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Dozens Reported Killed In Strike On Ukrainian Barracks In Mykolaiv; Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin Says Russia Has Missteps, Struggled With Logistics; Arnold Schwarzenegger Joins Push To Pierce Putin's Digital Iron Curtain; Russia State News: WNBA Star To Be Held At Least 2 More Months; U.N.: 518,000-Plus Refugees Have Fled Ukraine To Romania. Aired 3-4p ET

Aired March 19, 2022 - 15:00   ET

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

[15:00:30]

JIM ACOSTA, CNN HOST: You are live in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Jim Acosta in Washington.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy today tells Russia it is time to meet. He says immediate peace talks are Russia's only chance to reduce the damage of its own mistakes. Thousands of Russian troops have now died fighting Vladimir Putin's war according to the U.S. and NATO. But officials fear the greater the setbacks for Russia the more brutal Putin will become with his air attacks on military and civilian targets.

Rescuers are still searching for survivors after a Russian missile strike hits a barracks housing Ukrainian soldiers. Reporters at the scene in Mykolaiv say dozens of Ukrainian troops have died and in Mariupol new drone video shows why a U.N. official says that area is now the center of hell. Attacks seem to be never ending. Hundreds of thousands of people are in danger as they remain cut off from the outside world.

Russia also continues to shell areas around Kyiv, although for now it's still holding strong with Ukraine's military saying two main routes into the city are cut off. Ukraine's former president told me earlier today Kyiv would welcome a visit from President Joe Biden.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PETRO POROSHENKO, FORMER UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT: I know that President Biden plans to go to visit Europe next week. And I think that he realizing the possibility. Why don't very good friend of mine and very good friend of Ukraine, Joe Biden, the leader of the global world to demonstrate now the leadership. Why don't he can visit Kyiv next week?

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Of course President Biden is going to Europe next week for a very key trip. And I want to start in Mykolaiv where rescue operations continue after a Russian missile strike hit a Ukrainian barracks.

CNN's Nick Paton Walsh is there. Nick, just incredible devastation where you are. Is there any update on how many people have been pulled out alive?

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN INTERNATIONAL SECURITY EDITOR: I have to tell you, Jim, we don't have an official number from the Ukrainian military for how many dead. But I understand from several sources now that we are talking in the region of 30 if not higher lives having been lost. And I understand that a similar number were in fact injured from this devastating blast.

A military target, it should be pointed out because we have seen civilian targets so devastatingly repeatedly and indiscriminately targeted just in this city behind me. But the pictures you're seeing I think now show quite how devastating these missile attacks were. A building frankly torn in half, another reduced to rubble. And we met ourselves the soldiers impacted by these explosions. Some unable to talk. Some speechless.

Past fury, one man in tears, both of his legs fractured from that. Another man lying there simply and asking, where are my friends, each by name. And so even though these are soldiers, they still obviously carry with them a devastating human cost.

But this is not, I mean, while this is possibly one of the worst single cases of loss of life that we know about publicly, because Ukraine's military for reasons they say are operational have not always been that transparent about their losses including this case, too, where we still don't have an official casualty number.

This feeds into a wider picture here of Ukrainian success frankly strategically on the rows that we've seen around this town of Mykolaiv. When we first came here two or three weeks ago, the Russian military was trying to push into some of the key roads that head into the city. We saw burned out armor at main roundabouts here. We saw Ukrainian army that had been destroyed in exchanges with the Russians.

They were pushing into the city and now they have been pushed back very far. In fact saw ourselves on the roads to Kherson, the first city that Russian claimed to have held, now sees a lot of civil disobedience there but holds it technically. The Ukrainian military are pushing towards that again. They are pushing the Russians away from this vital port city on the Black Sea coast. That Russia kind of has to have a military say over before it tries to move on to the big goal of the third largest city of Odessa, also on the Black Sea coast.

But when Russia finds itself losing on the ground strategically, when its troops are bogged down or intercepted, or taken on in ambushes, they respond with devastating fire power like that strike we saw on the barracks yesterday.

[15:05:08]

And even just tonight, Jim, I should point out, on the horizon there, in kind of that direction -- the flashes you're seeing here, by the way, are police cars patrolling in curfew, not explosions. IN the distance over there behind where you might see a tree line three, four, five possibly significant explosions we believe targeting another military target here as well, or also too it could be civilian targets. We don't know precisely.

But it is just a sign that the fire power continues to exact a devastating toll on Mykolaiv, even though shops are opening again. You can buy a coffee for the first time in about three weeks normally. It's life coming back to normal here but that has not stopped Moscow's desire to exact a toll for they seem to be finding strategic losses on the ground -- Jim.

ACOSTA: Yes, Nick, I just wonder if you can answer the question about that disconnect as best as you can. You have so much experience covering these types of just God awful situations. But when, you know, military analysts, when the U.S., when NATO officials, when they say it appears Russia is losing on the ground or things aren't going according to plan and so on, and you see the kind of devastation that they've unleashed on Ukraine, does that -- how do you square that?

Does it feel like Russia is losing to you when you're taking a look at the devastation on the ground? What's your sense of that?

WALSH: Yes, I mean, they're losing in terms of the way that they thought they were going to win this war in that if you listen to the Western intelligence assessment. And they kind of jarred a bit or they tallied a bit with some of the Russian statements at the start of this that they felt they would walk in as, quote, "liberators," ridiculous as an idea.

And Western intelligence assessment thought this might be a quick campaign. It has not been that. In fact it hasn't even been a half successful campaign. In fact, frankly, it's been a disaster by any measure because all we do is drive around and see abandoned Russian armor or blown-up Russian armor or see places where Russia has exacted a devastating indiscriminate explosive toll on the very population it thought it was, quote, "coming to rescue from Nazis."

It's completely ridiculous even as I say that. So I think it's very hard to see how Russia could in any rational way see that this war is going well. Physically on the ground, it is definitely going very badly. A place like Mykolaiv should be frankly a stepping stone on the way to the broader goal of Odessa. But the military around Ukraine have held the Russians back for three weeks now, defeated them in many areas, too, are pushing them back as well.

And so yes, I think we are looking at a Russian military who essentially need their command at some point to say, OK, this really isn't going where we thought it was, what are we going to do next? But instead we're seeing these massive explosion blasts kind of getting some sense of vengeance possibly on the Ukrainians who are extracting a big toll on the Russian military -- Jim.

ACOSTA: All right. Nick Paton Walsh, thank you very much. We appreciate it. Stay safe, sir. Thank you.

Next week, President Biden heads to Europe for a NATO summit that the whole world will be watching. Ahead of that is Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin was in Bulgaria meeting with U.S. and NATO troops. While there, the secretary offered some stark analysis on Russian missteps in the war that Nick Paton Walsh was just talking about during an exclusive interview that the secretary had with our Don Lemon.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: What's your assessment of the Russian military?

LLOYD AUSTIN, DEFENSE SECRETARY: Well, it's hard to tell, Don. I think, you know, they have not progressed as quickly as they would have liked to. I think they envision that they would move rapidly and quickly seize the capital city. They've not been able to do that. They've struggled with logistics. So we've seen a number of missteps along the way. I don't see, you know, evidence of good employment of tactical intelligence.

I don't see integration of, you know, air capability with the ground maneuver. And so there are a number of things that we would expect to have seen that we just haven't seen. And the Russians really have had some -- presented some problems. So many of their assumptions have not proven to be true as they enter the fight.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Let's bring in CNN military analyst, retired Lieutenant General Mark Hertling. He's the former commanding general of Europe and Seventh Army.

General Hertling, we have new satellite images showing protective mounds that the Russians have built northwest of Kyiv. Russia was apparently expecting a quick takeover. I mean, I was just, you know, talking to Nick Paton Walsh about this. There's this sort of disconnect, and maybe you can pick up on it, between the massive devastation that the Russians can inflict on the Russian -- on the Ukraine people, on Ukrainian targets while at the same time struggling militarily to achieve really any of their objectives at this point. What do you make of that?

[15:10:06]

LT. GEN. MARK HERTLING, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Yes, Jim, I'm going to comment on what you said to Nick Paton Walsh and also to Secretary Austin. You know, I could go down the list that Secretary Austin did and say here are all the things that Russia has not done and how they have failed. I'm going to put it in a bigger perspective. I'm going to quote Sun Tzu for you. Sun Tzu, the Chinese philosopher, once said in order to win on the battle field, you have to see yourself, see the enemy and see the terrain.

Russia went into this not being able to see themselves. They did not know how inept they were in every aspect of mounted and maneuver warfare across the board. You know, I thought as I said before, I thought they were going to be bad. They are much worse than I have anticipated. They haven't seen the enemy. They didn't know how good Ukraine's military was. And they did not expect the kind of fight that they are now receiving from both the Ukrainian army and the Ukrainian territorial force.

And they certainly don't see the terrain. You know, Nick was commenting on the defense of Mykolaiv. If you just look at a map which all military commanders do, in order to get from Mykolaiv to Odessa, you have to cross a wide river that goes internal to the country. They didn't bring any bridge assets with them. So you have to ask a question, did you just expect to wander over the bridge and continue your attack on to Odessa and take over when the people of Odessa have been giving an unbelievable defense against the Russian forces?

Your other question about, you know, what's the disconnect between, you know, how military analysts like me are saying Russia is losing the war and how much destruction they have created.

ACOSTA: Right.

HERTLING: Well, the way I would answer that question is to say they are destroying the land they are trying to occupy and they can't overcome the will of the Ukrainian people or the will of the military. And that really is the object of warfare, is to overcome the will of your enemy. They are leaving towns and cities in ruins. They are killing civilians which I believe is a war crime, but they are not going to subjugate the nation of Ukraine. So that's, I'm sorry for that very long answer, but that's how I'd answer your question.

ACOSTA: No, and it leads me to my next question, General Hertling, which is U.S. officials have confirmed to CNN that Russia launched these hypersonic missiles this week. The first ever known use of them in combat. Our Pentagon reporters have reported on these hypersonic missiles in the past. And they do seem quite impressive and sort of an unbelievable use of technology and weaponry here.

But to your earlier point, if what the Russians have unleashed so far, you know, isn't sufficient to bring the Ukrainians to their knees, I mean, it seems to me you don't need hypersonic missiles if you're Russia to attack Ukraine. And so why use them? It seems to me it's to flex their muscles and that doesn't seem to work with the Ukrainians.

HERTLING: Well, and what I'd say is it was more of a threat to NATO than it was Ukraine in this case, Jim. This was the weapon they have been touting for several years. And in fact President Putin has said we've got hypersonics, the Americans don't. China has said the same thing. And we are behind that truthfully in the development of hypersonic weapons. But in this case, what I would say is two things.

They are trying to threaten NATO with these weapons. I would say NATO has picked up a lot of intelligence based on the shoot of that weapon because they have already said they were able to track it which Russia did not anticipate. The second thing is I would say is it's irrelevant. It's a precision-made weapon. They were able to use I think five or six of them against a specific site. But it did the same thing the other types of cruise missiles did.

ACOSTA: Right.

HERTLING: And again, bombing a nation is irrelevant unless you can overcome the will of the people. They may have hit an aircraft repair factory. I think that was their target and they did. And that's unfortunate for Ukraine. But truthfully they are trying to affect the logistics flow into Ukraine. The fact that those repair factories on the western side of Ukraine, they are signaling they can hit anywhere in Ukraine. But again I'd just say it's irrelevant because they hit those sites before and now they've just displayed one of their new weapons systems which truthfully ain't all that good. It moves fast but it hits the same kind of target and it still does not subdue the will of the people.

ACOSTA: All right. General Mark Hertling, thank you very much. Good talking to you, sir. We appreciate it.

HERTLING: Pleasure, Jim. Thank you.

ACOSTA: All right. Coming back, he's back. Arnold Schwarzenegger flexing his diplomatic muscles and tries to breakthrough Putin's wall of propaganda with an emotional appeal to the Russian people.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER, FORMER CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR: This is not the war to defend Russia that your grandfather, that your great grandfather fought. This is an illegal war.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

[15:15:07]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ACOSTA: Arnold Schwarzenegger aiming a direct and powerful message at Vladimir Putin and all of the Russian people. Stop this war and don't believe the lies. But these aren't just lines from a former actor. It's from a man who watched his own father fight on the side of the Nazis and come home damaged and changed forever.

CNN's Brian Todd has the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Celebrities like Arnold Schwarzenegger as well as entities like the State Department attempting to tear down Vladimir Putin's propaganda wall.

SCHWARZENEGGER: I ask you to help me spread the truth.

TODD: The Kremlin's strongman's digital iron curtain blocking his people from the bleak realities of the war in Ukraine by moving to shut off Facebook, Twitter and Instagram inside Russia. Schwarzenegger, the Terminator himself, movie star, action hero and former California governor, this week posted a video over nine minutes long with Russian subtitles, telling the Russian people what's really happening on the ground.

[15:20:08]

SCHWARZENEGGER: See the world has turned against Russia because of its actions in Ukraine. Whole city blocks have been flattened by Russian artillery and bombs including a children's hospital and a maternity hospital.

TODD: Schwarzenegger posted it to his five million Twitter followers but also tens of thousands of his subscribers on Telegram, a messaging app that can also transmit messages and videos to a wider audience just like Twitter. Telegram has not yet been shut down inside Russia. Schwarzenegger tailored his message not just to Russian civilians.

SCHWARZENEGGER: To the soldiers who are listening to this, remember, that 11 million Russians have family connections to Ukraine. So every bullet you shoot, you shoot a brother or a sister. Every bomb or every shell that falls is falling not on an enemy, but on a school or a hospital.

TODD: And if only virtually, he looked the former KGB colonel right in the eye.

SCHWARZENEGGER: To President Putin, I say you started this war. You are leading this war. You can stop this war.

NATALIA KRAPIVA, ATTORNEY FOR DIGITAL RIGHTS GROUP "ACCESS NOW": The Russian public, especially my generation, has grown up watching Schwarzenegger. He's a beloved figure in Russia. And Russians have told me that his video literally brought them to tears because they haven't heard any Russian official speaking to them with such respect and compassion.

TODD: Still, Putin's propaganda and disinformation are unrelenting. This week a Russian Web site claimed three American so-called mercenaries were killed in Ukraine. But the U.S. National Guards says that they're still alive and not even in Ukraine. They were Guardsmen sent to train the Ukrainian military a few years ago. Some tech savvy Russians have used virtual private networks or VPNs plus encrypted apps and other tools to get around Putin's information curtain and access the internet directly. But analysts say there are challenges with those methods.

KRAPIVA: A lot of Russian people still haven't heard of VPNs or they cannot afford to use them.

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: What we've learned over in the Chinese model is that over time the state gets better and better about how to choke those off.

TODD (on-camera): Still, it's possible that the Terminator's message to Russians was seen by a very important audience deep inside the Kremlin. Vladimir Putin only follows 22 people on Twitter. But Arnold Schwarzenegger is one of them.

Brian Todd, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ACOSTA: CNN chief international anchor Christiane Amanpour joins me now.

Christiane, with so much going on, you know, I supposed maybe we shouldn't be starting with Arnold Schwarzenegger. But let me start with Arnold Schwarzenegger because I thought this was really remarkable. His video has some 700,000 views on Telegram, which is this messaging app that is widely used by Russians due to censorship of other apps.

I guess this is the kind of message that needs to get through to the Russian people in a way that perhaps Putin's people didn't think about quite enough. When you consider that rally that we saw, you know, just yesterday, he has such an iron grip around what people read and see and hear in that country and maybe Arnold is the right man for the job here.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Well, Jim, this is, as awful as the war is on the ground in Ukraine, it's also as much about information and a propaganda war because that is exactly what's going on. And Telegram is actually a really interesting platform because it's being used in many autocratic nations around the world by people who are and want actually independent view who've been cut off from some of the other better known social media platforms by their governments.

And I know for a fact that even in Russia the leaders use Telegram as well. So what I've heard and what we've seen written about the Schwarzenegger video is that as the previous reports suggested, that they appreciated, those Russians who were able to access it appreciated Schwarzenegger talking to them like human beings who had just gone wrong. That their country had gone, you know, in the wrong direction rather than demonizing and dehumanizing them.

And somebody has to send that message to Russians because this is not about a war on Russians. And Russians are going to have to be part of the -- whatever emerges after all this. Even if Putin remains or in a post-Putin Russia. So it was very important for him to get that message across and more and more Russians are doing it as well.

As you know, I spoke to the very brave editor of the Russian state television this week who had made that incredible protest.

ACOSTA: Right.

AMANPOUR: Been fined but as yet has not been, you know, accused of any criminality yet. And she says that the message is getting out more and more.

[15:25:01]

So there are cracks in this wall of propaganda that the Kremlin has erected. And throughout my coverage in many autocratic nations, I know that people play cat-and-mouse. As soon as a government puts up a wall, savvy techies figure out a way to get around it and so it goes.

ACOSTA: Exactly. These autocrats just can't get it through their heads that you can't completely wipe out the truth as much as they try to accomplish that. And that takes me to this, I mean just really surreal rally that Putin had on Friday. And Christiane, I was anxious to talk to you about this because I'm

wondering what your thoughts are, when you see the devastation in Ukraine, when you see obviously are war crimes that are being carried out by the Russians because of Vladimir Putin's, you know, blood thirsty quest for this Ukrainian land. You know, they have this rally. They ordered teachers and other public workers to go.

And you have these people cheering Putin on. And I'm just kind of wondering what is your sense of it, you know, being somebody who has covered so many of these conflicts and wars and autocrats over the years, to see something as monstruous as Putin has done to have an arena, a stadium full of people cheering him on?

AMANPOUR: Well, Jim, again, you know, this is right out of the autocrat playbook. Who knows whether those people went willingly, were they bussed there, were they told they had to go there, were they're told at school, in their places of work. It's unclear from, certainly from my perspective but you can bet that they were told to be there. And of course, some people still supported, and maybe even half the country, maybe even a majority of the country because of the way the information goes and because of, you know, 20 plus years of Putinism.

You know, and they never faced any kind of push back from the West like they're facing now. When he went into Georgia in '08, when he went into Ukraine in 2014, when he was in Syria, when he was in, you know, Chechnya, there was never that kind of push back from the rest of the world. So, you know, Russians are beginning to understand that actually the world is against them and is treating him like an international pariah.

And I was speaking to president of Finland last week who speaks fairly regularly to President Putin, and he said, you know, this is not just governments going against the Russian government. It's ordinary individual people all over the world, quote-unquote, "cancelling Russia." And he actually said that, you know, if China is perceived to be helping Russia in any way, you know, with its projection of its consumer products and all of that, people around the world could, you know, take matters in their own hands and not buy Chinese products whether or not they were, you know, subject to official sanctions or not.

So I think the message is getting through. The reality is what's on the ground and it doesn't matter to Putin whether the message is getting through or not, and the mothers are getting very upset because they know what's going on now. It's getting, you know, they get messages. They know what's happening. They can see the prisoners of war who are being, you know, put into press conferences in Ukraine.

They can hear President Zelenskyy because all these messages get through and the mothers were very instrumental in the last war, you know, demonstrating, demanding news from their soldier sons.

ACOSTA: Right. And Christiane, I spoke with the former president of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko earlier today and he brought up that President Biden is visiting Europe and NATO allies next week. He would like to see President Biden come to Ukraine. Here's what he said about that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

POROSHENKO: I know that President Biden planned to go to visit Europe next week. And I think that he's analyzing the possibility. Why don't the very good friend of mine, very good friend of Ukraine, Joe Biden, the leader of the global world, who demonstrates now the leadership. Why don't he can visit Kyiv next week?

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Now, Christiane, it's probably totally impossible for the president of the United States to travel to Kyiv next week. But you know, perhaps something could be done, perhaps something could be done where the president of the United States goes to the border of Poland and Ukraine to have some sort of show of solidarity with the Ukrainian people. Might we see something like that? What do you think?

AMANPOUR: Well, look, I don't know. You know, it's been bandied around and mooted. If he does, you know, it's his administration and his advisers who will advise. Yes, President Biden meeting President Zelenskyy would be a big, big symbol. However, what really matters is weapons, defensive weapons getting to the Ukrainians in time and to the places where they need them.

You've been speaking to, you know, all our military analysts who really understand all this. But the advantage in any kind of war like this goes to the side that can adapt the quickest.

And even if everybody thought Ukraine wasn't going to make it, as we have been saying at the beginning, look at what's happened the last three weeks. It is the aggressive who stalled.

By all accounts, U.S. intelligence are also saying more than 7,000 Russian soldiers. That's a big number in terms of percentage of how many are there.

These numbers when they reach certain levels affect the ability and will to fight on the ground. So you can see what is happening that they haven't been able to manage it from the ground.

And so they are resorting to terrorizing the population by hitting civilian targets and trying to terrorize the president and the leadership in Ukraine to surrender.

But still, even though he is doing badly, Putin's demands are very untenable for the Ukrainian people. That is recognizing the east of Ukraine, Crimea, demilitarizing, whatever that means, de-Nazifying.

And they've already conceded that NATO is not going to happen.

But his maximalist goals appears still to be completely unresolvable according to the Ukraine people and U.S. and other analysts.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN HOST: An extraordinary development. Christiane Amanpour, I know you will be on top of all that next week during the president's very important trip, those meetings with NATO leaders.

Christiane, great to see you. Thank you so much. Always great to talk to you.

AMANPOUR: Thanks, Jim.

ACOSTA: Breaking news. A tragic accident during NATO training exercises in Norway. We will get a live report on that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:36:11]

ACOSTA: We're following breaking news from Norway where the country's prime minister says four U.S. servicemembers were killed in a plane crash during NATO training exercise.

U.S. officials confirmed four Marines were involved but have not commented just yet on casualties.

I want to get right to CNN's Natasha Bertrand who is in Brussels, Belgium.

Natasha, what more can you tell us?

NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN REPORTER: Yes, Jim, the U.S. Marine Corps says the four Marines were involved in a training accident as part of this big NATO training exercise called Cold Response, which takes place every few years and is meant to prepare NATO forces for anything.

Those forces were involved in this crash. It remains unclear how it happened.

The statements we have gotten from the Norwegian police suggests that the weather was a major factor. That when the rescue crew got to the site, they faced heavy rain, heavy snow, and there was actually an avalanche warning, which made it very difficult to reach that plane.

They ultimately did. According to Norway's prime minister, all four Americans on board the plane did die.

We have not gotten confirmation from the United States that those four Marines died. They said they would not release the identities of the Marines until 24 hours after any family was notified.

But we did get a tweet from the U.S. ambassador to NATO, who said she is devastated by the loss of the four Marines. She is sending her condolences to their families.

This is a NATO exercise that really doesn't have anything to do with the current situation between Russia and Ukraine. Though, of course, that is context behind it, right? This is an exercise they carry out every two years. It was canceled in

2020 because of COVID. It involves about 30,000 forces from 27 different countries, including thousands of U.S. Marines that participate in this.

It is a delicate moment for the alliance as the world watches Russians invasion of Ukraine and it creeps closer to NATO's doorstep. This exercise this year was seen by NATO as one of the most important they've had in recent memory.

So obviously, this will leave a pretty grim mark on the remainder of the exercises, which are scheduled to be completed by April 1st.

ACOSTA: OK, Natasha Bertrand, thank you very much for that report. We appreciate it.

Coming up, a troubling update about a WNBA star detained in Moscow for more than a month. Unfortunately, it look like she will stay there a lot longer.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:43:19]

ACOSTA: Russia is extending the detention of WNBA star, Brittney Griner, for additional two months.

CNN's Brian Todd has the latest.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Her whereabouts inside Russia are unclear. And now, it appears American basketball star, Brittney Griner, will be held by Vladimir Putin's regime for at least two more months.

A court in Moscow has extended Griner's arrest until May 19th, according to the Russian state news agency, TASS.

We asked a former top U.S. official about the chances of Griner actually being released that day.

EVELYN FARKAS, FORMER U.S. DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: I'm afraid that on May 19th, they'll issue another delay.

Maybe they'll have her appear, if they want to make a bigger deal out of it and get the media to take some pictures and elevate this issue further.

Clearly, it's not in the interest of her loved ones to have this elevated. But this is how the Russians operate.

TODD: Griner has been in custody since being arrested after her arrival at a Moscow airport a few days before the war in Ukraine began. Russian authorities say she had cannabis oil in her luggage, discovered by a K-9 team. They've accused Griner of smuggling significant amounts of narcotic

substances, punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

TASS cites a Russian prisoner advocate as saying Griner shares a cell with two other women. And that at 6'9", her bed is too short for her.

(EXPLOSION)

TODD: The timing of the Ukraine conflict, the sanctions, and America's tensions with Putin, analyst say, are likely working against Griner.

ANDREW HAMMOND, FORMER BRITISH ROYAL AIR FORCE INTELLIGENCE OPERATIVE: It complicates it enormously because the whole relationship has broken down across the board, diplomatically, economically, culturally, politically, even militarily.

[15:45:03]

TODD: Biden administration officials say Griner's case is a top priority, that they're working diligently to secure her release.

We asked a former White House hostage advisor what could be going on behind the scenes.

DAN EGLI, FORMER WHITE HOUSE HOSTAGE ADVISER: You try and grab something that you have to work with them on, some avenue to start a conversation. Beginning with, you know, proof of life, proof of condition, location, anything to increase our hope and keep the dialogue going.

TODD: While a prisoner swap for Griner with the U.S. remains possible, one analyst says Putin could also be overplaying his hand.

HAMMOND: This could backfire with the rest of the world being against Russia is not enough. They could now have the global basketball community against them.

If I was Vladimir Putin, I'll be careful about how I play this.

TODD (on camera): As worrisome as Brittney Griner's case is, there are two other Americans also being held in Russia whose cases are very high on the agendas of U.S. officials.

Paul Whelan and Trevor Reed, former U.S. Marines, have been in Russian custody since 2018 and 2019, respectively. Both arrested and convicted for crimes they have emphatically denied. And both, we're told recently, have suffered serious health issues there.

Brian Todd, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ACOSTA: Coming up, the flood of refugees fleeing Russia's increasingly brutal invasion of Ukraine. We're live in Romania next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [15:51:08]

ACOSTA: The war in Ukraine has created a global refugee crisis. Neighboring countries are seeing a massive influx of displaced Ukrainians showing up at their borders.

Romania has already welcomed more than a half million refugees.

CNN's Miguel Marquez joins us from Bucharest, Romania.

Miguel, what's it like for these refugees once they arrive in Romania? It's such a tough journey for them.

MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: Yes. Oftentimes, it takes several days to get into Romania. Most of them are moving on but a half million right now have come through Romania. Most of them have moved on and 80,000 are so remain in the country.

The concern is, in the days and weeks ahead, as the Russians continue to push west, as the indiscriminate fire hits civilian areas, that they're going to see those internally displaced, those displaces inside Ukraine, then move across the borders into places like Romania.

This, as protests also continue in many capitals across Europe. In Bucharest today, there was a protest. Several protesters went from a square in town. They marched to the Russian embassy.

We spoke to two women, both Russians. One left the country a few weeks ago. She had been arrested in Moscow for just even looking at protest signs in Moscow.

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NATALIE FALKOVSKAYA, LEFT RUSSIA BECAUSE OF WAR IN UKRAINE: I know many people who are against the war. And it is really complicated. It is really dangerous to be against war in Russia. Because you know, because they will -- police will catch you and they can arrest you.

EUGENIA RUMENKO, RUSSIAN PROTESTING WAR IN UKRAINE: Literally, a fight in every home, you could say. Younger generation and older generation are struggling to find understanding right now. I'm sure that every Russian right now understands that something is going terribly wrong.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MARQUEZ: So their message essentially is that Russia is divided entirely on the question of this war.

And you know, the first woman you heard from, she had been arrested. She, on the 24th, the day this war started, she had gone to a tree that had some protest signs. She looked at that. They picked her up and held her for five hours.

It was very frightening, she said. She and her friends have left the country.

Romania now, from individuals, to the country to different cities, now preparing for a mass number of refugees as that war continues.

Just uncertainty across the board as Putin's war of choice continues -- Jim?

ACOSTA: Miguel, thank you so much for all of your hard work over there. We appreciate it. Thanks for the report.

Residents who escaped the Ukrainian city of Mariupol said the Russian siege has left people without access to drinking water.

With no end of the war in sight, this is a problem that "CNN Hero" Doc Hendley knows will likely get worse.

Since 2004, his non-profit, Wine to Water, has worked all over the world to provide clean water to those in need.

Now he and his team are responding to the war in Ukraine with their largest filter shipment ever.

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DOC HENDLEY, CNN HERO: Bottled water and sometimes even tap water in these communities is a luxury most people do not have access to right now.

We're going to be sending about 12,000 water filters, split up between three different drops inside western Ukraine and then at the two different borders, Poland and Romania.

That's enough to clean 2.4 million gallons of water every single day.

People are just scrounging, trying to find something to drink. And they end up trying to take water from an unsafe source that's going to give them diarrhea and dehydrate them even faster. We've already gotten word that's begun to happen.

[15:54:59]

My hope is that we're going to get these struggling people access to clean water ASAP.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And to learn more about Wine to Water and to nominate your own "CNN Hero," head over to CNNheroes.com.

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