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Civilians Evacuating Sumy; Russia Attacks Intensify; Biden to Announce Energy Ban; Russia Threatens Natural Gas Supply; Brett Bruen is Interviewed about Russian Energy; Steve Anderson is Interviewed about Ukraine's Combat Unit. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired March 08, 2022 - 09:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[09:00:06]

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking this morning, President Biden set to speak next hour and is expected to announce a ban on Russian oil, natural gas and coal imports to the United States. We will bring you that live.

Now this move, of course, comes as we are also watching in Ukraine a major evacuation effort now underway in the besieged northeastern city of Sumy after Ukrainian authorities say 21 civilians, including two children, were killed in the city in a Russian air strike overnight.

Good to have you with us at the top of the hour here. I'm Erica Hill in New York.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Jim Sciutto reporting from Lviv, Ukraine.

Overnight, the Ukrainian government and the kremlin agreed to set up a humanitarian corridor out of the heavily damaged city of Sumy. Russia's track record so far, though, leaves many burning questions here. Russia had offered humanitarian corridors from four other cities as well. These, though, would force the evacuees to enter only Russia or Belarus. Those have not yet been agreed to.

All of this is taking place as Ukrainian officials accuse Russia of using cease-fires to advance its forces in the field, and at the same time deliberately target civilians.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has remained defiant throughout. He appeared publicly from his office in the capital Kyiv for the first time since Russia's invasion began. This morning he is calling out world leaders asking for more help, more military assistance, to stop what he calls, quote, genocide inside his country. PRESIDENT VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY, UKRAINE (through translator): The fault

is with the occupants, but the responsibility is with those who for the last 13 days somewhere out there on the west, somewhere in their offices can't approve an obviously necessary decision. Those who still haven't secured Ukrainian skies from the Russian killers, who haven't protected our cities from air bombings and rockets when they actually can.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: And that requested no-fly zone still remains a nonstarter for the U.S. and its NATO allies. They fear a war with Russia.

The people fleeing this country, according to the U.N., 2 million have fled. That's in less than two weeks.

Here in the western city of Lviv, something of a lifeboat for Ukrainians throughout all this. Its mayor is pleading for help. He warns the city just struggling to feed and house some 200,000 displaced civilians who are now here. We've seen a lot of them on the streets, in shelters.

In the heavily damaged Russian-occupied port city of Mariupol, in the south, civilians there really under siege. They're without running water, heat, electricity. They're becoming the targets of shelling. Ukraine's foreign minister says Russian forces are committing war crimes by holding 300,000 civilians there, that city's residents, hostage.

We are covering the breaking news from every angle as only CNN can. We're going to beginning this morning with CNN's senior national security correspondent Alex Marquardt. He is near the capital Kyiv.

Let's talk, if we can, first, about this city, Sumy, not far to the east of Kyiv, just devastating barrages overnight. I believe the latest death toll is 21. What do we know about the latest and are people able to leave now?

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim, it goes without saying that there's a lot of skepticism when Russia talks about cease-fires and humanitarian corridors. Russia said that as of this morning they would be implementing a cease-fire for five Ukrainian cities to allow these humanitarian corridors to function. We should note that most of the corridors that they are proposing lead not to elsewhere in Ukraine, but into Belarus and into Russia, which is not where Ukrainians want to go. You can understand they don't want to go to places where these Russian troops have launched the invasion of their country.

When it comes to Sumy, however, that is the one corridor that the Ukrainians have agreed to. It is a corridor that is about 100 miles from the city of Sumy, which our viewers should know is right up against the border with Russia. That's why it's come under such withering attack from the Russians. It's a -- so this is a corridor that heads south to another Ukrainian city. We understand that it has, at least on some level, been functioning.

We've actually heard from the Indian foreign ministry. There are lots of Indian students who were in the city of Sumy, 700 we understand, have been able to get out and to head south in this corridor. And they plan to get on trains and then head westward, which is what a lot of Ukrainians have wanted to do, either from a Kyiv central train station or elsewhere to try to head to Lviv in the west, where you are, and then out into Europe.

[09:05:03]

So that, at least on some level, has been functioning.

But, Jim, you do note, there has been violence as recently as last night. It's more of that indiscriminate Russian shelling hitting a residential building that killed at least 21 people, including two children.

Where we see the corridors breaking down farther south in Mariupol, that critical port city that has been surrounded, has been besieged. As you mentioned, local authorities saying some 300,000 residents who are being held hostage there, and they say that a humanitarian aid convoy that was coming south to them from the central city of Zaporizhzhia has been hit.

So, at best, this ceasefire is tenuous. It really remains to be seen to what extent the Russians are actually going to commit to that, Jim.

SCIUTTO: And we have to note, all these negotiations about ceasefires, humanitarian corridors, they're taking place under duress, right? Ukraine's been invaded by Russia.

Alex Marquardt, thanks so much.

CNN international security editor Nick Paton Walsh, he is in another city. He's in a hospital in Mykolaiv, Ukraine.

Tell us what you're seeing there and I imagine that that hospital you're seeing some of the human cost of all this.

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN INTERNATIONAL SECURITY EDITOR: Yes, a steady flow into the (INAUDIBLE) over the past days, Jim. At the moment, in Mykolaiv, the fight is back on. We're hearing the impacts of shelling around the town at the moment. And on the way in, we saw artillery -- I think it was targeting Russian positions on the outskirts. Hard to tell, really. It appears that the Russians, despite being put back repeatedly here, tend to have another go and another go. And that's caused I think a degree of real panic to some degree in this town. We saw long cues of people trying to get out.

And just in this hospital, I heard one story which was startling, frankly, in terms of the intimacy of how awful it had been for this group of women, working in a children's rehabilitation center a fair distance out of this city. They said, the two survivors we spoke to, that their car, they were changing shift and they were driving out and they came across it seemed a Russian column. They called them the zeds (ph) because of the zed (ph) marked on the vehicles. A shell hit their car, killing, it seemed, three of them outright, one woman's head -- one woman's head removed by the force of the blast it seemed, and then gunfire followed up after that.

One of the woman in here shaking so forcefully still, even though this happened at 10:00 this morning, a good solid seven hours ago, still shaking to the point where she could hardly speak of what she'd seen. Obviously, we haven't been to the scene, so we have their word for what happened here. But it's a sign of the constant trauma and panic people are experiencing just when they come across these convoys here.

The impacts are continual and that is, at this stage, as we head towards sort of sundown, Jim, as you know, and a lot of the activity picks up here, another sign of how Mykolaiv is, I think, experiencing the bombardment because of potentially the Russian military's frustration at how badly they performed about trying to get into this vital port city.

The mayor is being, you know, at times ebullient about how much Russian weaponry they've managed to take off these troops they try and get in, but, still, the shelling continues. It was yesterday that a military brigade was hit here, a building, eight killed, eight soldiers killed in that. Continued residential buildings, it seems, being hit at the moment as well. And we see people being brought in here the whole time. So, yes, this is still a very active fight as Russia, it seems, tries to head west toward Odessa.

Jim.

SCIUTTO: Yes, we need to acknowledge that this is a war waged against a population here. This is a country of 44 million people. These cities full of hundreds of thousands and the fire directed at them.

Nick Paton Walsh, thanks so much.

HILL: As we are following what is happening in Ukraine, we are also following this breaking news out of Washington. Sources telling CNN the White House is planning to announce a ban on Russian energy imports, that means oil, natural gas, and coal.

CNN's Jeremy Diamond joining us now live from the White House.

So, the president expected to speak later this morning. What more do we know about what we will be hearing, Jeremy?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, that's right, Erica, three sources familiar with the matter telling me and my colleagues that President Biden is expected today to ban Russian oil, natural gas, and coal imports coming from Russia into the United States. The most significant of those, of course, is the oil imports. Russia and Russian oil imports account for about 8 percent of oil imports into the United States as of last year. But that's really just a small percentage when you look at that versus what European partners are facing.

And that's why it's notable here that the United States is choosing ultimately to make this decision unilaterally. We have seen so far that U.S. sanctions against Russia have largely been done in lockstep, in close coordination with European allies to try and maintain that united front.

[09:10:00]

But under growing political pressure here at home from both Democrats and Republicans to take this step, President Biden is now expected to announce that at 10:45 a.m. this morning. There was this disagreement among European leaders who, again, those countries much more reliant on Russian oil, much more reliant on Russian liquefied natural gas, so they were wary of cutting off those imports for fear of the effect that it would have on consumers in their countries.

Now, I would expect you to hear today from President Biden what the U.S. is also going to be doing to minimize and mitigate the impact of these sanctions, of this import ban on Russian oil on consumers here in the United States. We know that the U.S. has been exploring other options, talks with Venezuela, talks with Saudi Arabia, to increase imports to -- of oil imports to the U.S. So I think you can expect President Biden to address those concerns from consumers who are already dealing with such high gas prices here in the U.S. right now.

Erica.

HILL: Jeremy Diamond, appreciate it. We'll be watching for that announcement.

Meantime, as the weight of crippling sanctions falls on Russia, Vladimir Putin is now threatening to cut off Europe's gas supply.

CNN chief business correspondent Christine Romans joining me now.

So, Christine, Jeremy just made the great point, right, in the U.S. it's a little bit easier to for the U.S. to say, OK, we're cutting off Russian oil --

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Yes.

HILL: Because it's such a small percentage of what we use. In Europe, it is not.

ROMANS: That's right.

HILL: It is no small issue.

ROMANS: It's a huge part of their energy. I mean, honestly, parts of Europe are run on Russian energy, Russian natural gas and Russian oil. And, for years, there were politicians there who said, like, look, being tied closely on petro politics with Vladimir Putin would probably make him a better global citizen, right? Why would he attack his next door neighbor?

Well, that's not -- turned out to be false and now you've got a Europe with an existential crisis here. How are they going to run their factories and their cars and their economies if you are so reliant on Russia, who has not been a good global player here? And, indeed, Vladimir Putin threatening to cut off supplies to Europe.

Look, we know this is the new -- the new weapon that he has. That he has always had in his armory. He's raining down missiles and driving in tanks into Ukraine, but for Europe he has the petro power here.

And this is what Democratic Senator Chris Coons says is at stake for everybody.

Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. CHRIS COONS (D-DE): We might well see energy prices double because Putin realizes he's got western Europe over a barrel. This is his single greatest conventional weapon, nonmilitary weapon, that he can use to push back the west and to divide us. It's the weapon he used after he invaded Crimea in 2014 to dissuade our European partners from joining us in tougher sanctions.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: There are things the U.S. can do to isolate itself more. But Europe does not have that luxury here. And it is a global market, right? So when prices rise on the global market, they rise for everyone. So, for small business owners and for low income Americans who are looking at, you know, $5 -- or $4.17 a gallon for gas, they're going to feel this.

We've also have never seen gas prices in the U.S. run up so quickly. That is unprecedented. We would have to hit $5.25 a gallon, though, adjusted for inflation, to hit a new record. So, Americans are seeing these numbers and are, you know, are rightfully concerned. But these are not quite near real records.

HILL: Really quickly, because we actually are out of time, but Biden is supposed to address what this means for the U.S., right? What about for Europe? If that supply is gone, where does it come from?

ROMANS: It's going to have to come from the U.S. it's going to have to means investments in liquid natural gas here, getting it to Europe. It's going to mean maybe talking to Venezuela, maybe talking to the Saudis and OPEC nations and finding a way diplomatically to get them to pump more oil. It's going to -- it's going to be a scramble around the world on a lot of fronts.

HILL: Christine, appreciate it, as always. Thank you.

Joining us now, to dig a little deeper, Brett Bruen, who's president of the Global Situation Room, former White House director as well of global engagement under President Obama.

Brett, good to have you with us this morning.

Let's just pick up here where we left off with Christine, what we're seeing, what we're expected to hear from President Biden later today, in addition to this threat earlier today from Vladimir Putin to cut Europe's supply off. In the end, what does this do globally to that economy? Where does this put us?

BRETT BRUEN, PRESIDENT, GLOBAL SITUATION ROOM: Well, first, let me say this is a really important step. It's one that I've been calling for, for some time now. And I think it demonstrates U.S. leadership. While it is important that we're working in concert with our allies, we also have to push Europeans. I mean I remember these negotiations back in 2014 when I was at the White House and Russia invaded Ukraine for the first time. Now I think the Biden administration is really showing the direction the world needs to go on Russia and the kind of sanctions.

And let me also just flip this argument a little bit on its head because, yes, there certainly will here at home and in Europe be an economic cost. But if we continue to fund Putin, it will allow him to drag this conflict out even longer and the price will be even higher.

[09:15:05]

SCIUTTO: Brett, Morgan Stanley is predicting that the Russian economy defaults by April of this year. These sanctions, by restricting its oil sales, cutting off from the financial markets, and so on, they do collectively risk collapsing the Russian economy.

And I just wonder, there are dangers there. What are those dangers? The Russian debt crisis in the late 1990s helped spawn Vladimir Putin, frankly. What does Russia look like after the collapse of its economy?

BRUEN: Well, the biggest danger, Jim, is, obviously, that Putin lashes out, whether with conventional weapons or even, God forbid, a nuclear weapon. I see that as less likely because ultimately Putin is about survival. And engaging NATO, engaging in that kind of broader conflict, especially after the difficulties that his military is having in Ukraine, I think would ultimately spell the end of his time in office.

So, Putin is a calculating character and he understands that ultimately he has to play it very carefully here. But at the same time, I think those economic sanctions and this enormous economic pressure on Russia is going to create a whole lot of dissent and disruption in the Russian economy. The Russian people already, 4,000 of them, arrested over the weekend. That's only going to continue to grow.

SCIUTTO: You say he's calculating. And we hear that. We've heard that for some time. But he miscalculated here, right? I mean he was expecting, based on U.S. intel assessments, a very swift victory. He was not expecting this kind of global response.

So, he does miscalculate. Do we not need to prepare for further miscalculation?

BRUEN: Oh, absolutely he does. And it's one of the problems with dictatorial leaders is they don't get the -- the truth from their advisers. They are told, and supported on, you know, their ambitions (ph) and on their plans. And I think this is a case where Putin has not calculated effectively. But it doesn't discount from the fact that he is going to continue to weigh his options, especially after the disastrous attempt to invade Ukraine. I think he will be more cautious. I think he is going to take into account perhaps some of those dissenting views and voices within the Kremlin.

HILL: Brett Bruen, great to have you with us this morning. Thank you.

BRUEN: You bet.

SCIUTTO: Five hundred additional U.S. troops are headed to Europe. This as Ukraine claims it has 20,000 foreign fighters forming a combat unit to fight the Russians. We're going to have a look ahead at the coming military strategy, both for NATO, its partners, but also here on the battlefield in Ukraine just ahead.

HILL: Also ahead, a harrowing report from the front lines as a journalist follows a stream of people desperate to escape the besieged city of Irpin.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where are you going now?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: To Kyiv railway station.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And where are you going after that?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: After I -- my family go to east, I go to war.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You're going to war?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. It's my land.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:22:50]

HILL: The U.S. is sending another 500 troops to Europe as the war in Ukraine intensifies. Those forces will be deployed to several countries to defend NATO's flank.

SCIUTTO: Ukraine has also created a special unit of foreign fighters to help combat Russian forces dubbed the international legion. Ukraine says already more than 20,000 volunteers, many of them veteran, from 52 countries, have now expressed a desire to join.

Joining us now to discuss the fight here, the broader response in Europe, retired U.S. Army Brigadier General Steve Anderson.

Steve, it's good to have you here this morning.

First, I want to ask you your view of the state of the battle on the ground. We're at 12 days in. Thursday will be two weeks. It's already a longer, more difficult fight than Russia expected. But Russia has a tremendous numerical advantage and it's forging head, particularly in the south, and it's becoming more ruthless. It's targeting cities. Where does the fight stand?

BRIG. GEN. STEVE ANDERSON, U.S. ARMY (RET.): The fight stands very well right now due to really one factor, the will of the Ukrainian people. They are showing their fortitude. They're putting up an incredible fight. They're making it extremely difficult for the Russians to resupply their forces. You know, this is turning into a logistics war in some respects in that it's a race between our ability and NATO's ability to push forward supplies, such as the 17,000 missiles that have been recently approved, to get those into the hands of the Ukrainian war fighters before the Russians can regroup and get their logistics, lines of communication and their capabilities up to snuff.

You have seen many, many instances of their inability to resupply their forces. I was a senior logistics officer in Iraq. Most people don't realize the magnitude of the effort over there. I was providing in Iraq 900 trucks a day to sustain those forces. And our forces were less, were smaller. I mean you're talking about feeding a city the size of Mobile, Alabama, with 190,000 troops in Ukraine right now Russia.

[09:25:02]

So we're seeing a great will of people from Ukraine to interdict the lines of communication, the resupply lines and keep the Russians off balance.

HILL: I feel like we have talked about that lack of logistical planning on the Russian side. You know, as Jim pointed out earlier, in some pretty clear miscalculations on the part of Vladimir Putin.

What's also been interesting, and this is actually something that Jim and I were discussing earlier this morning, is that there doesn't seem to be more of an effort on the part of Russians, on the part of Russia, rather, to go after communications. Yes, there was an early hit we know on the TV tower. But in terms of lines of communication, and the ability for people within Ukraine to continue to communicate, they're going after the electric grids. They haven't really hit that.

Does that surprise you, General?

ANDERSON: Not really. I don't really think that they're that -- really effective at identifying -- I don't think they have the kind of intelligence. I don't think they have the boots on the ground intelligence. I don't think they have the capabilities to really put the kind of impact that they want to on the communications system. They would have done that if they had that capability. They just aren't as good as we've been led to believe and their performance has been very -- I mean it's been miserable, really.

If you look at them from a tactical standpoint, they're obviously not achieving their tactical objectives. They're not gaining any objectives on the ground.

Operationally, they're failing as well. They have essentially attacked Ukraine on four fronts. They have violated the principle of mass. They would have been much better off concentrating their forces in the north and attacking the center of gravity in Ukraine, which is, of course, the capital of Kyiv.

And then strategically they've failed miserably. They have essentially enabled the entire NATO community and the United States to unify and to essentially isolate them. And it's been a miserable effort on their part. So I'm not surprised that they can't take out a communications tower when they can't even do the basic work on these skills that we'd expect them to do.

SCIUTTO: The concern among NATO allies, particularly those in the east, those facing Russia is that Ukraine is not the end of Putin's ambitions. And, by the way, when you listen to what he says not just about Ukraine but about the Baltic states, for instance, as to whether they are actual nations that should be independent, you can understand that concern.

You have 500 more U.S. troops going to those Baltic states. You've had some other moves of aircraft, et cetera. Are those sufficient moves in your view?

ANDERSON: I think they are for the time being. We need to get more troops -- more boots on the ground. I think that the 500 people there are going to provide additional planning capability, intelligence analysts that we no doubt need over there, and logisticians. I mean there's going to be a huge humanitarian crisis. There already is. And so the extent that our -- our military can assist, I mean our logistics capability is a profound reflection of our national power. Our ability to protect troops, supplies and equipment across the globe is unparalleled. And we need to bring all the forces to bear of that power to help these people and to help relieve the humanitarian crisis.

I mean it's all about Ukraine. I mean if Ukraine falls, then I think we're going to have problems in the Baltics, we're going to have problems in Hungary, we're going to have problems in Romania and Poland, et cetera. But if we can put up a fight and if we can leverage those -- the incredible will of the Ukrainian people and sustain them and empower them and push supplies that they need to be able to do that and to put up a fight, that's going to make sure that we carry the day.

HILL: Brigadier General Steve Anderson, appreciate your insight this morning. Thank you.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

ANDERSON: Thank you.

HILL: The desperate journey to escape war very real, as you have seen in the last several days across Ukraine. Just ahead, you're going to hear from Ukrainians struggling with this harsh heartbreaking reality, triggered, of course, by Russia's invasion.

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