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Evacuations Begin from Mariupol Steel Plant; Russian Video Shows Sub Launching Missiles in Black Sea; Israeli Forces Kill Palestinian Man; Flight Suspensions Cause Increased Air Freight Rates; Ethiopia in the Grips of Severe Drought. Aired 12-1a ET

Aired May 01, 2022 - 00:00   ET

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

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): This is CNN breaking news.

ALISON KOSIK, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hello and welcome to our viewers all around the world. I'm Alison Kosik in New York.

We begin with a glimmer of hope for people trapped in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol. After weeks under siege by Russian forces and several failed evacuation attempts, a handful of civilians managed to leave on Saturday.

A Ukrainian commander at the Azovstal steel plant, the last bastion of Ukraine's defense in Mariupol, says 20 women and children got out after a cease-fire. But that's after a tiny fraction of the hundreds still trapped inside the plant and the thousands more believed to be sheltering in other parts of the city.

Meantime, missile strikes hammered southern and Eastern Ukraine on Saturday. In the southern port city of Odessa, witnesses reported hearing several explosions. Ukraine's military also confirmed that the runway at Odessa's airport had been destroyed.

In his nightly address, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy vowed to rebuild.

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VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): The runway of the Odessa airport was destroyed. We will, of course, rebuild it. But Odessa will never forget such a Russian attitude toward it.

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KOSIK: We also have new video from the Russian defense ministry, confirming what Ukraine's military has been saying for almost a week: Russia is using submarines in the Black Sea to launch missile attacks on Ukrainian targets. For more, let's turn to Isa Soares. She is in Lviv, Ukraine. Isa.

ISA SOARES, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Alison. The humanitarian situation that you just outlined there in the besieged city of Mariupol is extremely dire indeed.

CNN's Scott McLean is following the latest efforts to evacuate civilians from the besieged city as well as the Azovstal steel plant.

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SCOTT MCLEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From a distance, smoke rises above Mariupol's sprawling Azovstal steel plant. But only from above is the true scale of the damage apparent.

New satellite images show nearly every building on the sprawling industrial site has been damaged. Some roofs have caved; some entire buildings are a pile of rubble. What cannot be seen from above is the damage from days of Russian bombing in the network of tunnels and bunkers below the surface.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): All last night, barrel (ph) artillery worked on the territory of the plant, which caused new destructions and new rubble (ph) blockages.

As of now, the special rescue operation is being carried out by the Azov Regiment. We get civilians out of the rubble with ropes. It's the elderly, women and children. We hope that this process will continue and we will be able to evacuate all the civilians.

MCLEAN (voice-over): Svyatoslav Palamar (ph), the Ukrainian Azov Regiment's deputy commander, now says that about 20 women and children rescued from under that rubble have also been taken out of the plant, made possible by a cease-fire, the commander says, and an evacuation convoy, which arrived in the city in the early evening.

Russian media reported there were 25 civilians evacuated, including six kids.

After back-to-back meetings in Moscow and Kyiv by the U.N. secretary general, the United Nations stepped up negotiations to evacuate the civilians trapped under the steel plant.

ZELENSKYY (through translator): We are doing everything to ensure that the evacuation mission from Mariupol is carried out.

MCLEAN (voice-over): By Saturday afternoon, the Mariupol mayor's office reported the Russians were allowing civilians to leave neighborhoods east of the Kalmius River and cross to the west side to potentially meet up with an evacuation corridor at a mall on the edge of the city.

Their journey, through a wasteland of obliterated housing, in weeks of heavy fighting around the steel plant. It's not clear how many people from under the plant were able to escape the desperate conditions. The plant's CEO says the underground bunkers were stocked with enough food and water to last two or three weeks. It's now been more than two months.

YURIY RYZHENKOV, CEO, METINVEST, AZOVSTAL PLANT OWNER: It's a humanitarian disaster. The city is being destroyed. Basically a beautiful, thriving city was turned into a concentration camp by the Russians in less than two months.

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RYZHENKOV: You can say it's genocide which is happening there.

MCLEAN (voice-over): Even with some civilians getting out, the fighters are not, even the hundreds that Ukraine says are injured.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We asked to guarantee the opportunity to leave, not only for civilians but also for our wounded service men, who need medical care.

MCLEAN (voice-over): But the fate of those wounded now ultimately lies with Russia-- Scott McLean, CNN, Lviv, Ukraine.

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SOARES: Ukrainian officials are telling us in the last few weeks they expect around 20,000 people or so have died in just Mariupol.

John Spencer is the chair of urban warfare studies at the Madison Policy Forum. He's also served for more than 25 years in the U.S. Army and joins me now from Colorado.

Very good morning to you, John. Thank you very much for taking time to speak to us. Let me start right there where Scott McLean left off in the city of Mariupol. We did get a small breakthrough, it seems, for those 20 civilians being evacuated. But there're still so many more inside.

How do you see this playing out?

Because of course, the Ukrainian soldiers we have spoken to have said they will not surrender.

JOHN SPENCER, MADISON POLICY FORUM: Yes, I don't think they will and I think it is a humanitarian crisis that is being forced or being caused by Russia. Make no mistake: if Russia wanted those civilians out, they could give the order and that cease-fire would happen and last and get every single civilian out.

And, oh, by the way, the wounded soldiers, those are considered non combatants in the law of armed conflict. They're not fighters. They need to get out as well.

SOARES: And in the meantime, John, what we have been seeing in the battlefield is Russia really pressing on with its offensive in the east and intensifying -- I think it's important to point out -- intensifying that offensive.

What is your assessment of their tactical coordination and that push that we've been seeing?

Because they are somewhat a bit more organized all of a sudden.

SPENCER: Yes, they have the advantage of basically having their supply line but they're still making a lot of the same mistakes, Isa. I mean, yes, they've massed some forces in their heavy use of artillery. We see that. That's why this is a dangerous phase.

And some of these fights like where the fight for Izyum and really this is a war over logistical lines right now. They need certain road intersections, railway heads and cities, to do this encirclement of the Donbas that they want to do.

It's a real dangerous phase. But we also see Ukrainians counter attacking in Kharkiv and other locations that are more promising than a couple of the spots. This is a day by day fight.

SOARES: Yes, and we have seen, like you said, Ukraine pushing back. And we have seen the pull and push of battle.

On the question of what Russia, what they are suffering, according to President Zelenskyy in his overnight address, he said they -- defenders have already destroyed more than 1,000 Russian tanks, almost 200 Russian aircraft, almost 2.5 thousand armored fighting vehicles.

Obviously, they are still in stock. They still have plenty of stock. The supply lines are still coming in. And we are seeing, from the Russian side, those attacks on the supply lines, John, here in Ukraine. And that is critical for the Ukrainians.

SPENCER: Yes, absolutely. And I would really question -- we all know that Russia has stockpiles of tanks but we've also seen the quality of the stuff they put into Ukraine now. Unlike the Ukrainians, who are getting some of the world's best equipment -- vehicles, tanks, artillery -- Russia, even if it resupplies and they can get it, it's not good stuff.

SOARES: Yes, and I suspect, I mean, with the Western artillery that we've got coming in and it starts making its way in here, this battle will be very much kind of a long range weapons and would force, I suspect -- and you can correct me here -- force them to ultimately grow more nimble.

SPENCER: Yes, absolutely. It will break them up. We've already seen long-range attacks today in Izyum. They supposedly took out a Russian command and control center. That long range that we've been talking about, the phase we're entering, where both sides will be trying to hit each other from as far away as possible, while Russia continues its war crime.

But those systems, as more and more get in, the more holding and pushing back and breaking up of those Russian forces the Ukrainians will be able to do.

SOARES: And just before we came to you, we reported the story that really many have been saying, that Ukraine has been saying for over a week, that Russia is using submarines in the Black Sea.

What do you make of what we've been seeing, carrying out cruise missiles on Ukrainian targets from the Black Sea?

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SOARES: What are the challenges for the Ukrainians here, John?

SPENCER: One is to stay vigilant. As I say, as we saw Odessa was struck, I think they're running out of cruise missiles, to be honest. So you see them using them, such as a submarine fleet. But like we saw in Kyiv, like in Odessa, the Ukrainians have to stay vigilant.

That's why curfews and things like that, just to keep people safe, because Russia is going to continue this basically missile terrorism.

SOARES: Very briefly, John, as we push forward with this offensive and we see this offensive play out, Putin seems to be wanting a victory, some sort of victory for May 9th.

What are the risks here for Ukraine as we look ahead to the next few weeks?

SPENCER: A lot of risks. Russia is being pushed a lot harder and a lot of us believe it's going to need something to celebrate, because they really have to make something up at this point. They've lost so much.

So the forces that are holding the line along that east have to be reinforced as quickly as possible. So this is an urgency for Ukraine and the world, really.

SOARES: Yes, and we don't know yet what that win would be. Odessa, we saw them attack Odessa, of course, yesterday; Mariupol perhaps. But explains really why we have seen Russia attacking those critical supply lines of Ukraine. John Spencer, always great to get your thoughts. Appreciate it, John.

SPENCER: Thank you.

SOARES: Elements of normal life are returning to some Kyiv suburbs that have seen some of the worst death and destruction of the war. The international Red Cross says it has restored water service in four towns near the capital.

The organization said it laid seven kilometers of pipes over the past 18 days, pretty fast. As a result, water service is up and running again for some 200,000 people, including in the town of Irpin, which had been heavily damaged, as you can see there.

The Red Cross said it went ahead with the project, despite the risk of workers running into leftover mines during the construction.

I'll have much more a bit later in the show. Back to you, Alison.

KOSIK: OK, Isa, thanks very much. Deadly attacks during the holy month of Ramadan are raising new

questions and concerns about security in Afghanistan.

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KOSIK: Israeli forces have arrested two Palestinians suspected of killing an Israeli guard late Friday night. That makes four Palestinian detained as a result of the attack. al-Aqsa Brigade claimed responsibility.

The shooting comes amid rising violence in the region. The Palestinian ministry of health said Saturday that Israeli forces shot and killed a Palestinian man in the West Bank. The Israeli military says it was conducting counterterrorism activity when a number of people threw Molotov cocktails at the soldiers.

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KOSIK: Hundreds attended the Palestinian men's funeral. Clashes broke out after the funeral. The Palestinian Red Crescent said at least three people suffered moderate injuries.

Police in Afghanistan say an explosion in a Kabul residential area killed one person and wounded three others on Saturday. That incident highlights the growing security concerns in the Afghan capital, where, a day earlier, an explosion at a mosque killed at least 10 and wounded dozens more.

CNN's Arwa Damon reports a wave of deadly attacks in recent weeks has people increasingly worried.

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ARWA DAMON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): At this packed marketplace in Kabul, shoppers wander through the stalls of dried fruits, nuts and sweets. They are preparing for the Eid and for their holiday.

But despite the bustling scene, the anticipation of laughter and loved filled gatherings with friends and family, there is an inescapable sense of caution, unease. This is a crowded public space. And in Afghanistan, that means potential danger.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): The security situation is still not good. There is some security but the kind of security that people were expecting is still not there.

DAMON (voice-over): This was the first Ramadan in Afghanistan since the Taliban regained control of the country last summer. And even though the Taliban said it would bring security to the country and protect its often targeted minorities, like Shia communities, a series of brutal attacks have rattled several Afghans cities in recent weeks. Mosques have been targeted, especially during Friday prayers. On

Friday, a blast ripped through a mosque in Kabul. Witnesses say there were so many wounded, it took hours to transport the victims to hospitals.

There was a similar attack the previous week at a mosque in Kunduz province in the north of the country, killing at least 33 people. The fear so pervasive, worshippers say, it's never far from their minds.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): I was very much preoccupied with thoughts and fear. I was thinking a suicide attack or explosion would happen at any moment now. Or the mosque would be attacked. Not only me but every Afghan has this fear in his heart.

DAMON (voice-over): The Taliban condemned the attacks on the two mosques. And also targeted recently, a school and a learning facility in a Shia neighborhood in Kabul, where at least six people died nearly two weeks ago.

The ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan, which often targets Shias and a tribe of the Taliban, has claimed responsibility for several attacks during the Ramadan period.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): How long will such incidents continue?

Afghanistan's situation is so bad, we have no secure place to live.

DAMON (voice-over): Many are questioning if the Taliban government can actually live up to its promises to bring stability to the country. And so, as Afghans celebrate Eid this year, that sense of apprehension they have lived with us for so long, it just continues -- Arwa Damon, CNN.

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KOSIK: Universal Studios Beijing will be closed beginning on Sunday, because of the COVID-19 outbreak. The theme park did not say when it might reopen. And after several weeks in lockdown, Shanghai reported nearly 7,900 new COVID cases on Saturday. And 38 deaths.

Those numbers are from the Shanghai municipal health commission, which reports the number of new local cases and deaths. Both declined slightly over the last two days. Shanghai is the engine of China's $18 trillion dollar economy. And the city's strict COVID lockdown could come at a heavy cost. CNN's Kristie Lu Stout explains.

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KRISTIE LU STOUT, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: It's China's biggest and most affluent city. And the streets have been empty for weeks. Shanghai is battling its worst ever COVID-19 outbreak, determined to crush it with its zero COVID policy. It comes at a steep cost to its economy and has implications for the world.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're forecasting that the lockdown in Shanghai will rock China's economy. Shanghai is an economic powerhouse for China. It holds one of the two stock exchanges. Shanghai's port accounts for something like 3 percent of global carfare (ph) throughput at any given time.

STOUT: Shanghai's home to the world's busiest container port. It remains operational. But according to logistics platform Project 44, on April 18th, some ships have been diverted away due to truck shortages.

But the containers are piling up at the port, waiting on average for 12 days before they are picked up and delivered, compared to just over four days in late March. Shanghai is also a major aviation hub. But the outbreak has forced the suspension of many flights.

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STOUT: Causing air freight rates to skyrocket. All of this is putting even more pressure on global supply chains.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is having a supply shock. A lot of these shipments now can't leave the ports, can't leave the airports in Shanghai. And these are goods which are ultimately going to Europe and the U.S. It's going to push prices up. We're going to see more inflation pressure.

STOUT: The zero COVID strategy has also forced many factories in Shanghai to suspend operations. The Apple supplier, Pegatron, has suspended production at its Shanghai plant and Volkswagen and Tesla's factories have been shut for weeks.

Production has resumed at Tesla, with CEO Elon Musk saying this, "Tesla Shanghai is coming back with a vengeance."

But the company warned it, too, is not immune from supply chain problems.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Authorities in Shanghai are trying to get essential production plants open under what they call a closed loop system. That means that their staff is actually sleeping on the premises, on the factory floors, eats there, don't leave them, don't go home.

But the problem is a lot of staff don't want to do that and there's a shortage of parts to get these factories reopened. So it will be a global problem.

STOUT: An analyst warns that the economic pain caused by the zero COVID strategy could spiral out of control, saying this, quote, "Implementing the strategy in an excessive manner by itself could lead to disruption on the supply chain, mass unemployment and then could translate into social political instability, exactly what the zero COVID strategy wants to avoid," unquote.

And yet, Shanghai's weeks-long lockdown still has no end in sight with the bottom line from China watches to the world, brace yourselves for the fallout -- Kristie Lu Stout, CNN, Hong Kong. (END VIDEOTAPE)

KOSIK: Life is hard enough in Ethiopia. Now there's a massive drought.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): Our children eat once a day but the adults go for days without food, so that the children can eat. That's how we're surviving this drought.

KOSIK (voice-over): Coming up, the problem, its causes and what's needed there.

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KOSIK: Welcome back. I'm Alison Kosik.

Ethiopia is in the grip of its worst drought in decades. Add to that, rising food prices and climate change. It's a recipe for disaster. Eleni Giokos has the details.

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ELENI GIOKOS, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In southeastern Ethiopia, malnourished children fill this pediatric ward, desperately in need of help. The hospital receiving as many in one month as in all of last year.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's an increasing number --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): -- the increase in starving children started about five months ago. It's largely because of the drought. Some families are arriving with two or three children, who need treatment.

GIOKOS (voice-over): Ethiopia is among countries in the Horn of Africa facing the driest conditions in more than four decades, as climate change wreaks havoc on the region.

According to the United Nations' World Food Programme, three consecutive rainy seasons have gone with little rain, killing crops and livestock and making food and clean water scarce.

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GIOKOS (voice-over): Leading to a crisis forcing thousands into displacement camps.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): This drought has devastated my family. It's displaced me from my home. Our children eat once a day but the adults go for days without food so that the children can eat. That's how we're surviving this drought.

GIOKOS (voice-over): Now the crisis could deepen, as UNICEF warns that the lives of 10 million children across the Horn of Africa are at risk.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We know that over a quarter of children are suffering malnourishment. And over a third of pregnant and breastfeeding women are suffering, are severely malnourished because of this drought. So it's essential that we get nutritionally fortified foods to them right now before it's too late.

GIOKOS (voice-over): Making matters worse, the World Bank warns that the war in Ukraine is contributing to an historic rise in global prices of energy and food. That's hitting communities in Ethiopia, that rely on staples like grain, particularly hard, relief groups say.

Humanitarian need in Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa growing more dire, as war in Europe and the global climate crisis converge in one of the most vulnerable areas of the world -- Eleni Giokos, CNN.

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KOSIK: In Washington, the annual White House Correspondents Association dinner made a grand return on Saturday, after a two-year hiatus due to the pandemic. The black tie event featured President Joe Biden, journalists, government officials and even some celebrities.

The night was filled with jokes, roasting Mr. Biden, the Republican Party and the news media. Here's part of Mr. Biden's lighthearted speech.

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JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm not really here to roast the GOP. That's not my style. Besides, there is nothing I can say about the GOP that Kevin McCarthy hasn't already put on tape.

You know, at the -- at the same time, a lot of people say the Republican Party is too extreme, too divisive, too controlled by one person. They say that's not your father's Republican Party.

Ronald Reagan said, Mr. Gorbachev, tear this wall down. Today's Republicans say, tear down Mickey Mouse's house. And pretty soon they'll be storming Cinderella's castle and you can be sure of it. Our Republicans seem to support one fellow. Some guy named Brandon. He's having a really good year. And I'm kind of happy for him.

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KOSIK: The dinner had some serious moments, too, including tributes and praise for journalists covering the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Thanks for watching. I'm Alison Kosik. "CONNECTING AFRICA" is next.

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