Return to Transcripts main page

New Day

Ukraine-Russia Talks Underway in Turkey; U.S. to Accelerate Missile Production after Ukraine Requests; Russian Billionaire, Ukrainian Negotiators Sickened in Talks; Russians Leaving Behind Destroyed Villages in Ukraine. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired March 29, 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.

[05:59:14]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Good morning to our viewers in the United States and all around the world. It is Tuesday, March 29. I'm John Berman in Lviv in Western Ukraine. Brianna Keilar is in Washington.

And what you're listening to right now, the sounds of the air-raid sirens warning of a threat here in this western Ukrainian town, telling people to go seek shelter. These have been going off fairly regularly over the last few days. And I do have to say, people here generally heeding these warnings now after the attack over the weekend at the fuel storage depot.

So we'll listen to these sirens for a little bit. We'll monitor the situation here very closely, bringing you any updates as they come in.

In the meantime, there is important breaking news elsewhere. Russia and Ukraine at the negotiating table in Turkey at this very moment. Ukraine's foreign minister says that, at the very minimum, he hopes these talks yield a solution to the humanitarian crisis caused by the Russian invasion.

Now, this is the first time they've met in weeks, so no one should think this will be easy or overly optimistic. But there does seem to be more ceremony surrounding today's talks.

We also are watching these very closely. But again, talks happening as air-raid sirens are going off gives you a sense of how expectations should be tempered.

The Russian attacks here all over the country relentless. Just into CNN, Russian forces hitting Mykolaiv's regional state administration building, demolishing half of it. Most employees were able to get out, but rescuers are looking for eight civilians and three military personnel who could be under the rubble.

Look at that hole in the building right there. Amazing.

The mayor of Kyiv tells CNN the shelling in the capital has intensified. Still, Russian forces appear to be largely stalled in several parts of Ukraine. That's according to a senior U.S. defense official.

In Mariupol, Ukrainian officials say 90 percent of the residential buildings in the city have been damaged or destroyed. One hundred and sixty thousand people still trapped there. And Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, says Russian troops control all evacuation routes in and out of the city.

In Lutsk, in Western Ukraine, the Russians bombed another fuel depot, setting off a raging fire. They've now targeted fuel depots at several locations around Ukraine in recent days, including right here in Lviv where I am, Brianna.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: And in the meantime, President Biden is refusing to walk back his off-the-cuff comment that Vladimir Putin cannot remain in power. He's offering no apologies.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Nobody believes we're going to take down -- I was talking about taking down Putin. Nobody believes that. The last thing I want to do is engage in a land war or a nuclear war with Russia. That's not part of it. I was expressing my outrage at the behavior of this man. It's outrageous. It's outrageous.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Reaction from the Kremlin was swift. A Putin spokesman telling PBS Biden's comments were quite alarming and a personal insult.

BERMAN: All right. Joining me here in Lviv, CNN's Phil Black. The air- raid sirens off for the moment here, Phil. The negotiations, or discussions, I should say, in Istanbul very much on.

PHIL BLACK, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: On, but manage your expectations, John. As you've touched on, no real breakthroughs expected here today.

And that's because, on some of the positions, they remain a very long way apart. And because, essentially, both sides are still trying to inflict as much pain as possible on the battlefield in order to force concessions at the negotiating table. Neither side is at that point yet.

On the day these negotiations are taking place, we've had some interesting comments from the Russian defense minister, Sergei Shoigu, who has reenforced statements made by a senior general last week, which essentially say the first phase of the battle is over from Russia's point of view. We have tied down Ukraine's forces, and now we can focus on our real priority, which is purely Eastern Ukraine. That remains the whole purpose here.

Now, what that means in the context of what we're seeing on the battlefield isn't clear. Because in key cities around the country -- Chernihiv in the North, Kharkiv in the South -- in the East, Mykolaiv in the South, you're still seeing Russian forces strike at those cities indiscriminately with shelling and indirect fire and rocket- fire and so forth. Still inflicting pain and pressure on Ukrainian forces.

And even in places where Ukraine is doing well, like around the capital of Kyiv, overnight in the area of Irpin, which Ukraine took back in its entirety yesterday, there was more rocket fire. And President Zelenskyy says that area is not secure.

And then, of course, there is Mariupol, the port city on the South, which has been besieged for weeks, as we know, where Ukraine says it is maintaining a circular defense. Circular because it is surrounded. There is nowhere to go. And every day, it seems, the territory they're defending is getting smaller. There is a sense of inevitability there, that that will fall to Russia.

We spoke to Mariupol's mayor yesterday. And he said that, yes, they are still fighting fiercely, but they will fight to their very last drop of blood.

BERMAN: And he said they're still there. They're still in control of part of the city right now. But the situation very, very dire.

All right. Phil Black, thank you so much for being with us this morning.

U.S. defense officials say they plan to step up production of the missiles being sent here to Ukraine in order to refill their own depleted stockpiles. The Ukrainian military's wish list from the U.S. includes 500 Stinger missiles, 500 Javelin missiles per day.

CNN's Barbara Starr, live at the Pentagon with the details on this. How quickly can production get going?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, they are trying to ramp it up. The idea is increase production and lower production times so you can get more missiles back into U.S. inventories so what is inside U.S. inventories can be shipped off to Ukraine. That's the whole idea here.

[06:05:15]

The Stinger, that antiair missile, the Javelin, that anti-tank missile, these are the two things they're trying to improve. How would you improve production? More workers on the line. Reduce -- get rid of obsolete parts. Get more modern tooling. All the industrial things that sound boring, but which are going to be essential to getting more missiles out the door.

Right now, of course, as you say, the Ukraine wish list is 500 Javelins, 500 Stingers a day. Already, as you can see there, the U.S. and the allies shipped out thousands. And the U.S. is promising hundreds more right now: 800 Stingers, 2,000 Javelins, according to a fact sheet that was put out by the White House. That is what is on the "to do" list, if you will, to ship off to Ukraine.

But again, what they have to do is get more back into U.S. inventories so they can ship from inventory over to Ukraine. It's vital right now. And what this is all really telling us, I think, John, everyone is

settling in for a very long haul on this. This is a very long-term proposition: to try and improve production and get more missiles out to the front line -- John.

BERMAN: I did have one Ukrainian official tell me, basically, haven't we proved we know how to use them? So these Javelins and Stingers making a big difference on the ground here. Barbara Starr, thank you very much -- Brianna.

KEILAR: All right. Let's talk about where things are right now with retired Army Major General James "Spider" Marks. Stalled, right, largely. Tell us what's going on here.

MAJ. GEN. JAMES "SPIDER" MARKS (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Yes, significantly. What you see is what we've seen for the past couple of weeks. Right? That essentially the Russian offensive is kind of stalled.

But as been reported, what's taking place in places like Kyiv and then certainly in Mariupol -- We've talked about Kharkiv, as well -- is incredible rubble destruction. Families are being dispersed.

I mean, you look at this and you go, well, the Ukrainians are doing well. Frankly, they're doing extremely well. But what's happening inside that little grid square is a lot of human suffering. That's what's really significant.

Let's -- let's go down here. When you look at Mariupol, a lot of reporting about how this city now is completely -- 90 percent rubble. It's really a wasteland.

Strategically, you look at it, and you might say this is illogical. What are they trying -- what is Russia trying to achieve?

Essentially, as we've been discussing, Russia just wants to turn this into a land bridge so you can get into Russia from Crimea. You don't have to go across this bridge.

So the destruction of Mariupol in my mind, in a military guy's mind, makes no sense. Because eventually, you have to reclaim it or, unless you're just going to completely level the thing.

But bear in mind, the Ukrainian also had some success down here in Berdyansk. They knocked that ship out of effective use.

This is -- this is just -- I think -- I think it's fair to say we're at a stalemate where the Russians are achieving success through long- range fires of artillery and rockets, dumb missile systems. You don't need precision-guided munitions to go after stationary targets.

And then Ukrainians are having incredible success tactically going against those Russian formations. That's why they haven't moved. That's why the Russians cannot get any traction at all.

So you have push by the Ukrainians, great success. Then the Russians refuse to engage in battle. And then they launch all these rockets at families and apartments and hospitals. I mean, it's criminal.

KEILAR: It's stunning the descriptions that we're hearing of the damage here in Mariupol.

I do want to ask you about the Kremlin spokesman reiterating that Russia would use nuclear weapons only if there is a threat to existence of the state. I think on its own, alarming. Then you listen to the fact that you've had a number of Russian officials say that lately. OK, so it's now new. Why they keep repeating it?

MARKS: They want to remind everybody they've got this capability. In other words, the Russians are having a hard time tactically, conventionally in Ukraine, and they want to hold up this big hammer and make sure the world doesn't forget they've got them.

Well, the world has not forgotten that the Russians have nukes. They have close to 4,500 nukes. By comparison, Brianna, the United States has about 5,000. So at the same number of nukes as the Russians. And again, by comparison, the Chinese only have 400.

So when you look at the nukes, this is the challenge right here. You know, one nuke is enough. Let's be frank. But we're talking 4,500 to about 5,000 nukes.

And when you look at it the way -- there's a comparison between how the United States and the Western powers view the use of nuclear weapons and how the Russians do it.

[06:10:06]

The Russians view this very objectively. They have a checklist. This criteria, this criteria, this criteria. Check, check, check, launch a nuke.

This takes the social and the political completely out of the discussion. And that's the major issue. The notion of escalation, one nuke then could lead to hundreds of nukes, that is a very, very difficult discussion to have. And when you objectify it, then you can get from one to 150 to 200 in a heartbeat.

When you keep it social and political and you understand the significance of all that, then you back off, and you just -- you don't remind the world that you've got 4,500 nukes. Everybody knows that. What you have is a more mature discussion about what is the real value of having this capability.

KEILAR: It doesn't feel like a mature discussion. It feels like someone sort of flashing as a knife as they come into a store repeatedly right now, is what it feels like.

MARKS: Right.

KEILAR: General, thank you so much for taking us through that. Really appreciate it.

MARKS: Thank you, Brianna.

KEILAR: Several people involved in the negotiations between Russia and Ukraine actually getting sick. And now officials are downplaying the possibility that they were poisoned.

Plus, CNN is on the ground at the site of destroyed homes and villages in Kyiv. What our reporter found is chilling.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:15:30]

BERMAN: Welcome back. I'm John Berman in Lviv in Western Ukraine.

Two Ukrainian negotiators and a Russian billionaire, Roman Abramovich, suffered minor skin peeling and sore eyes during the Ukraine/Russia talks in Turkey a few weeks ago.

"The Wall Street Journal" and investigative group Bellingcat reported that Ukrainian peace negotiators and Abramovich suffered from suspected poisoning at the talks aimed at ending the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

A source tells CNN that the incident was not regarded as serious, with the Reuters news agency citing an unidentified U.S. official who suggested the cause was environmental factors.

Joining me now is Andrei Soldatov. He's a Russian investigative journalist and founder and editor of a watchdog of -- watchdog of Russian secret services activity that is now blocked in Russia. He's also the co-author of, quote, "The Compatriots: The Brutal and Chaotic History of Russia's Exiles, Emigres and Agents Abroad."

Andrei, thank you so much for being with us. This minor skin peeling and eye irritation, I know there are all the caveats about what we don't know here, but what do you see going on?

ANDREI SOLDATOV, RUSSIAN INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALIST/AUTHOR: Well, these symptoms are quite consistent with what happened before. Specifically in 2018, a very prominent Russian activist, Aleksei Brusilov, was poisoned in Moscow and then emigrated to Germany. So now he's OK.

And also, the Russian security services has a history of poisonings. It's, to be honest, one of the most preferred methods being used. And the last 20 years, we saw lots of poisonings in Russia.

BERMAN: I've read your writing before. And you said Russia loves poisoning. The question is, if they were anyhow involved in this and if this was, in fact, poisoning, why poison the peace talks?

SOLDATOV: Well, poisoning is quite different from, say, other methods to kill a person, because it's not only about liquidating a threat. It's also about sending a message. It's about scaring people, and sometimes it's about messaging.

So you send a message that these guys, you need to be cautious and you need to remember who's in charge. And you do not necessarily kill people for that. Everybody would take this message very, very seriously.

So maybe here, it's a question about loyalty and it's about re reminding people what is at stake.

BERMAN: So one of the people who was experiencing the skin peeling and eye irritation was Roman Abramovich, who is this Russian oligarch. He owns the Chelsea football club, who was there two weeks ago for these negotiation. "The New York Times" is reporting he's there today as Russia and Ukraine sits back down at the table for these talks.

Why him? I mean, why is he there, do you think? And if someone was trying to poison him, even to send a message, why do it to him?

SOLDATOV: Well, Roman Abramovich is a very special kind of Russian oligarch. He's not just some rich guy. He's also extremely chose to the family of the first Russian president, Boris Yeltsin.

So he was always seen as a representative of his family, if you wish. So his position is quite special.

But right now, he has some access to Putin, but I cannot say that Putin would listen to him in all cases. And that makes him a very interesting character to choose for a negotiator. So you can listen to him, you can use him, but you can dismiss him if you wanted.

And this question about poisoning is absolutely -- well, it's really mysterious. So maybe there are some questions about Abramovich's loyalties right now at the Kremlin. That is why we got this -- this situation.

BERMAN: Andrei Soldatov, I really appreciate you helping us understand the ramifications of what's going on here and the possible motivations behind all of it. Thanks so much for your expertise.

SOLDATOV: Thank you.

BERMAN: Russian attacks on the suburbs of Kyiv. We've seen some devastating impacts. CNN's Fred Pleitgen met an 84-year-old woman in one town who was a child when the Nazis rolled through in World War II. She says this is time, it's much worse. A report from the ground, next.

[06:20:08]

Plus, the city of Chernihiv, right now under siege. We just spoke with the mayor as a bomb appears to go off during the interview.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: So gruesome images show just some of the devastation from the barrage of Russian military strikes in and around Kyiv in recent weeks. High-rise buildings, schools and hospitals now just huge piles of rubble as Ukrainian troops defend the capital in hopes of keeping it from falling under Russian control. CNN's Frederik Pleitgen has much more. And we do want to warn you,

some of these images are disturbing.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

[06:25:07]

(GUNFIRE)

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): Kyiv remains under full-on attack by Vladimir Putin's army. Ukrainian officials saying Russian forces are trying to storm the capital but failing, unleashing artillery barrages on civilian areas in the process.

We drove to the village Novipetriska (ph), north of Kyiv, only a few miles from the frontline. Even the streets here are pockmarked with shrapnel and massive impact craters. Whole buildings laid to waste.

(on camera): I mean, just look at the utter destruction caused by this massive explosion. There's some really thick brick walls that even they were annihilated by the force of whatever landed here.

The people here tell us they only felt one really large explosion, and it wounded several people and killed a small child.

(voice-over): That child was 2-year-old Stepan (ph), killed while in his bed when the house came under fire.

These videos, given to us by local authorities, show the chaos in the aftermath. As the wounded appear in shock, residents and rescuers try to save those who were inside. Stepan (ph) pronounced dead on the scene.

Stepan (ph) was Oleg Shpak's second youngest child. We found Oleg sifting through the rubble of his house days later.

Inside, he shows me the damage caused by the explosion. He was at work when his home was hit. His wife, the other children and his mother-in- law had already been brought to the hospital when he arrived at the house. Stepan (ph) couldn't be saved. And because of staff shortages at the morgue, Oleg (ph) had to prepare his son's body for burial himself.

OLEG SHPAK, SON KILLED BY RUSSIAN SHELLING (through translator): I had to wash him, to dress him. His head, from his left to his right ear, one large hematoma. His arms, his legs, a total hematoma not compatible with life. And besides that, lots of other wounds were discovered after death.

PLEITGEN: Many other houses have also been hit here. Police tell me the Russians shell the town every day.

We bumped into 84-year-old Halyna in the town's center. She was a child when the Nazis invaded this area and says now, things are worse. HALYNA, SURVIVED NAZI INVASION AS A CHILD (through translator): Worse

than fascists. When the Germans were here and entered our homes, they would shoot at the ceiling, but they would not touch us. They moved us into the woods, but they did not shoot us like the Russian soldiers are shooting now, killing children.

PLEITGEN: The Kremlin claims its forces don't target civilian areas, but the U.S., NATO, and the Ukrainians say the Russians are frustrated by their lack of progress and are firing longer-range weapons, because they can't make headway on the ground.

VLADYSLAV ODINTSOV, KYIV REGIONAL POLICE (through translator): They understand that sooner or later, our troops will push them out of our territory. Now, the Russians are doing dirty tricks. They shoot more at civilian areas than at the positions of the Ukrainian army.

PLEITGEN: Ukraine's army says its pressing its own counteroffensive, trying to dislodge Russian troops from the outskirts of Kyiv. The Kremlin's forces, meanwhile, so far unable to take the Ukrainian capital, are instead laying waste to its suburbs.

Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Novipetriska (ph), Ukraine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN: Even in these areas where the Ukrainians have had success pushing the Russians back, the Russians leaving behind so much destruction and so much suffering.

Much more from here in just a moment. In the meantime, back in the United States, members of the January 6th Committee frustrated with the attorney general and the Justice Department, telling them to, quote, "do your job."

Plus, for the first time since he hit him on live television, Will Smith with a message to Chris Rock.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:30:00]