align with the positions of the union.”

Serbia’s President Aleksandar Vucic said that “Serbia has a very determined and clear position” and has done “nothing that would hurt Ukraine.”

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MOSCOW — Russia’s communications and media regulator says it's restricting national access to Instagram because the platform is spreading “calls to commit violent acts against Russian citizens, including military personnel.”

The regulator, called Roskomnadzor, took the step Friday as Russia presses ahead with its invasion of Ukraine.

Earlier on Friday, Meta, the company that owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, said in a statement tweeted by its spokesman Andy Stone that it had “made allowances for forms of political expression that would normally violate our rules on violent speech, such as ‘death to the Russian invaders’.”

The statement stressed that the company “still won’t allow credible calls for violence against Russian civilians.”

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PRAGUE — Prague City Hall has started readying temporary accommodation for a surge in refugees from Ukraine after the Czech capital ran out of housing options for them.

The government estimates that up to 200,000 refugees — 55% of them children — have arrived in the Czech Republic, a European Union and NATO member that doesn’t border Ukraine. About 25% of the refugees entering the country have gone to Prague.

Prague Mayor Zdenek Hrib has asked the heads of 22 city districts to prepare at least 100 beds each in school gyms and also provide food for the refugees there.

Hrib compared the current situation in Prague to Germany facing the waves of refugees during a European migrant crisis in 2015-16.

“The difference is that Germany had months to react, we have just days,” Hrib said. “The demand for accommodation in Prague is enormous and by far surpasses what we can offer.”

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ANTALYA, Turkey — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has suggested that the war in Ukraine could have been avoided had the world spoken out against Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea.

“Would we have faced such a picture if the West, the whole world, had raised their voices?” Erdogan asked. “Those who remained silent in the face of Crimea’s invasion are now saying some things.”

Erdogan spoke Friday at a diplomacy forum near the Turkish Mediterranean city of Antalya, where the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba met a day earlier for talks facilitated by Turkey’s foreign minister.

Erdogan said Turkey would continue its efforts for peace.

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COPENHAGEN, Denmark — Finnish President Sauli Niinistö spoke in a phone call Friday with Russian President Vladimir Putin about the war in Ukraine.

Niinistö's office said in a statement that he informed Putin that he, earlier in the day, had a phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and that Zelenskyy was prepared to talk directly with Putin.

The statement said Niinistö called for an immediate ceasefire and the safe evacuation of civilians, but also spoke to Putin about the security of nuclear energy facilities in Ukraine.

Niinisto is one of the few Western leaders who has kept a regular dialogue with Putin ever since the Finnish leader took office in 2012.

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BUDAPEST, Hungary — Hungary’s prime minister said Friday that sanctions imposed against Russia by the European Union would not involve a ban on imports of Russian oil and gas.

In a video on his social media channels following a meeting of EU leaders in Versailles, France, Viktor Orban said it was possible that the war in Ukraine “would drag on,” but that “the most important issue was settled in a way that was favorable to us.”

“There will be no sanctions covering oil and gas, which means that Hungary’s energy supply is guaranteed for the next period,” Orban said.

Orban, widely considered to be the Kremlin’s closest ally in the EU, has supported the bloc’s sanctions against Russia over its invasion of Ukraine, Hungary’s neighbor.

But he has remained firm in insisting that the energy sector be left out of sanctions, arguing that such a move would damage EU countries more than Russia.

Last year, Hungary extended by 15 years a natural gas contract with Russian state-owned energy company Gazprom, and has entered into a 12 billion-euro ($13.6 billion) Russian build-and-finance agreement to add two nuclear reactors to Hungary’s only nuclear power plant.

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KYIV, Ukraine — Ukraine’s president says his country’s military forces have reached “a strategic turning point,” while Russia’s president says there are “certain positive developments” in talks between the warring countries.

Neither leader explained clearly what they meant, however.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday: “It’s impossible to say how many days we will still need to free our land, but it is possible to say that we will do it because ... we have reached a strategic turning point.” He didn’t elaborate.

He said authorities are working on 12 humanitarian corridors and trying to ensure needy people receive food, medicine and basic goods.

He spoke on a video showing him outside the presidential administration in Kyiv, speaking in both Ukrainian and Russian about the 16th day of war.

Meanwhile, in Moscow Russian President Vladimir Putin said there have been positive developments in talks between the warring countries, but he didn’t offer any details about what those developments were.

Putin hosted Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko for talks on Friday and told him that negotiations with Ukraine “are now being held almost on a daily basis.”

Biden, allies move to suspend normal trade relations with Russia

Seeking to further punish Russian President Vladimir Putin for what he described as a “merciless assault” on Ukraine, President Biden said on Friday that he would move to revoke Russia’s status as a top trading partner with the United States.

The action, Biden explained, would “make it harder for Russia to do business with the United States” by allowing for new taxes on imports from which nations with most-favored status are exempt. The European Union and Group of Seven nations — which include Japan, Canada and the United Kingdom — are taking similar steps, which could deal Russia what Biden described in his White House remarks as a “crushing blow.”

Congress will have to take up the matter, but given the rare eagerness with which Democrats and Republicans have united around a single foe, this latest effort to isolate Russia could be realized within a matter of days.

“The free world is coming together to confront Putin,” Biden said. “Our two parties here at home are leading the way.”

Putin does have a key ally: China, which trades far more with Russia ($147 billion last year) than it does with second-place Germany ($65 billion) or distant-fifth United States ($35 billion). Beijing has done its best to remain neutral when it comes to the Ukraine conflict and has not been party to any of the restrictive new trade policies directed at the Kremlin.

Still, the loss of premier trading status across Canada, Japan and much of Europe means that Russian exporters — already caught in a hostile global economy — will now face the possibility of tariffs on the goods they are looking to sell abroad. And even though the trade relationship with China remains stable, it is not clear just how much more that relationship can be expanded simply because Moscow has few other friends left.

Earlier this week, American financial giants Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase said they were ending business in Russia, further underscoring the costs both ordinary Russians and Russian elites are bearing for the unprovoked attack on Ukraine that Putin began last month. So far, diplomatic efforts to end the conflict have failed.

“Putin’s actions are causing massive harm to the Russian people,” former Finnish Prime Minister Alexander Stubb tweeted. “The sanctions will be as total as the isolation. No area will be spared: finance, trade, goods, services, individuals, culture, sport, energy, transport. Reserves will not last forever.”

American officials have said U.S. troops would not fight in Ukraine. Economic means are thus seen as the best way to convince Putin to withdraw troops from sovereign Ukrainian territory, an occupation that has already taken the lives of thousands of Russian troops and hundreds of Ukrainian civilians.

“Russia has now become a global economic and financial pariah,” the White House said in announcing the move, which comes with an outright ban of imports from Russia of luxury goods like vodka and caviar — two poignant symbols of the country after two decades of Putin’s rule, which has enriched a class of oligarchs known for their lavish lifestyles.

Biden called those oligarchs “corrupt billionaires,” and the Treasury Department moved on Friday to implement new sanctions on Russia’s ruling elite. “They support Putin, they steal from the Russian people and they seek to hide their money in our countries,” Biden said.

“They must share in the pain of these sanctions,” Biden continued, vowing to go after “their superyachts and their vacation homes.” Later in the morning, he signed an executive order banning the export of American luxury goods to Russia.

Congress gave Russia access to permanent normal trade relations (PNTR) — also known as most-favored-nation status — in 2012 as a sign that it had become a democracy that had recovered from the chaos and corruption of the early post-Soviet days. Yet antidemocratic abuses by the Kremlin, including the death of imprisoned attorney Sergei Magnitsky, made some wonder if Russia was deserving of such privilege.

“This culture of impunity in Russia has been growing worse and worse,” said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., at the time.

Today, Cuba and North Korea are the only nations in the world that can’t claim the favored-nation protections of the PNTR, underscoring how quickly Russia is being expelled from virtually all U.S. economic arrangements.

Even Iran retains PNTR status, though trade with the Islamist republic has been sanctioned, to the point of nonexistence, since 1987. Venezuela, another adversary, also retains its favored-nation status. In fact, it appears to be on the cusp of selling oil to the United States again, in a stark contrast to Russia’s narrowing trade options. (Congress suspended oil imports from Russia earlier this week, thus making Venezuela’s vast oil reserves a potentially attractive option.)

Biden said Russia could soon be deprived of loans from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, further squeezing a nation cut off from Western financial markets. “He cannot pursue a war that threatens the very foundations of international peace and stability and then ask for financial help from the international community,” the president argued.

As such, the move would be as symbolic as it is economic. Last month’s invasion of Ukraine seemed to reverse three decades of optimism about Russia. Trade relations with Russia were normalized in 1990, with hopes that the Kremlin would steer the nation in the direction of a free-market economy. And for a while, that was indeed the course undertaken by President Boris Yeltsin and his successor, Putin.

Putin ended the “gangster capitalism” of the 1990s, turning the oligarchs who had gotten rich during that time essentially into an arm of the Kremlin. Those who weren’t chased out (Boris Berezovsky) or jailed (Mikhail Khodorkovsky) became near-literal vassals of Putin. Meanwhile, he ruthlessly consolidated control over the media and other sectors of free society.

American corporations and legislators were willing to overlook much of that over the last 15 years, though Putin invaded Georgia (2008) and Ukraine (2014). But the second Ukraine invasion — which has been longer and more brutal than the first — has shifted the calculus, and now the same Congress that granted Russia PNTR status could move to revoke the vote of confidence it gave a decade ago.

In his remarks on Friday, Biden made clear that the Russian people have one man to blame, just as his administration has said that Americans upset at higher gas prices should point their finger at the Kremlin, not the White House.

"Putin is an aggressor. He is the aggressor. And Putin must pay the price."