Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Newsroom
Dozens Killed In Strike At Kramatorsk Train Station Crowded With Evacuees; Visiting With Ukrainians Sheltering From Invasion; Some Russians Flee To Georgia To Protest Putin; Russian Troops Discussed Killing And Raping Civilians In Intercepted Audio; U.S. Issues Warnings About COVID-19 In China; Pakistani Lawmakers Considering No Confidence Vote For Khan; French Residents In Shanghai Will Miss First Round Of Voting; Regional Military Governor Says Heavy Shelling Of Kharkiv By Russian Forces Continues. Aired 4-5a ET
Aired April 09, 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]
(MUSIC PLAYING)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): This is CNN breaking news.
LYNDA KINKADE, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hello and welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm Lynda Kinkade, coming to you live from Atlanta.
Russian forces are being blamed for a missile strike that ripped through a crowded train station early Friday, killing dozens of civilians, trying to flee ahead of an expected Russian assault in the eastern part of the country.
At least 50 people were killed and many more were injured. The Kramatorsk station has been a major hub for those evacuating daily. Ukraine's president vowed to pursue the attack as a war crime. Here he is speaking.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, PRESIDENT OF UKRAINE (through translator): We expect a firm global response to this war crime. Like the massacre in Bucha, like many other Russian war crimes, the missile strike on Kramatorsk must be one of the charges at the tribunal, which is bound to happen.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KINKADE: There are allegations the Russian missiles delivered cluster bombs, which scatter and explode over a wide area. Despite Moscow's denial of involvement, the airstrike shows Russia is deliberately trying to prevent civilians from leaving.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OLEKSANDR KAMYSHIN, UKRAINIAN RAILWAYS: Yesterday, they bombed the bridge which connects all the cities, like Kramatorsk, Slovyansk, Lyman and others, with Ukraine. And they keep shelling stations. They keep shelling trains. And they do whatever they can to stop the evacuation program of civilians.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KINKADE: Well, all of this is taking place as Ukrainian military commanders say Russian forces, massing near the eastern Donbas region, are almost ready to launch an all-out assault.
CNN's Christiane Amanpour has more on the horrific aftermath in Kramatorsk and a warning: the images in her report are shocking and graphic but they reveal the true level of brutality the Ukrainians are blaming on the Russian forces.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): You can hear the fear and the anguish, you can see the desperate efforts to rescue civilians after an attack on this train station in the eastern city of Kramatorsk.
A crowded platform hit by Russian missile strike as people tried to escape heavy fighting. Russian forces also struck the station building itself, the head of the railway told CNN. Now dozens are dead, including children and many people remain unaccounted for.
I asked Ukraine's Chief of Military Intelligence for his reaction.
MAJOR GEN. KYRYLO BUDANOV, CHIEF, DEFENSE INTELLIGENCE OF UKRAINE (through translator): What can I say this is another example of criminal activity of war criminal dictator, Putin.
It is in our case that I hope that would be added to the criminal investigation against him in the international courts conducting a powerful missile strike against a civilian infrastructure during the evacuation of civilians. It's an act of terrorism.
AMANPOUR (voice-over): In the hours and days before this attack, the station was crowded with thousands of refugees. Kramatorsk has been a hub for internally displaced people in the Donetsk region.
Families desperately boarding trains to escape the Russian assault. Now body bags and abandoned luggage are all that remain. The hundreds wounded are one step further from evacuation.
Painted on the side of this deadly rocket were the words, "for the children," a chilling message, the European Commission president tells me, just strengthens her resolve to make sure Vladimir Putin fails in Ukraine.
URSULA VON DER LEYEN, EUROPEAN COMMISSION PRESIDENT: If you look at the attack today at the train station, I watched on pictures where the shelling had written on, "for our children," which means like revenge for children. So they are building indeed this awful narrative, as if they would be returning something, a nightmare. AMANPOUR (voice-over): Russia has denied responsibility for the strike, calling it a provocation by Ukraine. But the brutality of this invasion is well-documented despite Russia's military consistently denying attacking civilians.
Kramatorsk was one of the first places targeted when the Russian invasion was launched February 24th.
VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): Why do they need this war against Ukraine?
Why do they need to hit civilians with missiles?
[04:05:00]
ZELENSKYY (through translator): Why this cruelty that the world has witnessed in Bucha and other cities liberated by Ukrainian army?
AMANPOUR (voice-over): On Friday, Ukraine announced 10 humanitarian corridors, including one in the Donetsk region but civilian casualties are increasing every hour that Russia's bombardments continue -- Christiane Amanpour, CNN, Kyiv.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KINKADE: Well, international condemnation has been quick. French president Emmanuel Macron calling it an abomination, saying the only things in the victims' hands were push carts, teddy bears and suitcases.
U.N. secretary general Antonio Guterres tweeted that there must be accountability for a gross violation of humanitarian and human rights law.
UNICEF says it's still unclear how many children were killed or injured. But it fears the worst.
Much of northern Ukraine is in ruins, following Russia's failed push on the city of Chernihiv. Russian forces have abandoned the region as they focus on the east. Clarissa Ward shows us the trail of destruction left in their wake.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is what remains of Russia's presence in much of northern Ukraine, a hastily abandoned camp by the roadside, just 30 miles in from the Russian border, where soldiers dug in and prepared for their advance, their foxholes still littered with their rations.
WARD: So this is where it looks like they were doing their cooking. You can see onions, coffee and water, some cans over there. But what's so striking, walking around this camp, is that it's just a mess. It seems there was a total lack of discipline.
WARD (voice-over): Around the corner in the village in Chernihiv, Lyudmila Stefanov (ph) tells us residents hid their valuables as Russian forces looted the area.
"Five weeks they were staying here. Tanks were all around us. At night, they would shoot at the houses with machine guns," she says. "But, praise God, they didn't touch us."
As the Russians continued their lightning offensive down to the city of Chernihiv, their tactics grew more brutal. Faced with stiff resistance on the ground, they doubled down on bombardment from the skies.
Ukrainian soldier Bogdan Barditski (ph) shows us what's left of this village of Novoselivka, just outside Chernihiv. The scale of the destruction is jaw-dropping. Not a single house is untouched.
Bogdan explains this was the final push to get into the city. He's saying this was a Ukrainian position, the Russians bombed it heavily and then Russian soldiers were actually here in this area just a mile away from the city.
Nikolai Krasnato (ph) never saw the Russian soldiers here but felt the full force of their assault.
"This is my cellar," he says. He tells us his nephew was sheltering from the bombardment there when it took a hit. Pinned down, Nikolai was forced bury him there in a shallow grave in the garden.
"We put a cross and we covered it with the shields, so the dogs won't give dig him up," he says.
"I feel such hatred for Putin. I want to tear him apart. I lived through 70 years but I never saw a beast like this."
Many here fear they haven't seen the last of him. On a destroyed bridge, an emotional Tatyana and Svetlana are returning from their first visit with their parents since the war began. They're worried they may not see them again.
"We don't know if the Russians will come back to the village where my parents are," Tatyana says. "And this is so scary."
In the end, Russia's offensive in the north was a failure but the scars of its assault remain deep, with the prospect of a return to normalcy still seems far away -- Clarissa Ward, CNN, Chernihiv region, Ukraine.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KINKADE: Well, joining us now, live from Dnipro, Ukraine, is a Dr. Joanne Liu, a physician with Doctors without Borders.
Good to have you with us. I know you've been very busy and I'm grateful you're taking the time to speak with us. I know you've been seeing horrifying scenes at the train station hit by the Russian airstrike. Your team has been working at that strain station.
What can you tell us? [04:10:00]
DR. JOANNE LIU, DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS: Well, we've been doing what we call train evacuations for the last week. And then a few days ago we were at the same train station, evacuating patients coming from other locations, a little bit more north and south from Kramatorsk toward the west.
So the idea what we're doing right now is taking and off-loading hospital more closer to military operation, to more separate places in the western part of the country.
KINKADE: And so where else are your teams working right now?
And how challenging is it for people to try and leave cities like Mariupol?
LIU: Well, right now, we're working in places that are basically close to the front line. And then we work on three main pillar, which is supply, making sure they have everything to respond to an increased influx of patients.
We're working on what we call mass casualty preparedness, which is, when you have a big amount of patients coming at once, because they're wounded, either you triage them or you prioritize them and you make sure everybody gets the care they need.
And the third part is working on evacuation, medical evacuation of wounded and medical people to a separate place, to make sure they have continued health care management.
KINKADE: And so talk to us about the sort of injuries that Doctors without Borders are treating right now.
LIU: So we've been, you know, seeing, in the most of like in many other crises, the early case management is actually done by the Ukrainian hospital. And they have great skills. But we've been seeing patients we have been evacuating, a lot of them has been injured, especially the first transfer we did from fleeing Mariupol.
So they had blast injury and they had gunshot wound but mainly blast injury, which created what we call fracture, open fracture of limbs, lower limbs or upper limbs, and then some of them as well had trauma to the abdomen. So those patients were stabilized and then we transferred them to another facility for continued care.
KINKADE: I understand the trains helping to evacuate people from the east to the west have an ICU unit on board that some of your doctors are working on.
Can you describe what happens in -- on these trains, in these ICU units?
LIU: Well, no, for the time being we have a medicalized train that is giving medical care and nursing care but not yet intensive care unit level. So what we are able to do now is to transfer patient, who's been injured, or we have medical pathology that are stable.
You have to understand and appreciate the journey to being from east to west is at least the very minimum 20 hours of train transport. And we do hope, in the next few weeks, we're going to get our intensive care unit train, we will be able to transfer patient, who are less stable, meaning they might need oxygen, they might be ventilated or they might have need for support for blood pressure.
KINKADE: And no doubt it must be crucial to utilize the local resources in each city and town.
How does your team collaborate and work with local hospitals and the railway?
LIU: So we've been -- this has been a fantastic collaboration. And we're very grateful that we have an amazing relationship with the railway -- we say company here, who has been basically giving -- basically putting together a medicalized train for the medical evacuation, that's one thing.
But as we've been in a close relationship with the ministry of health in a different hospital, because when we decide on the evacuation of patients, we talk with the sending hospital. And we go there and triage patients together. And we come up with a list of patients that can sustain the travel of 20 hours in the train.
And as we were in communication with the receiving hospital, that's going to basically ensure continued care to those patients. So this has been working very well. And it's been well-organized and we're grateful for this collaboration.
KINKADE: You're doing incredible work. And your team, like local medical staff, are working at great risk, given the hospitals and health care centers that have been bombed by Russia, similar to what we saw in Syria.
How are your staff holding up five weeks into this war?
[04:15:00]
LIU: Well, our staff is highly committed and everybody wants to do as much as they can, of course, as always, balancing out the risk and the added value of our medical care. So this is what we're going through each time. We assess what we're taking in terms of risk and what we're giving in terms of management and medical care to patient in need.
So, yes, it's been a challenge. But right now so far, we're able to sustain medical activities in the different -- in different ways through medical evacuation with the train but as well through mass casualty preparedness, preparing for influx of patient into supply.
KINKADE: Dr. Joanne Liu in Dnipro, Ukraine, our thanks to you and our thanks to all your staff of Doctors without Borders. Thanks so much.
LIU: Thank you very much. KINKADE: Still to come on CNN NEWSROOM, millions have fled to Poland
to escape the fighting in Ukraine. We'll have a live report from the border just ahead.
Also Ukrainians aren't the only ones hoping to escape Putin's oppression. Why many in Russia are hoping to leave their homeland behind.
(MUSIC PLAYING)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[04:20:00]
(MUSIC PLAYING)
KINKADE: According to the United Nations, more than 4.3 million people have fled Ukraine and more than 7 million are internally displaced. Ukrainian officials are racing to get civilians out of endangered areas.
In the coming hours, there will be humanitarian corridors for the Mariupol, locked cities in the (INAUDIBLE) region and from the Luhansk region. CNN's Salma Abdelaziz is in Poland for us.
Salma, what influx are you seeing there and how do the number of arrivals compare to the start of when the war began?
SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We're at a train station near the border. It takes a few days for people to flee the areas in the far east, the most affected area. Sometimes those families wind up here at this train station.
This is really their first point of safety in Poland. So it is not just a transfer hub or an ordinary train station, it is a medical point as well. You can see an ambulance here. Inside, there's first aid, so you can get checked out by a medic. And it is also a place you can get a warm meal.
World Central Kitchen is here, they serve food 24 hours a day. This is where families start to get a sense of dignity and start to feel they can make a plan because you have to remember, these families flee in an instance. They don't know where they're going to sleep tonight when they arrive here.
Oftentimes the first thing they do is take a seat and get a hot meal and try to figure out what's next.
KINKADE: Incredible effort underway there. I wonder if you have spoken to people in Poland, whether they fear the war will come to them and what the people are saying of the invasion.
ABDELAZIZ: I think it has been horrifying for the Polish, particularly along the border. There has been this overflow of warmness, of kindness. We see volunteers coming in to offer a room, a ride to another location, to provide food and baby clothes, of whatever they can do to try to help these many refugees who flown out.
We have over 2.5 million refugees right now in Poland. It has been a strain on this country. You have heard the Polish government say, look, we want to accept as many families we can but we have to share this burden together, Lynda.
KINKADE: Salma Abdelaziz, good to have you with us. Thank you very much.
Many Russians apparently are not happy with Vladimir Putin's decision to invade Ukraine. In the week after the war began, the Google search term, "how to leave Russia," hit a 10-year high inside Russia, as people looked for ways to get out of the country.
CNN's Matt Rivers is in the neighboring country of Georgia, talking to Russians who left everything they know behind in search of freedom from Putin's oppression.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MATT RIVERS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Down into Tbilisi, on a side street across from a church lies a bar called Grail, a holy place of sorts for a cold lager in a conversation. And bar owner Vincenty Alexeev, who is Russian says he's had one particular conversation a lot more lately.
VINCENTY ALEXEEV, RUSSIAN BAR OWNER IN TBILISI, GEORGIA: Hello, what are you doing here?
I just moved two days ago. I just moved three days ago.
RIVERS (on-camera): So there's a lot more Russians coming in?
ALEXEEV: Yes.
RIVERS (on-camera): And why are people leaving?
ALEXEEV: Why are people leaving?
Because they're scared.
RIVERS (voice-over): We met about a half dozen such people here but one stood out. Alisa Kuznetsova left Russia with her husband, just a few days after the war began.
RIVERS (on-camera): You couldn't take it anymore after this invasion?
ALISA KUZNETSOVA, LEFT RUSSIA FOR GEORGIA AFTER INVASION: Yes. It was like an additional trigger. I just had to leave.
RIVERS (voice-over): The 33-year-old has long been a member of Russia's opposition in favor of democracy. She says, not Putin.
This is her being arrested in 2016 while she was working as an independent poll watcher in her hometown in Russia. She says pro-Putin authorities accused her of vague elections violations and held her in detention until voting ended. But the invasion was the final straw. Alisa could no longer live in Russia. Now in Georgia, she wants everyone to know what side she's on.
KUZNETSOVA: I'm just trying to take it in stride, signal as much as I can.
[04:25:00]
RIVERS (on-camera): With the Ukraine flag there?
(voice-over): It's a public show of support matched across Tbilisi. Ukraine flags fly all over in Georgia, a former Soviet republic also invaded by Putin's armies in 2008. Many here have deep sympathy for what Ukrainians are going through.
(on-camera): But it's not just about pro-Ukraine sentiment. It's also anti-Putin. So look at this coffee shop door, it says you are more than welcome here if you agree that Putin is a war criminal and respect the sovereignty of peaceful nations. Pretty clear how the owners of this store feel.
(voice-over): Another sign at the shop not far away, says in part, Putin is evil. If you do not agree with these statements, please do not come in. Many Russians in Georgia feel the same way. Some even taking part in recent protests where an effigy of Putin was burned. But there's sometimes grouped in with Putin and his supporters, nonetheless.
Over coffee the day after we met drinking out of cups emblazoned with Ukraine's colors, Alisa says that a cab driver told her recently that she was one of the good ones, because 90 percent of Russians should be hanged.
KUZNETSOVA: It's not nice knowing that you're the Nazis now.
RIVERS (voice-over): Back at the bar, every single Russian told us that the vast majority of Georgians had been kind and welcoming and that they're grateful to live in a freer place. Because everyone we spoke too also said, there'll be here for a while.
KUZNETSOVA: I love my life there. But I am not returning there anytime soon.
RIVERS (voice-over): Matt Rivers, CNN, Georgia.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KINKADE: Still ahead in the CNN NEWSROOM, in their own words, intercepted radio conversations of a Russian commander who ordered soldiers to kill civilian members.
Also, Ukraine's path to E.U. membership.
(MUSIC PLAYING)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [04:30:00]
(MUSIC PLAYING)
KINKADE: Welcome back to our viewers. You are watching CNN NEWSROOM.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KINKADE (voice-over): That's a sound of a Russian rocket, hitting the Kramatorsk train station, killing at least 50 people who were trying to flee Ukraine. It was filmed by a journalist, who was there covering the evacuation. He described the moment the missiles hit.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OLEKSIY MERKULOV, JOURNALIST (through translator): When that horrible thing happened, what I could feel right away was this just air blast, this really powerful wave, something -- although the explosion itself didn't seem to be that hard.
The wave was unbelievable. It's as if something just hit you on your head and your legs couldn't keep you any longer. You couldn't stand on them. And you understand that something terrible happened but you're not aware of what it is. And you're afraid to look up but you know you have to do something.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KINKADE: Moscow continues to attack civilian infrastructure in the country. Russian armed forces seized the offices of Ukraine's national telecom provider, Ukrtelecom, in the city of Enerhodar.
On its official Telegram channel, it said all equipment had been removed and the city may be left without Ukrainian communication and the internet.
Intelligence officials say they intercepted disturbing radio transmissions of Russian soldiers talking about killing Ukrainian civilians. Matthew Chance reports the recordings add to the growing evidence that war crimes are being committed by the invading forces. We need to warn you: the images you are about to see are graphic.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is a war with mass digital evidence. Every Russian atrocity can be recorded as the Kremlin's finding out, every illegal order potentially intercepted and exposed.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A car drove by but I'm not sure if it was a car or a military vehicle. But there were two people coming out of the grove dressed as civilians. Kill them all, for fuck's sake.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Got it. But all the village here is civilian. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's wrong with you?
If there are civilians, slay them all.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
CHANCE: Intentionally targeting civilians, something Russia categorically denies, is a war crime.
Kremlin blames Ukrainian forces for the devastation and the bloodshed. But hours of audio recordings said to be of Russian soldiers communicating with their commanders and released by the Ukrainian security services seems to tell a very different story. One of the civilian areas laid to waste by Russian forces on purpose.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Shell everywhere.
Shell the settlements directly, got it?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Got it. That's what I'm doing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Throw some to the west, damn it, several shells, to those closer to me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Kulinovka, Riabushki, I think they are working from there, aren't they?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Roger that. I will pass on the coordinates now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Shell them. Shell them a lot to raze these two villages to the ground.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
CHANCE: And killing civilians isn't the only excess of which Russian forces are accused. Multiple reports emerged of rape of young women, even children, by rampaging troops. One intercept record a Russian soldier in a tank regiment, telling a horrified woman on the other end of the line what he knew.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Basically, three tankers here, raped a girl.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Who?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Three tankers -- she was 16 years old.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Our tankers?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Fuck.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
CHANCE: But these are not the crimes of victors. Time and again, Russian armor has been ravaged by Ukrainian forces with report of severely disrupted supply lines.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do they feed you well?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, OK. We feed ourselves all right. We butchered a dog and ate it. It was OK.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
CHANCE: And plunging morale among inexperienced soldiers, some as young as 18, disturbed by the violence.
[04:35:00]
CHANCE (voice-over): And desperate for peace so they can go home.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are so fed up sitting here and I just hope we are not going to get hit.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But you are going to be a veteran after this special military operation in Ukraine. Putin has signed a decree.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What veteran?
They promised us we would all get medals and money with each medal. But I want to go home. I don't need those medals.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
CHANCE: But instead of medals, there are now growing calls for those suspected of war crime to be tried. It may never happen but forensic teams are in Ukraine piecing together evidence just in case.
Already, there are thousands for who justice must be done -- Matthew Chance, CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KINKADE: U.S. President Joe Biden has signed off on two bills that will further sanction Russia and Belarus for the invasion of Ukraine. The bills will suspend normal trade relations with Russia and Belarus and any imports of Russian energy.
Both bills were unanimously approved by the U.S. Senate and overwhelmingly supported by the House.
The president of the European Commission traveled to Ukraine on Friday to show solidarity with the embattled government. Ursula van der Leyen met with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in the capital, Kyiv.
Mr. Zelenskyy thanked her for approving new sanctions on Russia but said much more needs to be done.
She also visited the suburb of Bucha, where Ukraine says at least 164 bodies have now been found since Russian troops retreated.
She called the carnage unthinkable.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
URSULA VAN DER LEYEN, PRESIDENT, EUROPEAN COMMISSION: We have seen cruel face of Putin's army. We have seen the recklessness and cold- heartedness which they have been occupying the city. Here in Bucha, we saw our humanity being shattered. And it is -- the whole world is mourning with the people of Bucha.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KINKADE: While in Kyiv, she presented Ukraine's president with a document that she says brings Ukraine closer to E.U. membership. Here is what President Zelenskyy had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ZELENSKYY (through translator): I am convinced of our success on this path. I am convinced that we are finally close to realizing our long standing goal. Ukraine will be one of the equals in our common European home. Ukraine will be a member of the European Union, a peaceful and sovereign state. There is no doubt.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KINKADE: We'll take a short break. Just ahead, the Pakistan leader is fighting for his political life. We'll go live for the latest.
And details on the economic crisis and the political turmoil that's ahead in Sri Lanka. Stay with us.
(MUSIC PLAYING)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[04:40:00]
(MUSIC PLAYING)
KINKADE: Well, the once bustling city of Shanghai remains under lockdown. Of at least 25,000 cases reported in all of China, 23,000 are in Shanghai. Officials are now planning more citywide testing to help them decide how to go forward.
The U.S. State Department just authorized nonemergency government workers and their families to leave Shanghai. The U.S. is also warning against travel to China because of what they call arbitrary enforcement of local laws.
The number of people who attended a Washington event and are now infected with COVID just continues to grow. The Gridiron Club says 53 people have now tested positive. They all attended a dinner of Washington power players last Saturday.
Now among the high-profile guests who have COVID include the attorney general, Merrick Garland; the Commerce Secretary, Gina Raimondo; several members of Congress and President Joe Biden's sister. And no one has reported severe symptoms from their infections.
The fate of the Pakistani prime minister Imran Khan hangs in the balance in the country's parliament. Lawmakers were expected to hold a no confidence motion today against Mr. Khan. It's now unclear when a vote will be held. Sophia Saifi is in Islamabad.
Sophia, this vote was meant to take place about an hour ago.
What's happening?
SOPHIA SAIFI, CNN PRODUCER: Lynda, this has been called the longest week in Pakistan's recent political history and now it's looking like it's going to be one of the longest days in Pakistan's political history.
This was a vote due to take place in the second week of March. It has now stretched on to the middle of April.
Last week on Sunday, the vote of no confidence against Imran Khan was due to take place. The opposition had enough seats; they needed 172 at that point and they had 177 to oust him from his position as prime minister.
And what happened last Sunday, the deputy speaker of parliament, who was loyal to Imran Khan, had blocked the vote of no confidence (INAUDIBLE) foreign conspiracy linked to the United States.
Imran Khan came out to dissolve the parliament and called for elections. This had gone to the supreme court, which then made a unanimous ruling that, on this Saturday, early morning, there has to be a session in parliament to hold this vote of no confidence.
It started on time but immediately, an hour later, it was adjourned. It was due to take place just an hour after that. And now we've been waiting for many, many hours. The month of Ramadan, days end quickly because people have to end their fast.
There's a concern if they do not have that vote today, which looks like Khan is going to lose and finally have to leave his office, is going to be in contempt of court if this vote does not take place, a vote that has been stretched on for many, many days.
The other concern is there is no precedent of what is going to happen if Khan, if political temperatures keep rising the way that they are. The opposition has enraged Imran Khan. Many people are saying he's throwing a tantrum, not showing any grace. [04:45:00]
SAIFI: There are concerns there could be a coup, as there have been in the past. The military has said it absolutely does not have any association with the current political crisis. But we're just going to have to see what happens today -- Lynda.
All right, Sophia Saifi, we'll get back to you shortly. Thanks so much.
Well, protesters have been taking to the streets of the Sri Lankan capital as the nation faces a harsh economic and political crisis. A severe lack of foreign currency has left the country with a shortage of basic goods and inflation. Vedika Sud explains.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VEDIKA SUD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Sri Lanka is witnessing its worst economic downturn in decades. Protests have forced mass resignations. The country's political turmoil deepened after the ruling coalition lost its majority in parliament earlier this week.
The country's top leader has no plans of giving up his post. On the ground, power and fuel shortages continue.
SUD (voice-over): It's another day without power for this woman's family. Her daughter struggles to write by this oil lamp, which barely illuminates the room.
Sri Lanka's economic crisis, the worst since its independence, has forced millions to live hand to mouth. This man, a daily wageworker, has been out of work for three days. The struggle to feed the family has never been so hard.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): If we eat, it's with a lot of difficulty. This is not how we used to live before. Earlier, we used to eat well.
SUD (voice-over): There's no rice, no lentils. They've been surviving on pans of boiled water.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): I stood in line for kerosene every day. But the queues are long and they run out of supplies very quickly. We chop wood from plants and cook our food.
SUD (voice-over): For months there's been a shortage of basic commodities. Young and old have been standing in the scorching heat for food, fuel and medicine. Doctors say the entire health system could soon collapse.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): We keep coming here to get kerosene and they send us back without any. Then we come again and they send us back empty handed. There's no gas, no flour. There's no sugar. We've been turned into beggars. UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We can't even buy medicines
with our money.
What is happening to us?
See how old I am. I'm weak and sick. We're miserable.
SUD (voice-over): These chants across the streets demand the resignation of the Rajapaksas. Protests against the president and his powerful family have been taking place outside their homes and across the island nation.
Civilians blame the top leadership for its unprecedented financial debts, along with poor economic decisions and its dependency on foreign loans. Sri Lanka has been hit hard by national disasters, terror attacks and the pandemic.
Speaking to CNN earlier this month, the prime minister said the government is doing all it can to set the economy right.
The president's close ally has said he'll not step down as Sri Lanka's leader. Analysts worry this could fuel the already existing anger on the ground. The situation could get worse before getting any better.
Unfortunately, for this family and perhaps thousands of others, there are darker days ahead.
SUD: On Thursday the president appointed an advisory panel to help pull Sri Lanka out of the growing debt crisis and engage with the International Monetary Fund. However, immediate economic relief looks unlikely at least for now -- Vedika Sud, CNN, New Delhi.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KINKADE: Well, French citizens living abroad will not be able to vote in Sunday's first round of the presidential elections.
With Shanghai under COVID-19 lockdown, the French embassy says China has refused to open a polling station in the city's consulate. Voters and polling officials wouldn't even be allowed to leave their homes to cast those ballots. One French voter says it's a shame his voice will not be heard.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAVID IOSUB, PARIS RESIDENT ABROAD (through translator): It's a shame, as it's the first time that I am not able to vote.
[04:50:00]
IOSUB (through translator): We don't have many opportunities to voice our opinions, because French people living abroad have few opportunities to vote.
We hope to be able to vote in the second round. That's the small glimmer of hope that we still have. (END VIDEO CLIP)
KINKADE: Well, these are the candidates on this weekend's ballot. President Emmanuel Macron is seeking re-election, while far-right candidate Marine Le Pen gains popularity. Now on Friday, Mr. Macron tried one final push to appeal to younger, progressive-leaning voters. Polls show he is slightly ahead in opinion polls.
But Le Pen rising fast. The poll on Friday showed the tightest gap between the two with Le Pen winning 49 percent of votes in a likely runoff against Macron.
We'll be right back. Stay with us.
(MUSIC PLAYING)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(MUSIC PLAYING)
KINKADE: News just into CNN: the head of the Kharkiv regional military administration says Russian forces have resumed shelling the area.
We told you earlier how Ukrainian military commanders warn Russian forces, regrouping near eastern Donbas, are almost ready to launch an all-out assault. Officials are urging the evacuation of civilians from Eastern Ukraine. We will bring you details as they become available.
[04:55:00]
KINKADE: Well, ahead of Eurovision's contest, which starts next month in Italy, Ukraine's nominee arrived in Israel for a preview event. The front man of the group says they'll be dedicating their song to their motherland.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(MUSIC PLAYING)
KINKADE (voice-over): The band also gave an impromptu performance at a news conference.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KINKADE: Now amid the ruins of their city in Ukraine, a couple is showing their eternal love, dressed in their bride and groom finery. These two lovebirds used the aftermath of Russia's heavy bombing as their wedding backdrop.
The Kharkiv couple have volunteered as medics since the start of Russia's invasion. When asked about the decision to tie the knot during all this turmoil, the groom said, "Love will defeat anything."
And the bride adding, "Only these feelings will help us win." I'm Lynda Kinkade. Thanks for spending part of your day with me. I'll
be back with breaking news of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. You're watching CNN.
