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Kyiv Suburb of Irpin Devastated by Russian Attacks; NATO Chief: Russia Not Withdrawing But Repositioning; Uneasy Calm Falls Over Parts of Ukraine; Ukrainian Refugees Deliver Babies after Evacuation; Biden Taps U.S. Oil Reserves to Combat High Gas Prices; Putin: Pay for Natural Gas in Rubles or Be Cut off; Ex-Russian Oligarch Renounces Russian Citizenship; EU and China to Hold Virtual Summit. Aired 12-1a ET

Aired April 01, 2022 - 00:00   ET

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

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

[00:01:166]

JOHN VAUSE, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hello. Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm John Vause, live in Lviv, Ukraine.

We begin with new signs that Russia is shifting its focus to Ukraine to the Donbas region in the east, without letting up on the capital of Kyiv. Authorities in Luhansk and Donetsk report heavy shelling as Russian military equipment heads in their direction.

One official says everything is involved. Aircraft, artillery, heavy- caliber weapons, and mortars. Here's more now from the Ukrainian president.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): The situation, in the southern direction, and in the Donbas, remains extremely difficult. Russian troops are accumulating the potential for strikes; powerful blows.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: To the north, Ukraine's second biggest city, Kharkiv, continues to be a major target. The region's military governor says Russian forces have launched dozens of strikes in the past day, hitting residential areas.

Ukrainian soldiers claim they've liberated a village to the east of Kharkiv. Images from the scene show burned-out Russian tanks, as well as destroyed homes and cars.

And Ukraine reports Russian troops have left the Chernobyl nuclear power plant north of the capitol. The site of the world's worst nuclear disaster, has been under Russian control since the first week of the invasion, in late February. The Pentagon says a small number of Russian troops are beginning to

reposition around Kyiv, but it is not a retreat. In fact, U.S. defense officials report Russian sorties have surged over the past 24 hours, targeting the capital and three other areas.

Ukrainian forces are fighting back, reclaiming the city of Irpin, West of Kyiv. And from there, CNN's Fred Pleitgen filed this report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): There is no safe way to get into Irpin. The only feasible route is on the back of a police special forces pick-up truck on dirt paths.

But even here, the earth is scorched after Russian troops shelled the trail.

(on camera): Ukrainian forces are taking us into this area on back roads, because they say taking the main roads is simply much too dangerous. They want to show us the damage done when Russian forces tried to enter Kyiv.

(voice-over): Ukrainian authorities say this is still one of the most dangerous places in this war-torn country, and we immediately see why. We are driving right towards an area engulfed in smoke from artillery shelling.

This is where Russian forces tried to push into Ukraine's capital but were stopped and beaten back by the underdog Ukrainians. The battles here are fierce. Authorities say 50 percent of the city has been destroyed. To us, that number seems like an understatement.

(on camera): We have to keep moving quickly, because this place can get shelled any time.

(voice-over): Ukraine's national police now patrols Irpin again, but their forces frequently come under fire, the chief tells me.

"Just yesterday, our officers, who were searching for dead bodies, they were shot at with mortars," he says. "They had to lay under the bridge and wait for it to stop."

But the grim task of finding and taking out the many dead continues. More than two dozen on this day alone. Some had been laying in the streets for weeks and could only now be removed.

When Russian forces invaded Ukraine, they quickly advanced on the capital of Kyiv, all the way to Irpin. Here, the Ukrainians stood and fought back.

Vladimir Putin's army controlled large parts of Irpin, and the battle laid waste to much of this formerly wealthy suburb.

(voice-over): This one is the epicenter, where we found burned-out Russian trucks and armored vehicles.

[00:05:03]

(on camera): So this is the area where some of the heaviest fighting took place in Irpin. And as you can see, that there was a Russian armored vehicle, which was completely annihilated.

We do have to be very careful around here, because there still could be unexploded munitions laying around.

We meet Volodymyr Rudenko (ph), a local resident who says he stayed and took up arms when the Russians invaded.

"Always, there was not a single day, when I left town," he says, "even during the heaviest fighting."

"It must have been difficult," I ask.

"Just so you understand," he says, "once there was 348 impacts in one area in one single hour."

And the battle here is not over. Suddenly, Irpin's mayor shows up with a group of special forces, saying they're looking for Russians possibly still hiding here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

PLEITGEN: I ask him how they're going. "We're working," he says. "There's information that there are two Russian soldiers dressed in civilian clothes. With our group, we're going to clean them up."

Ukrainian forces say they will continue the fight and further push Russian forces away from their capital. The deputy interior minister saying they need the U.S.'s support to succeed.

(on camera): What do you need from the United States?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everything. Military support, first of all.

PLEITGEN (voice-over): Weapons to help the Ukrainians expel the invading army, they hope, and, finally, bring this suburb out of the reach of Vladimir Putin's candidates.

Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Irpin, Ukraine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: Daniel Davis is a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. He saw 21 years of active service. He's now a senior fellow and military expert for defense priorities, a Washington-based think tank.

Daniel, thank you for being with us. I want you to listen to the general secretary of NATO and his assessment of Russian troop movement inside Ukraine. Here he is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JENS STOLTENBERG, NATO SECRETARY-GENERAL: According to our intelligence, Russian units are not withdrawing but repositioning. Russia is trying to regroup, resupply, and reinforce its offensive in the Donbas region. At the same time, Russia maintains pressure on Kyiv and other cities.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: The Pentagon also says this is not a retreat but rather a repositioning and a new strategy, with Russian forces now focusing on the Donbas region. Is that how you see this now playing out? Is this the new strategy?

LT. COL. DANIEL DAVIS (RET), U.S. ARMY: Yes. And you know, it's very interesting, because that's the same thing that Russia is saying. They're saying almost the same thing that the Pentagon is saying. It was saying anything different.

They are still keeping forces around Kyiv, around Sumy, and around Kharkiv, because their intent is to hold the Ukrainian troops in position, so they can't be repositioned to go to the Donbas.

Meanwhile, they're taking some of the troops that they have up in the north and repositioning them down into the Donbas. Because that is very clearly now -- I've been seeing this develop for about three weeks.

And now, I think all sides are recognizing the center of attention, the center of all the fighting, is in the Donbas, because really, I think it's come down to whoever wins this battle is probably going to win the tactical fight and is going to be in the best position to get the terms that they're liking in the negotiated settlement, it is certainly going to follow.

VAUSE: So if this is now essentially a war over Donbas, that's the war these two sides have been fighting for about eight years. So what does that mean in terms of time lines? Does it just drag this conflict out for months, or even longer?

DAVIS: It's important to understand what the Russian objective is. It's not the territorial capture of the area. It's the destruction of a large formation of Ukrainian armed forces. That's what their objective has been for a long time.

That's why they haven't really attacked any cities other than Kherson and Mariupol. Because those directly tied to the attempt to surround about 40,000-member battle force that the Ukrainians opposite the Donbas.

Right now, Russia is trying to flank the Ukrainians in the north and on the south. If they penetrate either one of those, it's possible for them to capture the entire battle force, and that would be a devastating, impossibly lethal blow to the Ukrainians.

So everything depends on Ukraine holding that line.

VAUSE: Russian forces appear to have abandoned the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, as well. Does that fit in with this focus on the Donbas, or is it more likely that it might have been the result of troops just being sickened by radiation?

DAVIS: I mean, I wouldn't have any way to know whether that was the case, but I do know that militarily, it has -- it has no power, and it has no importance to them. So you know, it's not like they're needing to hold that for anything else.

And I think they're -- the Ukrainians would have to go through several other lines of Russians to get there. What they need, though, is to focus on what's going on in the Donbas. Because I think they recognize that everything depends on that. And I think you're going to see them throw in the kitchen sink on this, and it looks like so if President Zelenskyy.

[00:10:07]

VAUSE: Well, 35 countries, including the United States and the U.K., agreeing to set armored vehicles, long-range artillery to Ukraine and much more lethal weapons. It's a real uptick and what they've been sending, compared to what they've said in the past.

It's still short of what the Ukrainian president has asked for, but how crucial will this military aid be? And how soon does it need to arrive for the Ukrainians to hold the territory, which they've recently retaken from the Russians, and hold that line that you were talking about?

DAVIS: You know, it's really -- it's going to have to come really fast. and I'll just tell you, when you get the kinds of equipment, and unless it's the same time of equipment that they've been using, you also need to have a train-up period on that. And it's not as simple as just getting some vehicles and sending them down there.

They also have to physically get them there and cross a large area of open planes, which of course, Russian drones and aircraft will be watching for it and try to interdict along the way.

So it's useful. If they can get it there, it can certainly help, and they desperately need a special artillery. But the question is going to be, can it get there fast enough?

VAUSE: Colonel, as always, thank you so much for being with us. Retired U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel Daniel Davis, thank you, sir.

DAVIS: Thanks, John.

VAUSE: The Ukrainian soldiers and successfully defended the capital of Kyiv, say it's their stronger morale and spirit which gives them the advantage over the Russians. But still, life in Kyiv is becoming increasingly difficult, with those who remain, facing acute shortages of essential supplies.

We have more now from CNN's Christiane Amanpour.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR (voice-over): The

first thing you notice, approaching the front northeast of Kyiv, are the lines of villagers waiting for humanitarian handouts. They receive a bag of bread and basics to get them through these difficult days.

"The first week of the war, a shell hit us near the greenhouse. We barely survived," says this woman. "We had help from strangers around us. They gave us bread and canned food. We wouldn't have managed, otherwise."

No one here knows when this war will end or whether Russia still has designs on Kyiv. The frontline is about a mile away. For now, an easy calm prevails, ever since the Ukrainian defenders stopped the Russian advance here. It was February 28, they say, day four of the war.

They want to show us how they did it, but first, we have to clamor over the bridge they downed, to see the armored column they managed to take out.

The river bank is littered with their skeletons. If this was a turkey shoot, Russian armored vehicles and tanks had come off the road to avoid the anti-tank mines, only to find themselves unable to cross the bridge and unable to reverse in time.

Ukrainian forces tell us none of the soldiers inside survived.

A little further up the road, two tanks have been virtually smelted, blasted almost to Smithereens. Forty-year-old Yevgeny, a veteran fighter, proudly tells us this was his handiwork.

"We all here have one role: to keep the enemy off our land," he says. "The first thing they did after seeing the village, they started to shell houses, just like that. They didn't see us. They didn't know we were here. So they just started to work on houses, and so I took the tank in my sights, and I fired a rocket, and goodbye to him."

The destroyed vehicles are stamped with an "O." The Ukrainian officers here tell us this identifies them as Russian units that entered from Belarus to the north.

Oleg is the officer who commanded this operation.

"As for now, looking at previous fighting we've had, I can tell you that we are trained better," he tells me. "We have stronger morale and spirit, because we're at home. They are afraid, but they go because they're made to. He's been battle-hardened ever since the first Russian invasion in 2014.

He says this side has enough weapons, ammunition, and determination to win.

"I can tell you, I'm almost sure the Russians are regrouping and not retreating," he says. "Besides, we are preparing ourselves to go forward. We're not preparing just to defend here."

U.S. and British intelligence say Putin seems to have, quote, "massively misjudged the situation and clearly overestimated the abilities of his military to secure a rapid victory."

This old lady tells us, "I've seen one war, and here we go again. I wish Putin would go away."

The people of this land remain stalwart, and the soldiers remain dug in, hoping they can continue to withstand whatever Putin has in store for them next.

Christiane Amanpour, CNN, east of Kyiv.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: We will take a short break here on CNN. When we come back. Vladimir Putin warning he'll shut off gas supplies to Europe today, unless he's paid in rubles. But some of the E.U.'s biggest economies saying nyet, insisting they will not give in to blackmail.

Also ahead, Ukrainian babies, born far from home. Refugees of war before their lives even begin. More on that, when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VAUSE: Welcome back, everybody. There is a glimmer of hope for those in the hard-hit city of Mariupol. In the coming hours, Russian troops are expected to reopen a humanitarian corridor to the north to the city of Zaporizhzhia.

Not much is left of the city of Mariupol after a brutal assault by the Russian military and missile strikes.

Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the corridor to be opened after the personal request from the French president and the German chancellor.

More than 4 million Ukrainians have been made refugees by this war. Since the beginning of the crisis, many of them have fled to Poland or Romania. Most are women and children. Many are women about to have children, making a hard and difficult journey even tougher. CNN's Kyung Lah has their story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

[00:20:10]

KYUNG LAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Born just hours ago in Poland, baby Adelina (ph) is already a survivor of the war in Ukraine.

(on camera): Is it hard to be happy?

(voice-over): "It is," she says. Adelina (ph) is Christina Pavlichenko's (ph) first child.

(on camera): You feel guilty? Why?

(voice-over): "Because I left," she says. Left her home in western Ukraine. The war had begun. The bombing neared their city. Pavlichenko (ph)

escaped by bus, then walked on foot across the border. Paramedics rushed her to the hospital. She delivered Adelina (ph) a month early, separated from her family.

"My mother, sister, grandparents, still in Ukraine. He's killing our people," she says of Vladimir Putin. "How could anyone be so cruel?"

DR. MAGDA DUTSCH, INFLANCKA SPECIALIST HOSPITAL: I'm terrified. I'm terrified that something like this can happen, that you can leave your everyday life and, all of a sudden, because of decisions that you have no influence upon, there is a war and you have to flee. It's -- it's unbelievable. It's terrifying.

LAH: Dr. Magda Dutch is a psychiatrist at Inflancka Specialist Hospital in Warsaw. The hospital, focused on treating women, has seen 80 Ukrainian patients this month; delivered 11 babies; and treated cancer patients like 58-year-old Tatiana Mikalak (ph).

"I ran with my granddaughter in my arms," she says. Missiles had already blown up the windows in their building. As they fled, something exploded next to their car. Her city is now occupied by Russians.

She's grateful for her doctors at the hospital and the free health care in Poland that's treating her cervical cancer.

Khrystyna is one of the doctors. We're not using her last name, because she herself is also a refugee from Ukraine, a mother of a five-year-old, and the wife of a Ukrainian military man.

(on camera): Your husband?

(voice-over): "My husband has been in the military since 2014. At the moment, he's in Lviv.

(on camera): You had to leave your husband behind?

(voice-over): "Yes," she says. Now in Warsaw, "I can't see it and do nothing," she says. "I have this opportunity here to help women who fled the country."

With each breath, baby Adelina (ph) offers her mother a respite from the war.

(on camera): What will you tell your daughter about her birth?

(voice-over): "The truth," she says. "We will tell her everything as it was. She should know the truth."

(on camera): All the Ukrainian patients you've seen in this story, that health care is being covered by the government of Poland, including all the care once they leave the hospital.

And they're not the only ones. The ministry of health here in Poland says 197 Ukrainian children have been born in Poland since this war began.

Kyung Lah, CNN, Warsaw, Poland.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: Wow. So if you would like to help the people of Ukraine who have lost so much, they are in need of shelter, food, basic supplies, please go to CNN.com/impact. There you'll find ways to help, ways that will ensure that your generosity, your assistance will go to the people who need it the most.

We'll take a short break. When we come back, the U.S. president making an historic announcement about the strategic oil reserves. His challenge to oil companies in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[00:27:52]

VAUSE: Russia's invasion of Ukraine has sent the price of oil skyrocketing on global markets. So on Thursday, the U.S. president, Joe Biden, announced a record release from the strategic oil reserve, up to 180 million barrels over six months, a move he hopes will help lower record high gasoline prices across the U.S.

Kaitlin Collins has more now from the White House.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, as Russia's war on Ukraine is continuing, President Biden is taking drastic steps to try to reduce gas prices here at home, where they've been skyrocketing, of course, ever since that invasion began several weeks ago.

And President Biden announcing today he will be tapping into the reserves, the emergency reserves of oil that the United States has to try to help lower gas prices now that they are over average, $4 a gallon.

And so President Biden's plan for the next six months is to release a million barrels of gas per day from the strategic reserves. That's ultimately going to add up to about 180 million barrels of oil.

And while industry experts say they don't think this is going to really have anything but a modest impact, the White House is hoping this will be a bridge for the next six months as they are also calling on oil manufacturers here at home to ramp up production, even asking Congress to impose fees on those who have these wells on their leases that they are not utilizing to the fullest capacity.

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This is a wartime bridge to increase oil supply until production ramps up later this year. And it is by far the largest release of our national reserve in our history. It will provide an historic amount of supply for an historic amount of time a six-months bridge to the fall. COLLINS: Of course, all this really comes at a time that it's a big

political hit for the president. You've seen Republicans talk about it time and time again. The midterms are coming up.

And President Biden saying today he does empathize with people who are paying more at the pump, but of course, talking about the importance, he believes, in putting these sanctions on Russian oil, banning these imports of Russian oil from the United States, all as they try to contain this effort, though.

What we know so far is, of course, gas prices have gone up, and right now experts -- still expect them to continue to do so.

Kaitlan Collins, CNN, the White House.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: And now it seems the Russian president is playing the natural gas card, threatening to shut off supplies to Europe.

[00:30:10]

Putin has imposed new rules, effective today, that require so-called unfriendly states to pay for Russian gas in rubles. The E.U.'s economics commissioner slammed the move as blackmail.

Germany, France, the U.K. all refusing to honor this new edict, because existing contracts stipulate payment in euros or dollars. Here's the German chancellor.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OLAF SCHOLZ, GERMAN CHANCELLOR (through translator): We have looked at the contracts for the gas supplies and the other supplies. And in these, it says that the payments will be in euros, sometimes in dollars but usually in euros. And I made it clear in the conversation with the Russian president, that this will remain the case.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: The E.U. relies on Russia for about 40 percent of its natural gas. If Moscow suddenly shuts down the pipelines, it will be a huge economic shock.

With us now, from Stanford University, is Kathryn Stoner. She's the director of the Center of Democracy Development and the Rule of Law. And Kathryn, welcome back. It's good to see you.

We heard from Vladimir Putin on Thursday, speaking about why he believes Russia has been targeted with international sanctions. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VLADIMIR PUTIN, RUSSIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): These are sanctions to punish us for our right to be free, independent. For our right to be Russia. For not wanting to dance to their tune and sacrifice our national interests and traditional values.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: On the surface, that sounds like someone who's living in an alternative reality. So how can Putin rationalize this conflict and these sanctions, down to what seems to be an irrational statement?

I guess the other possibility is he just doesn't believe it himself.

KATHRYN STONER, DIRECTOR, CENTER OF DEMOCRACY DEVELOPMENT AND THE RULE OF LAW: Yes, so I wouldn't say he's irrational. He's emotional; that's for sure. I think he just has a very different perspective on the world and on human nature than we may have, and this, I think, plays into his understanding, or expectations of how people react in certain circumstances.

And so he assumed, I think, that the Ukrainian people would have little to no independent agency or decision-making capacity and that they're, instead, manipulated by this corrupt cabal of elites that is, in turn, manipulated and maybe even paid for by the West. And so he was expecting that Russian troops would be welcomed by Ukrainian citizens as liberators with bouquets of flowers. And instead, they were met, of course, with Molotov cocktails.

And so I think there, he has hey misjudged the situation, misunderstood the situation. But that's probably a result of the way, as I said, sees -- sees the world. And also, perhaps, bad intelligence. And, if you know, in an authoritarian system, that can happen. People are afraid to tell them.

VAUSE: How -- how -- sorry. Sorry to talk over you. There's a little bit of a delay here. But how does this all fit in with this threat right now to turn off gas supplies to Europe unless contracts are paid in rubles? It seems unlikely at this stage that any countries will give into that demand. It just seems a nonstarter.

STONER: Right. He's trying to -- to essentially make other countries pay in rubles to support the ruble. Because -- because of the financial sanctions that have been put on Russia.

So, right, it's in the contracts, as we heard from the piece that you just showed there. Oil and gas contracts are usually months and months, even years ahead of time at a certain price. And so, in this case, they're supposed to be paid for in euros or dollars.

So I think this is going to be a very, very difficult thing to enforce, because it hurts Russia, of course. If they don't deliver the oil or gas they're supposed to, than they don't get paid at all, not in rubles and not in dollars. And so it's a dangerous game, and I think there's very little credibility to the threat of actually shutting off those -- those resources.

VAUSE: We heard from -- we heard from the U.S. president. He spoke publicly for the first time about what may or may not be happening with Vladimir Putin inside the Kremlin. Listen to this. Here's Joe Biden. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: He seems to be -- I'm not saying this with a certainty. He seems to be self-isolated, and there's some indication that he has fired, or put under house arrest, some of his advisers. But I don't want to put too much stock in that at this time, because we don't have that much hard evidence.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: This comes after U.S. and British officials claim that Putin had been lied to by his advisers about the extent of the military losses in Ukraine, and that he doesn't actually have a -- you know, a fair assessment of what's been happening on the battlefield.

So if Putin is not getting a clear picture of what's happening, how -- how do you negotiate a peace deal with someone who doesn't actually have a proper assessment of the state of play?

[00:35:05]

STONER: Right. So I think he probably was unaware of the shortcomings of the military, but if the intelligence, as the president said there, we're getting is accurate, then there is, in fact, tension, with the ministry of defense and the minister of defense, Sergei Shoigu, who's one of his sort of trusted inside advisers.

But it seems he's currently aware, if there is that tension, that things are not going as planned. And obviously, he may have noticed that things didn't -- that the war is not over in three or four days.

And so as I was saying before, you know, this is -- and a Secretary Blinken said, this is the risk in a personalistic autocracy, which is that it's dangerous and difficult for advisers to -- to give the autocrat bad news.

But, you know, Putin's not stupid. The war was supposed to be short and successful. He was told that. And he knows it hasn't been short. And he likely knows the toll of the military is pretty great, much bigger than they had anticipated.

On a peace deal, I think, the Russians appear to be sort of presenting progress as mixed at this point, but they are continuing discussions.

So, you know, I think that is an indication also, that -- that things are not quite as easy as they had anticipated they would be, and that they may be willing to back off on what the original plan was and go for Plan B instead.

VAUSE: Kathryn Stoner at Stanford University, thank you so much. Good to see you again. Thank you.

STONER: Thank you.

VAUSE: So, even while Ukraine's military is having success against the Russian forces, the Ukrainian president made a surprise announcement late Thursday. Two of his top generals have been stripped of their ranks and removed. No specific reason was given, but Presidents Zelenskyy made clear he regarded both of them as traitors.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ZELENSKYY(through translator): Today, another decision was made regarding antiheroes. Now, I do not have time to deal with all the traitors, but gradually, they will all be punished.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Zelenskyy suggested the two fired generals had violated the military's oath of allegiance to Ukraine and said random generals do not belong here.

A lot more from Lviv at the top of the hour, but first, let's bring in Michael Holmes in Atlanta -- Michael.

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Good to see you there, John. Thanks so much. We'll check in with you a bit later.

We'll take a quick break. When we come back, a one-time Russian oligarch has denounced his home country and given up his citizenship. We'll have details on that and the consequences he thinks other oligarchs should face. That's when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[00:36:40]

HOLMES: Welcome back. The Ukrainian president has been on a diplomatic blitz since the start of the Russian invasion, on Thursday, speaking to Belgium lawmakers, asking for help with weapons, sanctions, and E.U. membership.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy calling the humanitarian situation in Mariupol a catastrophe and reiterating his request for a no-fly zone over Ukraine.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ZELENSKYY (through translator): Why are we waiting to set up a no-fly zone? We have the impression that the Europeans do not have enough courage to put in place, while the Ukraine has already given thousands of lives to defend the security of Europe. The defenders of Mariupol and other cities of Ukraine are fighting for the safety of all cities in Europe.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: From Japan to the U.S., and from Israel to Australia, Mr. Zelenskyy has addressed 17 Parliaments around the world since Russia invaded Ukraine in February.

European Parliament's president is traveling to Ukraine, becoming the first leader of an E.U. institution to do so since the start of the Russian invasion.

On Thursday, Roberta Metsola posted a photo of herself, saying, "On my way to Kyiv." An E.U. official says no details of the trip are being shared before the visit, due to security concerns.

Earlier this week, Metsola said it is important for the European Parliament to support Ukraine's aspiration to join the E.U.

A former Russian oligarchy does he is giving up his Russian citizenship after the invasion of Ukraine. CNN's Hadas Gold spoke to the billionaire, who wants other oligarchs to face more sanctions.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HADAS GOLD, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): When Russia invaded Ukraine, this one-time Russian oligarch had had enough. Leonid Nevzlin, a longtime critic of Vladimir Putin, publicly renounced his Russian citizenship in a Facebook post.

Speaking to us from his home north of Tel Aviv, Nevzlin said the decision was a long time coming.

LEONID NEVZLIN, FORMER RUSSIAN OLIGARCH: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

GRAPHIC: I just needed to announce that I do not accept this citizenship, my Russian citizenship, with the fascist Putin at the helm.

GOLD: Nevzlin left Russia for Israel nearly 20 years ago after what he says was a politically motivated series of charges against him and the Yukos Oil Company he cofounded.

The Israeli Supreme Court declined the Kremlin's request to extradite him. And the European Court of Justice ruled he did not receive a fair trial.

Nevzlin is calling now for harsher sanctions against his one-time compatriots, the Russian oligarchs, and criticizing the Israeli government for what he says is a lackluster response to the war.

(on camera): What do you think it would take for the Russian -- FOR the oligarchs to stop supporting Vladimir Putin?

NEVZLIN: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

GRAPHIC: It's imperative that stricter sanctions be placed on the elites, and not in the business sector but also among Putin's political, personal, and bureaucratic colluders who have a lot of blood on their hands after all these years. For me, Ukraine is the last straw. The sanctioning of such a large group of people must be carried out systematically, without any loopholes that will allow them to use their stolen money in the West or the East, and it should also have ramifications for those colluders' home countries.

[00:45:11] GOLD: We've been hearing here in Israel that there might be a new wave of Russian oligarchs, Russian elite who will try to leave Russia and come to Israel. Do you think they should be allowed in?

NEVZLIN: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

GRAPHIC: Anyone who has received Israeli citizenship legally but turn out to be big businessmen connected to Vladimir Putin, without a doubt, should have to face stiff legal consequences under Israeli law. Israel should minimally apply the economic sanctions and restrict access to any bank accounts. They should be cut off from society so they can no longer engage in either direct or indirect corruption.

GOLD (voice-over): Prime Minister Naftali Bennet has tried to mediate and not directly criticize Putin. And while Israel has condemned the Russian invasion and is sending humanitarian aid to Ukraine, it has not imposed economic sanctions against Russia, although it pledges it won't become a route to bypass other countries' sanctions.

Nevzlin says he is a proud Israeli citizen and Jew but says Israel needs to do more to support Ukraine and have a more generous refugee policy to all, whether Jewish or not.

(on camera): So, you do seem a little bit ashamed of the Israeli government and how they're handling everything from the politics to the refugees.

NEVZLIN: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

GRAPHIC: Not a little bit. I'm really ashamed.

GOLD: What do you hope will change, then, in the next few days, weeks?

NEVZLIN: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

GRAPHIC: I think things need to change dramatically after Zelenskyy's speech [to the Israeli Knesset]. If this doesn't happen, then I think society needs to push the government on this.

GOLD: You said you hope one day to be able to reclaim your Russian citizenship. What will it take for you to get there? Does Putin need to be gone?

NEVZLIN: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

GRAPHIC: I would. Let me tell you honestly, if I were to be offered Ukrainian citizenship, I would consider that a great honor.

GOLD (voice-over): Until then, one less citizenship in hand, Nevzlin says he'll continue to work, trying to democratize Russia from the outside.

Hadas Gold, CNN, Herzliya, Israel.

(END VIDEOTAPE) VAUSE: The E.U. and China getting ready for a virtual summit in Beijing, likely to catch some flak. We're live in Hong Kong with Kristie Lu Stout when we come back.

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[00:51:45]

HOLMES: Welcome back. As the war in Ukraine turns Russia into an international pariah, Moscow reaching out to two countries who've been soft in their condemnation. The Russian foreign minister, in India, right now, where he is scheduled to meet with his Indian counterpart in just over an hour.

A day earlier, Sergei Lavrov holding talks in China with the Chinese foreign minister.

India and China have not outright condemned the Russian invasion, but they're under strong international pressure to do so.

Now, China could face more of that pressure in the coming hours, when its summit with the European Union gets underway. Our Kristie Lu Stout covering this live for us from Hong Kong.

Good to see you, Kristie. So how do you see this summit unfolding? What's on the agenda?

KRISTIE LU STOUT, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Michael, this will be a very tense meeting amid an already rocky relationship. We're going to see this virtual summit take place, later today, between the E.U. and China.

On the table, human rights will be discussed, climate change, trade. But in the eyes of the E.U. officials, the focus will be on Ukraine and, namely, China's relationship with Russia after the invasion.

In the days leading up to today's high-level, virtual summit, we heard from a high-level E.U. official who accused China of political support in Russia and its assault on Ukraine. I'm going to bring up this statement for you, this is coming from the head of the European Parliament's Delegation for Relations with China.

He said this, quote, "The veil is threadbare, and it fools no one." He adds, "The way in which China handles this conflict will have bearing on the future overall E.U.-China relationship," unquote.

Now, a breakthrough is not widely expected to come out of the summit, not only because of the tense relationship between China and the E.U., but because how -- of the relationship between China and Russia, and how both sides have been doubling down on their prewar relationship.

This was made clear in that meeting that took place earlier this week in Tunxi, China. It's in Anhui province, between Sergei Lavrov, Russia's foreign minister, and his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi.

And during those meetings, Wang Yi made no indication that China was going to join any western condemnation of Russia in its actions in Ukraine. In fact, almost just the opposite. After day one of the Lavrov-Wang Yi meeting, we heard this from China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. A spokesman, Wang Weibin, saying, as follows.

He says, quote, "There is no ceiling for China-Russian cooperation, no ceiling for us to strive for peace, no ceiling for us to safeguard security, and no ceiling for us to oppose hegemony," unquote.

So Michael, if China declaring its relationship with Russia after the invasion as having, quote, "no ceiling," this comes just months after, of course, that summit in Beijing between Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, in which they declared that their relationship had no limits before the invasion.

Back to you.

HOLMES: All right. Kristie, thanks so much. Kristie Lu Stout there, in Hong Kong. Important meeting.

Now, there is new fallout, by the way, from the Will Smith slap at the Oscars. You'll remember that. The award show's producer says Los Angeles police officers were prepared to arrest Smith right then and there, but comedian Chris Rock was adamant he did not want to press charges.

Take a listen to the ABC News interview.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WILL PACKER, ACADEMY AWARDS PRODUCER: They were saying, you know, This is battery, was the word they used in that moment. They said, We will go get him; we are prepared. We're prepared to get him right now. You can press charges. We can arrest him. You have -- they were laying out the options.

And as they were talking, Chris was -- he was being very dismissive of those options. He was like, No, I'm fine. He was like, No, no, no.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Now, a source telling CNN that Smith apologized to the Academy leadership during a 30-minute Zoom call. The Academy telling Smith his actions, though, would have consequences.

The actor has maintained a low profile on social media since the slap heard around the world, except for a public statement admitting that he was, quote, "out of line."

I'm Michael Holmes at the CNN Center in Atlanta. We'll go back to John Vause, live in Lviv, Ukraine, after the break. I'll see you later.

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