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Ukraine Reports Heavy Shelling in Donbas Region; Russia: Ukrainian Choppers Hit Belgorod Fuel Depot; Adviser to Mayor Says Aid Supplies Not Reaching Mariupol; Russian Advance Stopped Before Reaching a Small Village; Kamikaze Drones Hunting Down Enemy Assets in Ukraine; More than Four Million People have Fled Ukraine. Aired 4- 4:30a ET

Aired April 01, 2022 - 04:00   ET

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

[04:00:00]

KIM BRUNHUBER, CNN ANCHOR: Hello and welcome to all of you watching us here in the United States, Canada and all around the world, I'm Kim Brunhuber at CNN world headquarters in Atlanta. We're following breaking news in the war on Ukraine just ahead.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): We are standing and we will continue to fight until the end.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All the territory is being constantly shelled by heavy artillery. They use any possible means of heavy bombardment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As can see, that there was a Russian armored vehicle which was completely annihilated.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The Russian rocket hit this exact room right here.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL IS BONDED AND ANCHOR: We just don't know what the future is going to be. How Putin will redirect and redeploy the forces.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BRUNHUBER: It is 11 a.m. in Ukraine where Russian forces appear to be focusing more of their fury on the eastern Donbas region without letting up on the capital, Kyiv. Authorities in Luhansk and Donetsk region attacks from artillery aircraft, heavy caliber weapons and mortars. Here's 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)

BRUNHUBER: To the north, Ukraine's second-biggest city Kharkiv, continues to be a major target. The regions 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 east of Kharkiv. Images from the scene shows burned out Russian tanks, as well as homes and cars destroyed.

Meanwhile, the governor of Belgorod, Russia, says two Ukrainian helicopters attacked a fuel depot there setting it on fire. Now CNN can't confirm the claim. Belgorod is just across the border from Kharkiv, Ukraine.

And President Zelenskyy also announced that two of his top generals have been stripped of their ranks and removed. Now he didn't give a specific reason but made it clear he regarded the two as traitors. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

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

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: CNN has correspondents covering the latest developments. We will hear from Christiane Amanpour in Kyiv, Matt Rivers in Hungary, Kristie Lu Stout in Hong Kong and Nina Dos Santos in London. But we begin this hour with Phil Black in Lviv, Ukraine. So, Phil, let's start with the reports of Russian troop movement in some areas, Russia says withdrawal. The U.S. and other say they're just repositioning. What's the latest?

PHIL BLACK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Kim, I think that's still the assessment that it's not a complete withdrawal. They're not going home. Some of them might be supplied and then set back into battle -- some straight back into battle. These are mostly in areas around the capital Kyiv and around the northern city of Chernihiv.

But we are also hearing about Russian troops pulling out from Chernobyl. The site of an existing nuclear power plant and also the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster in 1986. This was all area both the facility, the existing power plant and the surrounding region. This was all captured by the Russians in the earliest moments in their invasion. Now it would seem quite suddenly they have decided to leave entirely. We are told by Ukrainian officials there are simply none of them there.

Ukrainian officials also -- say we can't verify this -- they say that some of the Russian soldiers while they were there were digging trenches and building fortifications in soil that is still radioactive. And some of them very quickly suffered radiation poisoning creating some sense of panic among the Russian troops there. As I said, we can't verify that specifically.

Meanwhile, you touched on this, this apparently very daring raid across the border in Russian territory which has resulted in destruction of a large fuel depot. We're hearing this from Russian officials. No comment yet from Ukrainian officials. But what the Russians are saying is that two Ukrainian military helicopters flew into Russian air space at a very low altitude and then struck and destroyed this particular fuel depot. No casualties but significant damage to the infrastructure.

[04:05:00]

If true, this is a payback of a type because Russian missiles have been targeting fuel depots on Ukrainian territory, all across the country for some days now. And this is the sort of reciprocal measure that could perhaps in some way impact Russia's ability to move around and conduct military operations -- Kim.

BRUNHUBER: Yes, and Phil, there were hopes that a humanitarian corridor might bring some relief to besieged Mariupol. But so far at least the city's mayor says Russian forces haven't allowed any supplies in. What's the latest there?

BLACK: So, there are often humanitarian corridors out of Mariupol. That these are just for private vehicles, people driving themselves out very slowly through Russian controlled territories, through multiple checkpoints. What they haven't been able to do with any real success so far is send in buses to get out large numbers of people who don't have their own forms of transportation and also to send in trucks with aid, food, medicine, the stuff that tens of thousands, more than 100,000 people in that city still desperately need.

There's been an effort over the last 24 hours to get a fleet of 45 buses plus other vehicles in there. They didn't make it yesterday. We understand that they were stopped and still somewhere around the city of Berdyansk. This is a Russian-controlled city. But we understand that this corridor is going to be open again today. And there is some hope that these buses will make it to Mariupol and will be able to bring out a large number of the civilians that have been trapped there for the whole time that city has been under siege -- Kim.

BRUNHUBER: So critical. We'll be looking for that then later today. Phil Black in Lviv, Ukraine. Thank you so much.

The Ukrainian soldiers who have so far successfully defended the capital Kyiv say it's their stronger morale and spirit which gives them the advantage over the Russians. Still, life for Ukrainians are becoming increasingly difficult with basic essentials in short supply. We have more now from CNN's Christiane Amanpour in a battered suburb of Kyiv.

(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 front line is about a mile away. For now, an uneasy calm prevails ever since the Ukrainian defenders stopped the Russian advance here. It was February 28th, they say, day four of the war.

They want to show us how they did it, but first, we have to clamber over the bridge they downed to see the armored column they managed to take out. The riverbank is littered with their skeletons. And this was turkey shoot, Russian armored vehicles and tanks that had come off the road to avoid the antitank mines, only to find themselves unable to cross the bridge and are 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. "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 his 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 this situation and clearly overestimated the abilities of his military to secure a rapid victory.

And this old lady tells us: "I have seen one war and here we go again. I wish Putin would go away."

[04:10:00]

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)

BRUNHUBER: There is growing speculation in the West that Vladimir Putin may not have a clear understanding of how poorly his military has performed over the past month. Here's what President Biden said on Thursday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: 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 into that at this time because we don't have that much hard evidence.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: Now even before Biden said that the Kremlin was already pushing back at the notion that Putin was being misinformed about the war. According to the state news agency Tass, a Kremlin spokesperson said it was regrettable that Washington didn't understand Moscow's decision making. The Kremlin was concerned the misunderstanding could lead to, quote, bad consequences.

Britain's Defense Secretary says the U.K. and its allies will send Ukraine more lethal aid including long-range artillery and weapons to defend its coastline. Now comes as Ukraine askes the U.S. for more reconnaissance and attack drones. CNN's Tom Foreman has the details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Beneath the roar of missiles strikes and artillery blast, evidence of another deadly threat has appeared, so-called loitering munitions or kamikaze drones, brought by the Russians to hit hard behind Ukrainian lines.

COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: The terror aspect of these weapons is a significant psychological factor on the battlefield.

FOREMAN (voice over): Unlike massive military drones, which fly hundreds of miles an hour over vast distances, often to drop missiles and return home, loitering munition drones are small, slow and disposable.

The Switchblade 300, for example, weighs less than six pounds and can be carried in a backpack. Launch quickly and easily. It will cruise at about 60 miles an hour for 15 minutes while onboard cameras and GPS hunt for nearby enemy assets. Once a target is spotted and the command is given, the drone can sprint up to 100 miles an hour dive and explode on impact.

But as the battle has raged, military analysts say the Ukrainians who have such drones too, have turned the tables on the Russians using them to much more deadly effect.

LEIGHTON: My personal guess is that probably about 20 percent to 30 percent of the kills that the Ukrainians are registering against Russian armor and against, you know, other Russian entities is probably due to their very successful employment of these drones.

FOREMAN (voice over): According to analysts, kamikaze drones fit perfectly with the small, fast-moving squads favored by the Ukrainians. The weapons are hard to detect and can penetrate positions miles away, several systems of varying size, speed and capability appear to be in use. And the United States is committing to boost the Ukrainian effort with a hundred of those Switchblade systems.

BIDEN: Which demonstrates our commitment to sending our most cutting- edge systems to Ukraine for its defense.

FOREMAN: These drones aren't big but their impact is growing by the day if only because in the very noisy space of war, these tiny killer drones can strike suddenly and quietly like a bolt from a clear blue sky.

Tom Foreman, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BRUNHUBER: Coming up, CNN talks to a new mother who made the treacherous journey out of Ukraine so her child would be born away from the horrors of war. Stay with us.

[04:15:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BRUNHUBER: The U.N. refugee agency estimates more than 4 million people have fled the violence in Ukraine. And more than half of them have gone to Poland, but smaller countries like Moldova are also taking in refugees. Moldova is struggling to handle the more than 300,000 Ukrainians who have come into the country. Most of them are hoping to return home if there is a home to return to. They don't know when that'll happen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ELENA, REFUGEE FROM MYKOLAIV, UKRAINE (through translator): We have apartments. We have houses. We have places in the countryside. Well, everything is there. It's not like we left Ukraine because we wanted to. We want to go home. I'm already crying. To drop everything and just leave.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: Now of course these refugees are more than just numbers. Nearly all of those who are fleeing are women and children and, in some cases, women about to have children and it's making a hard journey even tougher. Our Kyung Lah has the details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

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

LAH: Is it hard to be happy?

LAH (voice-over): "It is," she says. Adelina is Khrystyna Pavluchenko's first child.

LAH: You feel guilty? Why?

LAH (voice-over): "Because I left," she says. Left her home in western Ukraine.

The war had begun, the bombing neared their city. Pavluchenko escaped on bus, then walked on foot across the border. Paramedics rushed her to the hospital. She delivered Adelina 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 lead 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.

[04:20:]

It's unbelievable. It's terrifying.

LAH (voice-over): Dr. Magda Dutsch is a psychiatrist at Inflancka Specialist Hospital in Warsaw. The hospital focus on treating women, has seen 80 Ukrainian patients this month, delivered 11 babies, and treated cancer patients like 58-year-old Tatyana Mykilev (ph).

"I ran with my granddaughter in my arms," she says. Missiles already broke out 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 healthcare 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.

LAH: Your husband.

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

LAH: You had to leave your husband behind?

LAH(voice-over): "Yes," she says.

Now in Warsaw, "I can't sit and do nothing," she says. "I have this opportunity here to help women who fled the country."

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

LAH: What will you tell your daughter about her birth?

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

LAH: All the Ukrainian patients you've seen in this story, that healthcare is being covered by the government in 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)

BRUNHUBER: Now I want to bring in David Gazashvili. He's the team lead for the CARE organization which is helping refugees in Warsaw, Poland. Thank you so much for being here with us. As I mentioned earlier, more than 4 million refugees, more than half going to Poland where you are. What's the situation there and how are you coping with this influx?

DAVID GAZASHVILI, TEAM LEAD, CARE: Yes, people arriving at the border points are in need of everything, including basic supplies, such as toothbrushes, wet wipes, baby food and diapers. They also need hot food and drinks as temperatures on many border points are still remaining freezing. It's snowing today in Warsaw as well.

There is a huge need for services to help people transit on to their final destinations. As well as regular and clear information on transportation options and services in the countries. Now there are many humanitarian aid centers at the border points as well as across Poland where refugees stay for a day or two while they find a longer- term accommodation.

BRUNHUBER: Yes, I just want to ask you, I mean, there are so many people coming to organizations like yours. Many people telling tragic stories. But also, many people with inspiring stories of courage and perseverance -- like we saw in that story about the pregnant woman there. What struck you?

GAZASHVILI: Yes, what strikes me is the generosity and support of the Polish people. Polish organizations and the Polish government, as well as organizations like ours. I see enormous number of people, volunteers in all of these crossing centers who stay there, who work for hours, most of the day. And many of them, they take refugees home.

For instance, I was in a refugee center here in Warsaw last week and I heard story when a volunteer who has three children of his own, he took another family with three children, one of them was born in the refugee center. So, he says now he has six children.

BRUNHUBER: Gosh. That's amazing. I mean, we're seeing the best of humanity alongside with, of course, the worst with the war. And the fact that Russia's ground invasion hasn't gone as planned, so that's good news from a Ukrainian military standpoint. But could it mean a harsher outcome for civilian as Russia is seemingly changing tactics and attacking more civilian targets. I mean, how big of a concern is this and how might that put even more pressure on civilians to evacuate?

GAZASHVILI: Well, we see that the refugees are still coming over the border. There was a slight decrease in the number of refugees over the last week. But unless the conflict is over, we think that people will flea for safety and unfortunately that's what we're seeing so far.

[04:25:00]

We obviously hope that the conflict will be over and eventually most of the people will be able to go back to Ukraine and rebuild their lives. Where organizations like CARE will be ready to support them. But in the meantime, we're here together with our partners, together with the people of Poland, the local governments providing all essential support.

BRUNHUBER: Well, with most of the men in Ukraine staying behind or not being allowed to leave, so many of the vulnerable, as we've said, are women and children. Your organization has warned of an increased risk of trafficking and exploitation. Why is that? And how do you prevent that?

GAZASHVILI: Yes, We see there is trafficking and gender-based violence in many different situations. So, obviously, the risk is here in Poland as well because as you said, most of refugees are women and children and many are traveling alone. And they are increased of gender-based violence, exploitation, abuse, discrimination or trafficking, as well as poor access to vital health services.

So, the best way to address this risk is to have information readily available to the refugees starting at the border crossing. So that they know what to expect once they cross the border. They know what services can be available for them, who provides those services. Also, which cities and areas are set up to receive refugees. Where there are accommodation and employment opportunities are. And most importantly, also, what to do if they experience a challenge or crisis.

BRUNHUBER: Yes, a huge challenge ahead. Really appreciate all of the work that you're doing. David Gazashvili, thank you so much for joining us.

GAZASHVILI: Thank you.

BRUNHUBER: And if you would like to help people in Ukraine who may need shelter, food and water, please go to CNN.com/impact, and you'll find several ways you can help.

Well, diplomacy is shifting into high gear in two countries refusing to directly denounce the Russian investigation. India holds face-to- face talks with Moscow's top diplomat. While China gets ready for tough talks the EU. We'll have all of that coming up. Stay with us. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)