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Retreat of Russian Forces Reveals Atrocities in Kyiv Region; Growing Number of Ukrainians Seek Asylum at U.S.-Mexico Border; JPMorgan Chase CEO Says, War in Ukraine, High Inflation Pose Significant Threat to Economic Recovery. Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired April 04, 2022 - 10:30   ET

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

[10:30:02]

STEVE HALL, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: He's like that bad next door neighbor that you have to complain to every once in a while. But this has changed everything. I think a lot, certainly, at least in the western world and our allies around the world have seen that what Putin is really about is indeed, by his own words, trying to change the world order to make it different, to make it more imperial, to divide it up into spheres of influence. And that is a real significant challenge.

I am not necessarily sure that it means Vladimir Putin, regardless of how it ends for him in Ukraine, is next going to go after the Baltics or going to go and take over Georgia entirely, but a containment, a cold war phrase, I think, is very much in order and really needs to be considered strongly when we look at what sort of happened just over the past couple of weeks.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN NEWSROOM: Yes. Folks, that was all behind us in 1991. Apprently not, not the end of history. Steve Hall, it's good to have you on.

HALL: My pleasure.

SCIUTTO: Well, more than 4.2 million refugees have now left Ukraine, a tenth of the population, most pouring into neighboring countries, some, though, have arrived at the U.S./Mexico border. Details on the long lines, the waits they're facing there.

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[10:35:00]

JOE BIDEN, U.S. PRESIDENT: You may remember, I got criticized for calling Putin a war criminal. Well, the truth of the matter, you just saw what happened in Bucha. This warrants him he is a war criminal. But we have to gather the information. We have to continue to provide Ukraine with the weapons they need to continue the fight and we have to get all the detail so this can be -- actually, we'll have a war crime trial.

This guy is brutal and what happened in Bucha is outrageous and everyone has seen it.

REPORTER: Do you think it's genocide?

BIDEN: No. I think it's a war crime

REPORTER: Sir, are you going to have more sanctions on Russia?

BIDEN: I'm thinking more sanctions, yes. I'll have time to announce that too.

REPORTER: Can you ever hold Putin accountable though? You called him a war criminal --

BIDEN: He should be held accountable.

REPORTER: (INAUDIBLE) without sanctions? What else can you do?

BIDEN: I don't know. The war crimes -- yes, I'm going to continue to add sanctions. Thank you.

REPORTER: What kind of sanctions, Mr. President?

BIDEN: I'll let you know.

SCIUTTO: President Biden arriving at the White House just moments ago, his first comments following the horrific images we have seen out of Bucha, Ukraine, this weekend. The president saying there that he sees that as evidence of war crimes by the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. He also says that he's currently seeking more sanctions on Russia for its invasion of Ukraine.

Joining us now is Tata Marharian. She's a volunteer medic serving in Ukraine. She has recently been on the frontlines, near Bucha, Irpin, Hostomel. These are all suburbs of the capital, Kyiv. We've, of course, spoken to Tata before. It's good to have you back on.

I wonder if you could tell us what you have seen with your own eyes as Russian forces have withdrawn from the areas around Kyiv.

TATA MARHARIAN, MEMBER, UKRAINIAN VOLUNTEER MEDICAL BATTALION: Hi, thank you so much for keeping track of what's going on in Ukraine. I promised myself not to be negative on this interview. I try my best to stay in good mindset and to believe in humanity, democracy, all the principles and values that we share with the rest of the civilized world.

But I got to be honest with you, the things that we've seen, I don't think I had the time to process it yet, but I've seen quite a lot, me and my friends as well, my colleagues in the battalion, my comrades. It's been just horrific. Women, children, men, no matter who they are, what clothes they were wearing, just corpses lying on the roads everywhere, different age, different backgrounds, civilians, different civilians, medics, whoever. Everyone were just brutally slaughtered by the Russian liberating forces and it just -- I'm lost for words. I've seen children raped and killed. I didn't think I would see anything like that in this day and age.

I've been there for our rotation. We've been there for longer than we were supposed to just because it was very -- the tactical situation didn't allow us to leave the area and we had no connection, nothing whatsoever for some time, no opportunity to resupply. We were -- I don't know, what miracle was that. I guess the miracle was the Armed Forces of Ukraine that sort of ensured at least some sort of passage and humanitarian corridors and stuff like that for civilians.

Right now, what we see is that Russians -- I don't want to say withdrew their troops because they're not backing off. They're not pulling back.

[10:40:00]

They're regrouping. They're taking their time to rethink their tactics, resupply and strike again harder than we've seen before.

And so what we were able to see after they sort of left the area, I'm still rethinking what just happened.

SCIUTTO: I'm sure, Tata. What do the people you meet there tell you? They must have witnessed visions of hell, it sounds like.

MARHARIAN: Yes. It's really ridiculous, because the people that are there, they have mixed, different reactions, mixed reactions sort of. Some of them are very -- you know, very dedicated to stay where they are. Some of the civilians that were there, they've taken the risk to take care of other people's homes until, you know, they're gone and they have no opportunity to feed the dogs or take care of the kitties who were left behind, et cetera, et cetera. Some of them are doing that.

The others are just praying to be alive and to survive the atrocities that were taking place and happening all over the area. So, we see people who are scared. We see people who are terrified and afraid. We see people who are not afraid to come to a mortar that didn't explode like two meters away from that, just to check on the dog if he's doing okay. So, very, very different reactions we're seeing.

But everywhere we go right now, Kyiv region sort of, we see people happy to be relieved from Russians at least for some time. When they see Ukrainian military, they burst in tears because they say that they were like, we didn't think that we were going to see you guys ever again, and this has just happened that we are united together with Ukrainian flags on us.

SCIUTTO: The war, as you say, is still raging. If it's moved away from the capital for now, we know that Russians are still attacking civilians in the east and in the south. What does this area that -- you're in the capital Kyiv but around it, what does it need now? Does it need more protection? Does it need more weapons? Does it need more military?

MARHARIAN: It definitely does. And we are in critical need of weapons, troops. We have a lot of foreign friends who come here to fight for Ukraine. In our battalion, there are quite a few foreigners, mainly from the U.S., from Great Britain, a few from Latin America, from Europe, from France. We have people supporting Ukrainians. We need more of that. We need more people who are qualified, who have the right motivation to come here and help.

What we see right now is that, relative to Kyiv and the Kyiv region, it seems relatively safe right now. But what we don't want to do is we don't want to shift all of our power towards east and south so that Kyiv is left unattended sort of and free to take over. So, we try to balance that.

My crew, some of our crews, mine including, we're going east right now. So, we're leaving in Kyiv and we're going east, but the crews already stay -- also stay in Kyiv region as well to take care of this in case -- yes, we're also preparing --

SCIUTTO: I'm grateful to you. I'm sure the Ukrainian people are grateful because that's where the need, of course, in the east and the south, but it's also where the danger is. Tata Marharian, thanks so much for coming back on the show.

MARHARIAN: Thank you for keeping track of this and Slava Ukraini.

SCIUTTO: Slava Ukraini. You hearing eyewitness accounts like that more and more and we'll continue to bring them to you.

And we'll be right back.

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[10:45:00]

SCIUTTO: Of course, most Ukrainians have fled the war to neighboring countries, but new this morning, the number of Ukrainians seeking asylum at the U.S. southern border with Mexico is actually growing by the day. Mexican immigration authorities estimate more than 1,500 Ukrainians fleeing Russia's invasion of their homeland are now waiting in the border city of Tijuana.

CNN's Priscilla Alvarez is joining us now. So, Priscilla, I mean, they come there, you were saying, because it's easier to get a visa to Mexico than to the U.S. So, how many now of these 1,500 are getting through?

PRISCILLA ALVAREZ, CNN REPORTER: Well, they get on that list they're provided a number. And their wait is usually more than 24 hours. And then as they approach the port of entry, that is where they gain entry. Now, remember, there are Trump-era pandemic restrictions in place, but the Department of Homeland Security has authorized CDP to make exemptions for Ukrainians on a case by case basis, so they can be paroled into the United States.

And the reason they're choosing this is because Ukrainians can -- it's easier for them to get a visa to Mexico and it is much harder to get a visa to the United States and there are limited pathways right now for them to come here despite the commitment from the administration to accept up to 100,000 Ukrainian refugees.

So, in the interim, with limited pathways that take a long time, they're opting to go to the U.S./Mexico border to gain entry into the U.S.

[10:50:03]

SCIUTTO: Now, is this something that -- particularly when title 42 goes away, that it becomes, if it's successful, a bigger path to entry to the U.S. for Ukrainians?

ALVAREZ: Well, they're already exempt from it. Again, most of them are exempt. So, it shouldn't make a big difference in May when those restrictions lift for everyone, but, as always, it can strain resources.

SCIUTTO: Understood. We'll be watching closely. Priscilla Alvarez, thanks so much.

The head of JPMorgan Chase warns on the economic impact of the war in Ukraine. How it would likely get worse in coming weeks and months, we're going to have that, coming up.

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SCIUTTO: The CEO of JPMorgan Chase is warning that the ongoing war in Ukraine as well as rising global inflation pose significant threats to the economic recovery that was just starting to pick up more steam.

CNN Business Reporter Matt Egan joins us now.

[10:55:01]

This is part of Jamie Dimon's annual letter to shareholders, what were the main takeaways besides that warning?

MATT EGAN, CNN BUSINESS REPORTER: Well, Jim, Jamie Dimon sounds concerned about all of these forces impacting the economy at the same time. There is the war in Ukraine, there's this rapid recovery from COVID, and this high inflation that's forcing the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates rapidly.

And Dimon is saying that the confluence of these forces rapidly increases risks ahead. What does that mean? He said, at a minimum, we're talking about a slower economic recovery, but he said it could, quote, easily be worse than that. And he reminded us that the 1973 oil embargo sent energy prices skyrocketing and tanked the world economy.

Now, we know that oil prices have gone up since the war in Ukraine began, up another 4 percent, so around $103 a barrel, as we speak, and that's lifted gasoline prices as well, the national average for gasoline price is $4.19 a gallon. That's actually down 14 cents from the record but it's still up.

I want to leave you with a key line from Dimon where he's calling for the western world to really unite here against Russia. He says, quote, we need to make this a permanent, long-lasting stand for democratic ideals against all forms of evil, particularly, appropriate words given the disturbing images coming out of Ukraine this weekend, Jim.

SCIUTTO: Yes, and interesting for him to highlight that given the economic cost that he's also noting there. Matt Egan, thanks so much.

EGAN: Thank you.

SCIUTTO: And thanks so much to all of you for joining us today. I'm Jim Sciutto

AT THIS HOUR with Kate Bolduan starts right a quick break.

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