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Russia Claims It Destroyed Fuel Depot Near Kyiv; Biden to Leave for Poland Following Critical NATO Meeting; Biden: U.S. Would Respond to Potential Chemical Attack in Ukraine; Biden: Russia Should Be Removed from G-20. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired March 25, 2022 - 06:00   ET

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

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

[05:59:19]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to viewers in the United States and all around the world. It is Friday, March 25. I'm John Berman in Lviv in Western Ukraine. Brianna Keilar is in Washington.

We do have breaking news this morning. Intense fighting overnight in several Ukrainian cities, with Ukrainian forces making gains East of the capital. In one town, about 35 miles East of Kyiv, a Ukrainian soldier talks about the destruction of three Russian tanks and nine infantry fighting vehicles. He calls them trophies.

The U.K.'s ministry of defense confirms the Ukrainian forces have been able to retake some towns and defensive positions up to 21 miles East of Kyiv. But this just in to CNN, Russia's defense ministry claims its forces destroyed the largest of the remaining fuel depots in Ukraine near Kyiv with a cruise missile strike. CNN has not verified that claim.

There's fierce fighting also reported in Azid (ph) in the East. The region is badly damaged. New satellite images from Maxar Technologies shows the burnt wreckage of a school, and a partially destroyed hospital.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: There's also some new video out of Mariupol this morning. Mourners burying their dead near a playground. You can see this year they're placing wooden crosses on the graves.

And Mariupol city council announcing moments ago that a Russian air strike on that theater there last week killed about 300 people. This as Ukrainian officials tell the U.S. they are facing potential weapons shortages. And they need 500 Javelins and 500 Stingers per day.

Some officials are pushing back on that request for anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles there, pointing out that more military aid is already heading into Ukraine.

Moments from now, President Biden will leave Brussels, headed for Warsaw. And before leaving, he announced a deal with European Commission that sets up a task force to ease Europe's reliance on Russian oil and gas. BERMAN: We'll begin with the latest on the fighting here in Ukraine.

And the attempted counter offensive. CNN's Phil Black joins me now.

Phil, I just want to say, before we start talking about the moves and counter moves, 300 dead in that theater in Mariupol right now. And I know we lose sight sometimes of what these numbers all mean. But it's just devastating. Each one of these lives is a tragedy. And they're all civilians.

PHIL BLACK, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: This is one of the iconic moments of the war so far, John, and for all the wrong reasons. It was a theater in Mariupol were it was thought as many as 1,000 or more could have been sheltering. It had the words "children" written in big Russian letters outside the building.

We understand it was mostly women, children, the elderly in there. But it has taken a long time to get a sense of precisely what happened. We've seen from images that most of that building was destroyed. And yes, now the official there confirm 300 is the believed death toll.

BERMAN: And the people in that building, those 300 dead, did nothing to the Russians.

Phil, let's talk about this Russian claim of a missile strike on an important fuel depot.

BLACK: So the Russians say they launched a cruise missile from one of the ships, presumably the Black Sea or the Caspian Sea. That's where they've been doing that from. And yes, it struck a fuel depot near Kyiv, they say, the largest of the remaining fuel depots.

That's what they say. We can't verify it. But if true, it speaks to the range of the precision of those cruise missiles that they've been firing from their naval vessel.

BERMAN: It shows what they can do, in spite of these Ukrainian claims of some counterstrikes.

BLACK: So around the East of Kyiv, we've been hearing from British and American officials that the Ukrainians have been making progress to the East of the capital. We now have some evidence to back that up.

Social media videos from very happy, seemingly celebrating Ukrainian soldiers in the aftermath of battle who were pointing out what they called trophies. These are Russian tanks often destroyed and damaged and talking about their operation being an absolute success and that they have knocked the enemy out.

Part of the reason that the Ukrainians are thought to have been so successful so far in not just slowing the Russians but fighting back is the assistance in hardware they've been receiving from Western allies. Some of that sophisticated, very light anti-tank weapons, Javelins and so forth.

We now know that, although they've been receiving it, they want a lot more of it. They're saying they want at least 500 of those a day, in addition to 500 anti-aircraft missiles, as well.

BERMAN: Yes. One member of Ukrainian Parliament told me last hour, give us this stuff. We've shown we can use it.

BLACK: They have indeed.

BERMAN: All right. Phil Black, great to have you on. Thank you so much -- Brianna.

KEILAR: President Biden is expected to leave Brussels later this hour, headed for Poland. This follows a series of emergency summits on Russian -- summits on Russia's invasion in Ukraine.

The president says that NATO has never been more united in its response. CNN's Natasha Bertrand is live for us in Brussels.

Natasha, good morning.

NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Brianna.

Yes, so President Biden making news earlier this morning when he announced that there is going to be a major effort in the next few months, few years to wean Europe off of its dependency on Russian oil and gas.

In -- in furtherance of that goal, they have announced that they will create this joint task force that will be chaired by members of the White House and also include members of the European Commission that will aim to look for ways that Europe can actually get off that dependency on Russian oil and gas and get liquefied natural gas from elsewhere, from other companies and countries around the world, including the United States here.

Now, this has been a major sticking point, right, for the U.S. and Europe, because the U.S. is not as reliant on European [SIC] -- on Russian gas as the European Union is. And they were actually able to ban those oil important entirely into the United States.

Europe, however, has been really dependent on Russian oil and gas to maintain its stocks and its reserves. And at one point, it was about 40 percent of all oil and gas they were getting from Russia.

[06:05:13]

And of course, they want to punish Russia and hit them where it really hurts here. So weaning off of that Russian energy is going to be in terms of punishing Russia there.

So this was a main topic of discussion. We are told yesterday during those meetings with European leaders and NATO allies.

But the topics were also about shoring up European security more broadly. And that includes, of course, coming up with contingency planning if Russia does use weapons of mass destruction in Ukraine, including chemical weapons. That is of top concern right now for the European Union and for NATO

allies. Because of course, any use of those weapons could have some kind of spillover effect into the rest of Europe.

So they're discussing how they would respond to that. President Biden did say there would be severe consequences if Russia did use such weapons. He did not detail what those might be.

But in the meantime, the European Union, NATO allies, have agreed to send additional equipment to Ukraine so that they might be able to protect themselves against a possible Russia chemical weapons attack -- Brianna.

KEILAR: All right. Natasha, thanks so much. The latest from Brussels for us there.

Joining me now is CNN political and national security analyst David Sanger. He's a White House and national security correspondent for "The New York Times." And he is with us from Warsaw, Poland, where President Biden is headed shortly.

David, thanks for being with us. Give us a sense of what this visit -- what the president needs to achieve here.

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, a visit to Poland is a little bit different than what he was doing yesterday in Brussels.

Brussels is all about holding the NATO allies, the European, non-NATO members all together on everything from sanctions to common strategy, as you heard from Natasha, on what to do if there is use of chemical, biological or even nuclear weapons.

This is all about showing the president's willingness to go support the Eastern Europeans who are taking in this huge influx of refugees. We haven't been given very much specificity about where the president is going today.

But it seems to be an area of Poland where refugees have been coming in relatively close to the border. He'll have a moment, I think, to talk to some refugees, get a briefing about what's going on. And I'm sure we'll be announcing more aid to Poland and other countries.

They're taking in what right now is 3 million refugees. That number has got to be going up.

KEILAR: What is the status right now of U.S. troops and other NATO troops in terms of being increased in Poland, as well as other NATO countries?

SANGER: Well, normally, Brianna, we'd keep about 80,000 American troops in Europe. That number is now closer to 100. This is a little bit more like what you saw during the Cold War. And so far those increases have been announced as temporary.

No one I talked to thinks temporary is what this is really about. They believe that, over time, the United States and all of the other members of NATO are definitely going to have to increase the number of troops, the kind of weaponry that they have, and the kind of defensive systems they have all along the eastern front.

Now, in part, this is to send a message to Vladimir Putin that he's getting the exact opposite of what he had hoped. What he was trying to do was drive NATO further away and drive its troops further from his own borders.

But at the same time, it's going to put a strain on the system. You have European countries that have been a weapon over time. That spend very much on beyond the 2 percent goals of -- 2 percent of GDP on defense. And of course, the United States has got a big commitment to go redeploy toward the Pacific.

KEILAR: You were writing, and this is pretty interesting. You said the early success of the pressure on Russia is also creating danger. Can you explain that?

SANGER: Sure. So no one thought a month ago -- and we've seen this war has now been going on for a month and a day -- no one really thought that the pressure campaign and that -- would be this effective, or the economic pressure campaign, or that the Ukrainians would have held out, as well as you just heard from John's reporting and others from Lviv.

And so now we're in the position to think about what a cornered Vladimir Putin does. That's the reason you're hearing so much about the possible use of chemical weapons or other WMD. It would be because he cannot accomplish his goals by conventional means.

[06:10:12]

So in some ways, if Putin doubles down, we're entering a more dangerous phase of the war. And a good deal of what President Biden was trying to do is get the heads of European leaders around this. Remember, nuclear confrontation with Russia is not something any of these leaders really had to grow up with in the past 30 years. And 25 years ago, people were talking about Russia joining NATO, not NATO massing again along the borders.

KEILAR: Yes. Certainly, a very good point. David, thank you so much. David Sanger, live for us in Poland ahead of the president's visit there.

Let's get back to Berman in Ukraine.

SANGER: Thank you, Brianna.

BERMAN: All right. Brianna, new this morning, Ukraine's armed forces revealing the name of the Russian landing ship, Saratov, that was destroyed in Berdyansk. They also say two other ships were damaged.

You'll remember, look at this video for a second. We saw this video yesterday of burning vessels in a burning port in that port town of Berdyansk right there. We don't have information about how the Ukrainians did it. But from

that picture right there, you can see some of the success that they have had. I want to bring in Asami Terajima. She's a political reporter for the "Kyiv Independent."

Asami, great to see you here. We talk about the success that the Ukrainians are having in some places. We also get new word every day about the devastation that civilians, Ukrainians are suffering.

And the idea that in the Mariupol theater, that 300 civilians, the Ukrainians have now said they can confirm there were 300 civilians who were killed there. Honestly, the number may very well be higher. It's just horrible.

ASAMI TERAJIMA, POLITICAL REPORTER, "KYIV INDEPENDENT": We don't know the real death toll in the theater. And also, we don't -- we know there were hundreds of children and women who were, you know, sheltering there. And only about 130 have come out, as far as we know.

And we also know that between 100,000 to 200,000 people are still left in Mariupol. They're still trapped there, because you know, evacuating from the city is also very dangerous. Because Russia continues to attack evacuees.

So it's very devastating. And the mayor of the city council also said yesterday that people are dying out of starvation. And this is crazy that it's 2022. We're in the 21st Century, and we have people starving to death. And the city is under siege for over -- for many weeks already.

BERMAN: Asami, right now, I don't know if you can see it here. This is new video we're just getting in. This is the first video that we have seen from the aftermath of the bombing of that theater.

Just to remind people, this was clearly marked, written on the ground in huge letters in Russian, "children." So that everyone knew that this was a shelter that was being used.

You can see -- there you can see right there the pictures written there. And then we see the pictures inside, inside of just how packed it was. Just how much damage there is in the aftermath there.

I just can't imagine the terror of what it was like inside as it was being hit by a Russian strike. And so much of your reporting is focused on, I think rightly so, the suffering of the Ukrainian people.

TERAJIMA: Yes. It's really -- we're all worried about what's happening, not only in Mariupol but those other cities that are still suffering a lot. But especially Mariupol. It's the most -- it's a city of suffering. I can't imagine what these hundreds of people are sheltering there have been through.

Because yes, they intentionally wrote "children" outside the theater, because they thought the Russian forces would have mercy and not attack places where there's children inside. But unfortunately for them, it means nothing. It probably means a target to them. You know, if they say the word "children," they see the words "children," I think they intentionally targeted also, because Russians are indiscriminately attacking Ukrainians.

BERMAN: You have to wonder what the thinking is. And again, I just want to point out, no one is attacking Russian theaters or where Russians are sheltering. And I'm not saying they should be at all. I mean, but the idea -- this is a one-sided thing right now. Russians are killing Ukrainian civilians. It is a one-way direction.

TERAJIMA: Yes. And I think that it's because, you know, Ukraine's ministry have shown very strong resilience, did very well to defend. So it's made it -- it's made it difficult for Russians. They wanted to conquer Ukraine in a few days, but it didn't work out.

So they're just, you know, shelling Ukrainian towns, cities, killing thousands of Ukrainian civilians, children, women, everyone. And it's -- you know, even destroyed schools, hospitals, maternity hospitals, as we have seen. It's very frustrating and worrisome because we don't know what's going to happen in the next few weeks.

[06:15:07]

BERMAN: We don't. And one of the things that's happening as Ukrainian forces do retake some areas, they're finding some of these areas they're getting back into and taking control of just shells -- Just shells of their former selves, because they have been destroyed.

The municipal structure in some cases is sheltered.

TERAJIMA: Yes. We see that, you know, Ukrainian forces, for example, outside Kyiv on the outskirts of Kyiv, we see that they are switching more into a counter offensive. And it's more about how well they are -- how well they're defending -- how do I say? How well the Russian forces have now switched from offensive to defensive.

It's no more -- The question is not about how far they've advanced so far. Because they have been doing pretty well on the outskirts of Kyiv. But at the same time, we don't know what's going to happen as many cities even outside of Kyiv are being shelled and attacked. So it's -- and there's still residents there, and there's many -- there's many people trapped there.

BERMAN: Asami Terajima, thank you for your reporting. Thank you for being with us this morning.

TERAJIMA: Thanks for having me.

BERMAN: So President Biden says Russia should be removed from the G- 20. But Vladimir Putin wants to go to the G-20 summit in Indonesia in November. Will there be enough votes to stop him?

And you met Moonfish and Juice, two Ukrainian fighter pilots. You met them right here on NEW DAY. Ahead, you will meet one of the Americans who helped train them.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:20:44]

KEILAR: President Biden is set to leave for Poland here in about an hour for more critical meetings with allies following yesterday's NATO and G-7 meetings.

Biden announced that he believes Russia should be removed from the group of 20, the G-20, arguing that, at the very least, if Russia is not removed, Ukraine should get an invite.

Joining me now is former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, William Taylor. What does this achieve, booting Russia out of the G-20?

WILLIAM TAYLOR, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR: Yes. It demonstrates to the world, and importantly, to President Putin, that he is a pariah. That he doesn't bring anything to the discussions at the G-20.

He is conducting an immoral, unprovoked, unjustified war against a country that all it wants to do is live in peace.

For him to be a participant among those serious people is -- is wrong. There's no reason that he should be able to be seen, to be working, sitting in the same room as Joe Biden and as Macron, and with others of the G-20. Even of the Chinese.

He's been kicked out, as you well know, of the G-8, a long time ago. Other organizations, other international organizations have kicked Russia out, whether it be hockey leagues, or soccer leagues. Judo. He's out of the judo league.

KEILAR: Which he loves.

TAYLOR: Which he loves.

KEILAR: He loves judo personally.

TAYLOR: That is the message to President Putin. That you are not welcome here. You are not -- for what you are doing, you are not welcome.

KEILAR: What's worse, as Putin sees it, it becoming the G-19 without Russia or becoming the G-21 by adding Ukraine? And would he even tolerate that?

TAYLOR: As we know, President Putin has said he doesn't think Ukraine is a real country. So that's why he's bludgeoning it.

KEILAR: So that might be worse, the G-21, then, as he sees it.

TAYLOR: For him. For him. And Ukraine ought to be there. Ukraine, this is a -- this would be a demonstration of respect for this nation that is valiantly, against all odds, trying to maintain its independence.

KEILAR: That's really interesting. I wonder. You mentioned no judo, no hockey. Do regular everyday Russians, you think, start to wonder, what is our government doing? I know someone who -- I shop at H&M. I can't go to H&M. I don't get my Netflix. I'm not going to get my McDonald's. And my -- the ruble means next to nothing what it meant before. Does that penetrate eventually?

TAYLOR: It absolutely does. Those economic sanctions are having an effect on all Russian families. There's no doubt about that.

There are -- sadly, there are about 15,000 Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine. They are going back for burial. That is getting through.

Other messages, when President Biden says something, it gets reported. So often the Russian media will respond, negatively, of course. But when President Biden says that President Putin -- their president is a war criminal, that gets through.

When Arnold Schwarzenegger gets through on YouTube, people -- Russians, you know, they identify with this strong guy. I think the answer is yes, Brianna. I think the message is starting to get through.

KEILAR: I'm glad you bring up the word "dead." Because you can't hide those bodies. And I think our reference point here in America isn't quite right, because we have an all-volunteer force.

Right? These are -- these are draftees that are forced to go. They didn't know what they were going into. You can't hide those bodies. You can't hide the effect on families.

I wonder, as we saw this announcement yesterday, this agreement trying to wean Europe off of Russian energy, it's not a quick fix. But what do you see the effect of this being?

TAYLOR: So again, there's a political effect. Investors take a look at where the market's going, where the market for natural gas is going. People start to make decisions about not using natural gas.

The European Union has apparently decided to reduce its use of natural gas by two-thirds by the end of the year. That's a major undertaking. These are steps that show that that's serious. That that effort to reduce the demand for Russian natural gas can happen.

KEILAR: Yes. You know, Putin is watching all of this. Ambassador, thank you so much for being with us. Appreciate it.

TAYLOR: Good to be here.

[06:25:03]

KEILAR: Coming up, 29 text messages. That is how many times the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas pressed Mark Meadows over the 2020 vote. What she wanted, ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: The January 6th Committee now has text messages that former Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows exchanged with Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, on efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

CNN's Jessica Schneider is with us now on this. I would say just when you think, Jess, things couldn't get any weirder. Tell us about this.

JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, there are two dozen, more than two dozen, 29 text messages in total between Trump's chief of staff, Mark Meadows, and Justice Clarence Thomas's wife, Ginni.

To be clear here, Brianna, she has long been a conservative activist.