May 2, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

Our coverage of the war in Ukraine has moved here.

Photo of Brittney Griner at a Russian police station, shown on Russian state TV, in early March.

The US Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC) is lending its support to efforts to get basketball player Brittney Griner released from custody in Russia, according to USA Today.

“If we felt like there was something we could do to be helpful, we would, in a heartbeat,” she said.

Hirshland said USOPC has had talks with the International Olympic Committee regarding Griner. Hirshland said she hasn’t spoken with IOC president Thomas Bach, but added that “the IOC has an acute focus on her and her health and safety as well.”

When reached by CNN, a USOPC spokesman verified USA Today’s reporting but declined to comment further.

Some context: Griner, who plays for Russian powerhouse UMMC Ekaterinburg during the WNBA offseason, was arrested by Russian authorities in February at a Moscow airport and accused of smuggling significant amounts of a narcotic substance – an offense punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

Svyatoslav Palamar, deputy commander of the Ukrainian Azov Regiment

Civilians and Ukrainian forces sheltering at the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol are facing “nonstop” bombardment, with basic supplies running low as Ukrainian officials race to evacuate those inside, according to a captain in the plant.

“The strikes (are) going on nonstop, it’s been tank artillery, volley artillery, and every three to five minutes there were air bombardments,” said Svyatoslav Palamar, deputy commander of the Ukrainian Azov Regiment. “There are still civilians sheltering in the plant, and yet the enemy continues this bombing.”

About 100 civilians were evacuated from the plant Sunday, but a further?planned evacuation for Monday did not take place. Meanwhile, the mood inside is grim, with the regiment reporting low supplies of water and food.

“If (worst) comes to worst and we run out of food, we’ll be catching birds, and we’ll be doing everything just to stand firm,” he said.

Last site of defense: Russia has claimed that its soldiers have reached the outskirts of the plant and are carrying out a “step by step clearing mission,” which Palamar denied.

“As of now, the entire plant territory is under our control and our defense is along the perimeter of the Azov steel plant, we are holding the defense,” he said.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he has no plans to visit Ukraine, after Germany’s president offered to go last month but was reportedly told that he was “not wanted” by Kyiv.

German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier said on April 12 while on a visit to Warsaw?that he had planned to visit Ukraine, but that the trip was “not wanted” by Kyiv.

The German President, long an advocate of Western rapprochement with Russia, has expressed regret for his earlier stance.?Steinmeier, a Social Democrat who served as Foreign Minister under Chancellor Angela Merkel before becoming president, has said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine meant he and others had to reckon honestly with what they had got wrong.

Meanwhile, German opposition leader Friedrich Merz said he would visit Kyiv this week.

Also in the Monday interview, Scholz said the financial and military assistance from Germany and other countries was why the Ukrainian army could now “hold out for so long against such an overpowering opponent.”

The alliance will defend every centimeter of NATO territory if attacked, said Scholz.

“Many citizens in this country are severely worried about an escalation of the war spreading beyond Ukraine and they are justifiably worried over this,“ Scholz said, reiterating: “There will be no direct participation of Germany and NATO in this war.”

The Chancellor also vowed there would be no lifting of sanctions against Russia unless a peace deal was reached between Ukraine and Russia.

“Without consensus with Ukraine, we will not lift sanctions. (Putin) must come to an agreement with Ukraine, and he will not be able to do that with a dictatorial peace and his conditions,“ Scholz said. “Our target must be that Russia may not succeed with their intentions.“

“Russia may not win and Ukraine may not lose.“

Firefighters spray water on a building after a missile strike in Odesa on May 2.

A Russian missile strike on a dormitory in Odesa killed a 14-year-old boy and wounded a 17-year-old girl, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a nightly address on Monday.

Zelensky said 220 Ukrainian children have been killed since the start of the Russian invasion.

At least 1,570 educational institutions have been destroyed or damaged by shelling, Zelensky added.

Zelensky’s claims have not been independently verified by CNN.

The Mariupol mayor’s office told the US that Russia has around four so-called “filtration?camps” in and around Mariupol reportedly used for processing Ukrainian civilians before they are sent to Russia, according to the US Ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).

A?CNN investigation?in April revealed that Russian forces and allied separatist soldiers were taking Mariupol residents to a so-called “filtration?center” set up in Bezimenne, where they were registered before being sent on to Russia, many against their will. Ukrainian government and local Mariupol officials say that tens of thousands of Ukrainian citizens have been forcibly deported to the Donetsk People’s Republic and Russia since the war began.?

Carpenter said he expected there would be additional such camps in the south and east of Ukraine, and said the OSCE will continue to look at the issue despite limited access from the ongoing war.?

Last week, Carpenter said in remarks to the OSCE that the world also “should expect Russia to intensify its ongoing forced transfers of local populations from areas of Ukraine’s south and east to Russia or Russia-controlled parts of the Donbas via so-called ‘filtration?camps.’”

Carpenter said that “what these reports describe brings back horrific memories of a bygone era.”

“Invading a neighboring country, removing its legitimately elected government, herding its population into ‘filtration’ camps, and holding sham referenda in a transparent attempt to cover its aggression with a false veneer of legitimacy is a wholly barbaric enterprise,” he said, calling on the world to “act with a greater sense of urgency.”

Russia has “forgotten all the lessons of World War II,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a nightly address on Monday, following comments from Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov Sunday alleging that Adolf Hitler had “Jewish blood” and that “the most ardent anti-Semites are usually Jews.”

“Such an anti-Semitic thrust by their minister means Russia has forgotten all the lessons of World War II. Or maybe they never studied those lessons,” Zelensky said.

Lavrov’s remarks also prompted a furious response from Israel, with Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid calling them?“unforgivable and outrageous,” adding that “Jews did not murder themselves in the Holocaust.”

“Of course, there is a big scandal in Israel today as regards [to] these words. However, no one hears objections or excuses from Moscow. There is silence,” Zelensky said.

“How could this be said on the eve of the anniversary of the victory over Nazism? These words mean that Russia’s top diplomat is blaming the Jewish people for Nazi crimes. No words,” Zelensky said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin could move to formally declaring war on Ukraine as soon as May 9, which would allow for the full mobilization of Russia’s reserve forces as they attempt to conquer eastern and southern Ukraine, US and Western officials believe.

May 9, known as Russia’s “Victory Day,” commemorates the Russians’ defeat of the Nazis in 1945. Western officials have long believed that Putin would leverage the symbolic significance and propaganda value of that day to announce either a military achievement in Ukraine, a major escalation of hostilities — or both.?

Officials have begun to hone in on one scenario, which is that Putin formally declares war on Ukraine on May 9. To date, Russian officials have insisted that the conflict was only a “special military operation” with the central goal of “denazification.”?

Wallace added that he “would not be surprised, and I don’t have any information about this, that he is probably going to declare on this May Day that ‘we are now at war with the world’s Nazis and we need to mass mobilize the Russian people.’”

More context: A formal declaration of war on May 9 could galvanize Russian citizens and surge popular opinion for the invasion. It would also, under Russian law, allow Putin to mobilize reserve forces and draft conscripts, which officials say Russia desperately needs amid a growing manpower shortage. Western and Ukrainian officials have estimated that at least 10,000 Russian soldiers have been killed in the war since Russia invaded just over two months ago.?

Other options for May 9 include annexing the breakaway territories?of Luhansk?and Donetsk?in eastern Ukraine, making a major push for Odesa in the south, or declaring full control over the southern port city of Mariupol.?

The US has “highly credible” intelligence reports that Russia will try to annex Luhansk and Donetsk “some time in mid-May,” the US Ambassador to OSCE Michael Carpenter said on Monday. There are also indications that Russia could be planning to declare and annex a “people’s republic” in the southeastern city of Kherson.

US State Department spokesman Ned Price said on Monday that there is “good reason to believe that the Russians will do everything they can to use” May 9 for propaganda purposes.

Price added that he had “seen the speculation that Russia may formally declare war” on May 9, and said, “that would be a great irony if Moscow used the occasion of ‘Victory Day’ to declare war, which in itself would allow them to surge conscripts in a way they’re not able to do now, in a way that would be tantamount to revealing to the world that their war effort is failing, that they are floundering in their military campaign and military objectives.”

“I’m quite confident that we’ll be hearing more from Moscow in the lead up to May 9,” Price added. “I’m quite confident that you will be hearing more from the United States, from our partners, including our NATO partners, in the lead up to May 9 as well.”

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is set to tell the Ukrainian parliament, the?Verkhovna Rada,?that Ukraine is living through its “finest hour.”?

Johnson will address the parliament via video link on Tuesday, according to a Downing Street news release.??

In his speech, the prime minister will draw a parallel between the Ukrainian parliament and the British parliament which during World War II “continued to meet throughout the conflict.”?

He will also tell Ukrainian lawmakers how Britain is “proud to be among Ukraine’s friends.”?

“Your children and grandchildren will say that Ukrainians taught the world that the brute force of an aggressor counts for nothing against the moral force of a people determined to be free,” Johnson will say.?

The prime minister will also lay out Tuesday a new package of $375 million (300 million pounds) in support for Ukraine, according to Downing Street.?

The package will include electronic warfare equipment, a counter battery radar system, GPS jamming equipment and thousands of night vision devices, according to the news release.?

Johnson’s address is set to coincide with the reopening of the British embassy in Kyiv which closed in late February just before the war started.?

A large smoke plume rises over Mariupol, Ukraine, in the vicinity of Azovstal steel plant on Monday, May 2.

Ukrainian fighters hope to evacuate the 100 adults and 20 children still trapped in the Azovstal steel plant, located near the southern Ukrainian city of Mariupol.?

In an interview with Reuters Monday, Deputy Commander of the Azov regiment Sviataslav Palamar described the mixed feelings he experienced when civilians were safely evacuated from the steel works on Sunday after weeks of being trapped there.?

Palamar said he felt “joy through tears” seeing the civilians leave the steelworks, stressing that during the time they were trapped “thousands?of people have died.”

The Ukrainian authorities had plans to rescue people trapped under the rubble on Monday but were unable to do to so due to non-stop artillery fire from Russian soldiers, Palamar said.?

Here are more of the latest headlines from the Russia-Ukraine war:

There will be a civilian evacuation on Tuesday in Mariupol, according to the city council’s Telegram channel.?

The agreement, according to the Mariupol City Council, was officially agreed upon with assistance from the United Nations and the Red Cross.

Although it will evacuate Mariupol citizens, the convoy will actually be leaving from a roundabout near Berdiansk, a Russian-occupied city to the west of Mariupol, at 7 a.m. local time.

Members of the Ukrainian National Guard assist a civilian as they try to help them leave the Azovstal steel plant on Sunday.

On Sunday, more than 100 civilians were evacuated from the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, Ukraine, which has been under heavy Russian bombardment. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced Sunday evening that for the first time, the vital corridor to evacuate civilians from the plant had started working, paving the way for them to pass through.

This was short-lived, however, as Russian shelling once again intensified and put a halt to further rescue efforts, commander of the 12th brigade of the National Guard Denis Schlegar?said.

These?images?were taken on Sunday during the partial evacuation. They were only transmitted on Monday.

People walk over debris at the Azovstal steel plant during the evacuation.

Ukrainian National Guardsmen assist a civilian over a pile of debris as they try to help them leave the Azovstal steel plant.

The United States welcomes reports that “some civilians have been able to evacuate Mariupol” and encourages “continued efforts” to allow civilians to depart the southern port city and other cities under siege, State Department spokesperson Ned Price said Monday.

Price noted the US is in communication with the international organizations involved in evacuation efforts “because we know that humanitarian corridors are absolutely critical to evacuating citizens and providing urgently needed humanitarian aid.”

There is only “a few hundred thousand dollars left” out of the $3 billion in presidential drawdown authority (PDA) funding the Biden administration has been using to supply Ukraine with military assistance, a Senate aide told CNN.?

“The PDA is very close to exhausted,” the aide said.

The $3 billion in PDA funding was included in the $13.6 billion Ukraine aid supplemental that was passed along with the?massive omnibus spending bill?on March 15.

The PDA funding is one of the primary ways the US is helping supply Ukraine with military assistance during the ongoing war countering Russia’s invasion of the country. It is “authorization from the President to pull from our own stocks,” Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said during a briefing Monday.

There have been eight packages of military assistance authorized by the Biden administration through PDA funding. The last one was?signed by Biden?on April 21.?As of April 28, the Biden administration had $250 million left in PDA funding, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said at the White House press briefing last week.

Last week, the Biden administration asked Congress to pass another $33 billion in funding to provide additional military and humanitarian assistance to Ukraine. This proposal would put $5 billion back into PDA funding, the Senate aide said.

As CNN’s Manu Raju reported earlier, congressional sources involved in discussions over the Ukraine funding bill do not expect that the package will come together this week. The sources said there are still many issues to sort through on the package, and it will likely take at least a couple of weeks to get the bill language sorted out.

CNN’s MJ Lee contributed reporting to this post.

Smoke rises above the Azovstal steel plant in the city of Mariupol on April 29, 2022, following heaving Russian bombardment.

Ukrainian fighters hope to evacuate the 100 adults and 20 children still trapped in the Azovstal steel plant, located near the southern city of Mariupol.?

In an interview with Reuters Monday, Deputy Commander of the Azov regiment Sviataslav Palamar described the mixed feelings he experienced when civilians were safely evacuated from the steel works on Sunday after weeks of being trapped there.?

Palamar said he felt “joy through tears” seeing the civilians leave the steelworks, stressing that during the time they were trapped “thousands?of people have died.”

The Ukrainian authorities had plans to rescue people trapped under the rubble on Monday but were unable to do to so due to non-stop artillery fire from Russian soldiers, Palamar said.?

He said the work “would have been 90% easier if we would have been given special equipment” and would have “saved lives of servicemen.”

Palamar also highlighted the plight of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky who he said is shouldering the “great responsibility” of the Azovstal evacuations as the “commander-in-chief.”

White House press secretary Jen Psaki speaks during the daily briefing at the White House, Monday.

There are currently no plans for US President Joe Biden to travel to Ukraine, despite travel to the region from Secretary of State Tony Blinken, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in the last several weeks, the White House told CNN Monday.

Ahead of Russia’s “Victory Day,” a prominent holiday that marks Nazi surrender in World War II, Psaki hinted the US would have more to convey to “mark our support for the Ukrainians and the Europeans in some capacity” in the coming days. She declined to offer specifics.?Officials tell CNN Russian President Vladimir Putin?wants to be able to celebrate a victory – of some kind – in his war on that day.

“Well, we know that President Putin has emphasized the significance of this day, for him and for the Russian military, but I don’t have anything to preview or predict at this point in time from here about what they are may or may not do,” Psaki told CNN, later adding, “Well, we will certainly mark our support for the Ukrainians and the Europeans in some capacity, but I don’t have anything more specific at this point in time.”

According to the White House, Biden spoke with members of this weekend’s congressional delegation to Ukraine, led by Speaker Pelosi, but plans to hold “a more extensive briefing from them when they return.”

Pressed on comments from Rep. Adam Schiff, a Democrat from California, that Ukraine requested additional aid, Psaki told CNN the administration is “going to continue to consult with and rely on the advice of the Department of Defense on what weapons systems and equipment the Ukrainians need to continue to succeed in the war.” She did not offer specifics on what requests the delegation relayed.

A large smoke plume in the vicinity of Azovstal steel plant — the last Ukrainian stronghold in Mariupol —?is seen rising over the city in new video.

CNN has geolocated and verified the authenticity of the video, which was first posted on Telegram by a pro-Russian channel on Monday evening.?

The video shows the large, black smoke plume near the northern side of the sprawling steel plant complex.?It’s unclear from the video whether the smoke is emanating from the plant itself, or whether it’s from an area just nearby.

However, a deputy commander with the Azov battalion at the plant, confirmed to CNN that the smoke in the video was coming from the plant, which was hit by a military strike. The soldier would not say what part of the plant was hit, noting that they did not want the Russians to correct their aim.?

CNN has previously reported that a commander among the Ukrainian soldiers at the besieged Azovstal steel plant says the complex has been under “constant fire” since early Monday.

The video also shows a number of cars on a roadway in northwestern Mariupol, in addition to bombed out public buses and military vehicles.?Apartment complexes on the side of the road also have sustained damage during the siege of the city.

Images geolocated by CNN show that an important road bridge linking the town of Sloviansk in the Donetsk region with settlements further east has been heavily damaged. It appears that at least one artillery round landed close to or on the bridge, which spans the Syverskiy Donets river.

A few days ago, the railway bridge just to the north was disabled by what appears to have been an explosive charge.

Neither the Ukrainian nor Russian forces have commented.

The bridges are an important link between Sloviansk and the town of Lyman further east, which has been under heavy attack by Russian artillery for several days.?

The US has “highly credible” intelligence reports that Russia will try to annex the separatist-occupied regions of Donetsk and Luhansk “some time in mid-May,” and that there are plans to create a similarly so-called “people’s republic” in Kherson to be annexed as well, the US Ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said.

Carpenter added that Russia is reportedly abducting local officials in towns they hold in eastern and southern Ukraine to replace with “groups that are loyal to Moscow,” and are also disappearing “school directors, journalists, local activists, municipal officials.”

“More recently, there have been reports as well that Russian forces have cut off internet and some cellular phone access in these regions in order to disable the flow of reliable information,” said Carpenter, adding that in these towns, Russia “may try to hold sham referenda to try to add a veneer of democratic or electoral legitimacy.”?

The Azov Regiment, whose soldiers continue to resist Russian forces at the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, says five Russian soldiers were killed late Monday during an attempted assault on the plant.

A missile was fired Monday at “one of Odesa’s infrastructure facilities,” said Maksym Marchenko, head of the Odesa region military administration.

“Unfortunately, there are dead and wounded,” he said.

Separately, the Ukrainian military’s Command South reported, “Another missile strike in the Odesa region. There were hits to the city infrastructure. In particular, one of the religious buildings was damaged. Information about the victims is being clarified.”

A journalist in Odesa told CNN an Orthodox church had been hit near the civilian airport.?

Cruise missiles were launched against Odesa’s airport at the weekend, putting its runway out of action.

The press center of the Ukrainian military in the south has told CNN one person was killed in a missile strike that hit Odesa late Monday.

Natalia Humenuk, the press center director, said the missile hit a residential building, killing a 15-year-old boy. A child was also injured and was taken to hospital.?

Azov Special Forces Regiment of the Ukrainian National Guard accompany people over debris at the Azovstal steel plant, in Mariupol, eastern Ukraine on Sunday, May 1, 2022.

A commander among the Ukrainian soldiers at the besieged Azovstal steel plant says the complex has been under “constant fire” since early Monday.

Mykhailo Vershynin, chief of the Mariupol Patrol Police, told CNN that “after the Red Cross mission left, we have been under constant fire since the early morning. Artillery and naval artillery are firing non-stop. Air strikes are constantly being launched.”

About 100 civilians were evacuated from the plant Sunday, but a further planned evacuation for Monday did not take place.?

“When I see five or six people die every day under bombs and the wounded die because they can’t get necessary medical care, and when I see what the soldiers eat — they’re already starting to faint because of hunger, I think it is necessary to address the world community,” Vershynin said.

“Today firstly there is no evacuation, and secondly there is a planned destruction. To say that an evacuation is underway is a cynical lie,” he said.

On Monday, the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) banned the Russian team and other from participating in UEFA competitions "until further notice," in light of the situation in Ukraine.

Russian teams and clubs have been banned from participating in competitions of the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) “until further notice,” the European football governing body announced on Monday.

Portugal will replace Russia at the Women’s EURO 2022 final tournament scheduled for England in July, UEFA said.??

Russia will not play their two matches scheduled in April for the European qualification to the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023.

For the 2022-23 season, Russia will not have any clubs participating in the?UEFA Champions League, UEFA Europa League, UEFA Europa Conference League, UEFA Women’s Champions League and UEFA Youth League.

UEFA also said Russia’s bid to host EURO 2028 or EURO 2032 has been ruled ineligible.

Ukrainian soldiers repair a tank at a position near Kharkiv, Ukraine, on May 1.

The Ukrainian military has confirmed that its forces have won back control of several settlements to the north and east of Kharkiv, potentially making it more difficult for the Russians to launch missile and artillery attacks against the city.

Ruska Lozova — a village north of Kharkiv — “returned to our control despite aggravation and losses,” the military said Monday.

The military also said the village of Verkhnya Rohanka in the east of Kharkiv was back in Ukrainian hands, and that the operation had been led by Col. Gen. Oleksandr Syrsky, the commander of land forces.

In the past two weeks, Ukraine has reclaimed about a half dozen villages in the area, bringing its forces slightly closer to Russian supply lines that run from the border to Izium.

Ukrainian forces have pushed Russian forces 40 kilometers (24 miles) to the east of Kharkiv over the last 24 to 48 hours, a senior US defense official told reporters Monday.

The official called it part of an “incredible effort” from the Ukrainian forces.

“It’s just another piece of the stiff Ukrainian resistance that they continue to demonstrate. And again to remind Kharkiv is important to the Russians because it sits at the very northwestern sort of lip or edge of that Donbas region,” the official said.

More than 70 M777 Howitzers have arrived in Ukraine — which is about 80% of the total 90 the US committed to giving the country, a senior US defense official told reporters Monday.?

“Over 200 Ukrainian artillerymen” have now been trained on the M777 Howitzers, including a group of 50 Ukrainians that are scheduled to graduate from the training today, the official added.

“Another 50 plus” Ukrainians will be arriving at one of the training sites outside of Ukraine “later this week” to begin training on the M777 Howitzers. A group of 20 Ukrainian soldiers began a “week-long training course” on the Phoenix Ghost UAV systems on May 1, the official added.

Over the last 24 hours, 13 flights of US security assistance for Ukraine has arrived in the European region, and an additional 11 flights from the US will arrive in the region over the course of the next 24 hours, the official said.?

There have also been “23 deliveries via airlift” from five other nations received “again, at locations in the region outside Ukraine” of security assistance for the country, the official added.

Russian forces are shelling Kherson region with Grad rocket-propelled grenade launchers and several civilians have been injured as a result, the regional prosecutor’s office said in a statement on Facebook on Monday.

According to the regional prosecutor’s office, as a result of the attack, residents of the?Novovorontsovka?village?suffered shrapnel wounds.

One?man with a broken neck and a fractured skull was taken to the hospital in critical condition. Several civilian houses and a school were damaged.

Ukrainians Luba and Rodion walk through the Lviv train station.

Ukrainians Luba and Rodion rushed through the tunnel at the Lviv train station with all their belongings packed in a large suitcase and a couple of smaller bags. Their most precious cargo is their daughter, born a month and a half ago, riding in a comfortable stroller. They were headed to Zaporizhzhia after being evicted from their house in Uzhhorod, near the border with Slovakia.

“They raised the price and we couldn’t afford it,” said Luba struggling to hold back tears.?

Anecdotal reports indicate rents are rising in the safer parts of the country as more people flee the frontlines in the east and south.

Luba said this is the second time she has been forced to leave her home because of a foreign invasion — she was 17 when Russia invaded the Crimea region in 2014.

“It was horrible,” she said. As soon as she turned 18, she moved, leaving behind the horrors of that war.?

The young couple, both in their 20s, said their focus is to find a safe place to live, knowing that the Russian army is within striking distance of Zaporizhzhia and Rodion could be called to take arms in defense of his country.

“I have no military training,” he said. “But I will join the other men and protect our land.”

While they would soon board a train to an uncertain future, they go with hope — figuratively and literally. They named their daughter Nadiya, which in Ukrainian means hope.?

Nadiya sleeps in her stroller.

Waiting for a train to Kyiv, Volodymyr Symonenko and his wife were going home, or what is left of it. At the train station, they shared photographs of the heavily damaged building in Hostomel, where he used to live with his wife.?

It was Feb. 24, the first day of the invasion, when Symonenko said they saw the Russian helicopters fly overhead firing missiles.?

“I wish I had a Stinger missile with me so I could take down the helicopters,” he said.

But instead they had to seek shelter in the building’s cellar for 20 days with the other residents who survived the attack.??

The retired army soldier said he was part of the Soviet army and remained with the Ukrainian armed forces after the Kremlin lost its grip on this country. He admits that he always feared Russia might want to take back this land.

After spending time in Lviv, the couple will return to Hostomel to be with their children. Their son is a member of the army.

They know the walls and windows of their apartment are damaged, but he said the roof is still intact, and that’s enough to try to rebuild their home.

Oil pumpjacks are seen in Udmurt Republic, Russia, in November 2020.

Germany is ready to agree to an oil embargo on Russian oil, according to the country’s finance minister.

“Germany stands ready for new sanctions, including an oil embargo,” Christian Lindner told CNN.

“We have prepared ourselves to be less dependent on Russian energy imports. It takes time to reduce the dependency, it was a mistake to be dependent in this way but we are making progress. We can reduce the imports, starting with coal, then oil. It will take more time to independent from Russian natural gas imports but will continue so in the end we will be completely independent from Russia,” he said.

Speaking about the negotiations on an oil embargo, Lindner said he did not want to speculate on whether EU member states, like Hungary, would have to given exemptions or carve outs from an oil embargo.

“I can assure you that Germany is ready to reduce oil imports, we know others are considering this question carefully,” he said. “We make these decisions together, it is in our best interests, all the world’s democracies share these interests, that we are staying together … we have to stay together in the European Union and trans-Atlantic partnership.”

The minister also made it clear that Germany will not pay for Russian gas in rubles.

Last week, Russia stopped shipments of gas to Poland and Bulgaria after they refused to pay in rubles. Gas distributors in Germany and Austria told CNN that they were working on ways to accept a Russian ultimatum that final payments for its gas must be made in rubles, while complying with EU sanctions. The Hungarian foreign minister also told CNN that his country will use the payment scheme put in place by Moscow to pay for its oil and gas.

Read more here.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz speaks at a press conference with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Berlin on May 2.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has appealed to Russian President Vladimir Putin to put an end to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and “the senseless killing” taking place on the ground.

Speaking at a news conference in Berlin with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday, Scholz said that what “is important is achieving a better future together, not by waging wars against each other, but by making economic development and joint development possible.”

The German chancellor also called on Putin to “withdraw his troops from Ukraine,” adding that “borders should not be changed through the use of violence.”

Gen. Valery Gerasimov, chief of staff of the Russian military, was recently in Ukraine, according to a senior US defense official.?

“We know he was in Donbas for several days beginning last week.?We don’t know if he is still there,” the official said.

The official declined to say why the US was certain about the Russian general’s location or what intelligence it has that led to the US conclusion.?

There were some reports that Gerasimov was injured while in Ukraine but the US has no indication of him being injured, the source said.

The US is uncertain why Gerasimov traveled to the Russian frontlines and whether it signals a lack of Kremlin confidence in Gen. Aleksandr Dvornikov who was appointed to command all Russian operations in Ukraine just a few weeks ago, the official said. Gerasimov’s trip however signals he wanted to see operations directly.

The?Ukrainian?Ministry of Foreign Affairs expressed solidarity with Jewish people against the background of anti-Semitic statements by Russian Foreign Minister?Sergey?Lavrov and called on the governments of all countries to further isolate Russia.

In a statement published on Monday, it said Lavrov’s comments are anti-Semitic attacks on the President of Ukraine and the Jewish people, and called it “absolutely unacceptable.”

Lavrov asserted over the weekend that Nazi dictator Adolf?Hitler?had “Jewish blood,” prompting a furious Israeli response on Monday.

“Russia is already too deep in its nonsense trying to justify the barbaric aggression against Ukraine.?In fact, the Russian Foreign Minister questioned the existence of not only the Ukrainian nation but also the Holocaust. Lavrov deliberately insulted the memory of millions of Jews who died at the hands of the Nazis during World War II,” the statement read.

Ukrainian foreign ministry called on the governments of all countries to take further steps to isolate Russian and impose an embargo on Russian oil and gas “that will deprive the Russian military machine of financial resources.”

Russian forces are continuously shelling the humanitarian headquarters in the Ukrainian town of Rubizhne in the Luhansk region, and the evacuation attempts were thwarted again,?according to a Telegram post from Serhiy Haidai, the head of the Luhansk region military administration.

He noted that the last time the evacuation vehicles reached Rubizhne was a week ago. They have rescued people and brought several tons of food.

In the other towns of Luhansk region, the situation with delivery of humanitarian aid is under control, he added.

As uncertainty continues over the progress of civilian evacuations from the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol, its mayor has said that the process is “very difficult” and dependent on Russian cooperation.

“We managed to take more than 100 people out of the bomb shelters, who are now heading to the territory controlled by Ukraine. We are waiting in hope that Russian troops will allow us to do this,” Vadym Boichenko told Ukrainian television.

CNN has confirmed that Boichenko was referring to the people evacuated Sunday from the Azovstal steel complex.

“The evacuation process is happening at a very high level, directly with the participation of the President of Ukraine and Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk. I emphasize, it is very difficult,” he said.

As for the evacuation of Ukrainian soldiers, at least several hundred of whom are still holding out at the Azovstal plant, Boichenko said, “the issue of military evacuation is a separate procedure and a separate negotiation process. It is a closed process, negotiations are underway.”

He also spoke about the so-called “filtration” centers set up by Russian forces to screen people leaving Mariupol. “Everyone who wants to leave for the territory controlled by Ukraine must go through this humiliating procedure. You need to sign up and wait.”

“On average, people wait a whole month for humiliating filtering,” Boichenko claimed. “Now we see a decrease in the flow of people arriving in Ukraine. The reason is that the Russians are creating obstacles so that people cannot leave.”

Boichenko went on to claim that at the filtration places, “men are deported to prisons and tortured. People are held there without food for two days or more, they sleep standing up.”

Acting United States ambassador to Ukraine, Kristina Kvien, arrives for her press briefing in Lviv, Ukraine, on May. 2.

The US embassy in Ukraine hopes to return to Kyiv by the end of May if conditions permit, the charge d’affaires, Kristina Kvien, said in a news conference from Lviv Monday.??

“We very much hope that the conditions will permit us to go back into Kyiv by the end of the month,” Kvien said. “We listen to the security professionals, and when they tell us we can go back, we will go back.”

The US decided to close the US Embassy in Kyiv on Feb. 14 and temporarily relocated a small number of remaining diplomatic personnel in the country to Lviv, just 10 days before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Kvien later told CNN in an interview this step would be “important symbolically” and also help “us do our jobs.”

“We’ve been doing things through?video conferencing and telephone?and WhatsApp and that’s useful?but there’s nothing like talking?directly,” she told CNN.

However, the entire embassy staff will not return together at once, Kvien said.

“We have a very large embassy?normally in Kyiv.?Obviously, we won’t all be coming?back at once. So, everyone that will be going back [in] the first group is very eager to go back. And of course,?if someone had reservations, we?would not force anyone to go,” she said Monday.

A bus convoy carrying civilians from?Mariupol, including evacuees from the Azovstal steel plant, on the way to Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, on May 2.

There is some hope for the residents of the besieged and embattled Ukrainian city of Mariupol, after an evacuation convoy got underway this morning.

But the fate of city’s vast Azovstal steel plant – the last holdout for Ukrainian resistance there – remains in the balance. While some evacuees left the plant over the weekend, shelling restarted overnight.

Here are the latest developments in the war in Ukraine:

Mariupol evacuations: An adviser to the mayor of Mariupol has said that a general evacuation of the city’s residents has begun, albeit slowly. Mariupol city council said that buses had not reached the main assembly point by Monday morning. An evacuation from the besieged city had also been planned for Sunday afternoon but did not get underway.

“Turbulent” night: After a rare period of quiet that allowed people to be evacuated from the Azovstal steel plant, the facility came under fire again on Sunday, according to a Ukrainian soldier. A Ukrainian commander inside the plant said it was a “turbulent” night. As yet there is no word on whether a second phase of that evacuation will get underway Monday.

Evacuated to a Russian-held town: Footage and photos posted over the weekend show civilians from Mariupol arriving in the Russian-held town of Bezimenne. Russia’s defense ministry said that dozens of people had been “rescued” from Azovstal, before they were taken to the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic, which has been controlled by Russian-backed separatists since 2014. While the ministry said that civilians who wished to leave for Ukrainian-held areas were “handed over to representatives of the UN and the ICRC,” it is unclear whether all were given the choice of where to go next. A?CNN investigation?in April revealed that Russian forces and allied separatist soldiers were taking Mariupol residents to a so-called “filtration center” set up in Bezimenne, where they were registered before being sent on to Russia?

Pelosi meets Polish President: US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has met Polish President Andrzej Duda on Monday. Pelosi met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv on Saturday, saying afterwards during a Congressional delegation’s visit to Poland that the visit sent “an unmistakable message to the world: that America stands firmly with our NATO allies in our support for Ukraine.”

Refugees continue to flee: At least 5.5 million people have fled Ukraine since the start of the Russian invasion in late February, according to the latest United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) data. In addition to the 5,563,959 registered refugees, at least 7.7 million people are internally displaced in Ukraine having been forced to flee their homes, according to the latest report by the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

Russia press to Sloviansk: Russian forces are pressing an offensive in the direction of Sloviansk, an important town in the Donetsk region, according to the Ukrainian military. The offensive involves heavy shelling of Ukrainian defenses, the General Staff said in its daily update. Some analysts say Russian forces have made modest territorial gains in this region over the past week, but the nearby city of Lyman remains in Ukrainian hands.

Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Archbishop of New York, visited Ukrainian refugees in Poland and Slovakia over the weekend, according to the?New York Archdiocese and tweets from Dolan’s verified account.

The Archdiocese?said last week?that the visit was meant to demonstrate solidarity with the refugees and show gratitude to their caregivers, express support for the leadership of local churches, and “[a]ssert the Christian commitment to support all those devastated by the evils of war, and to raise awareness of the human cost for this unprovoked aggression.”?

On Sunday, Dolan?tweeted about visiting a family?of refugees being cared for by a parish in Poland, a Knights of Malta care center, and a location offering hot meals. The Archbishop?also said he?visited a church in Slovakia and toured “one of the buildings that houses and distributes supplies to those in need in Ukraine.”?

Dolan is joined on the trip with a delegation of representatives from the Catholic Near East Welfare Association and other church officials, the Archdiocese said.

Mother and daughter Dina, right, and Natasha, left, from Mariupol, arrived in their own vehicle separate from a larger convoy expected later, at a registration and processing area for internally displaced people arriving from Russian-occupied territories in Ukraine, in Zaporizhzhia, on May 2.

An adviser to the mayor of Mariupol has said that the evacuation of the city’s residents has begun.

“We hope that thousands of our Mariupol residents who were stuck on the way from Mariupol to Zaporizhzhia … will get to Zaporizhzhia tonight or tomorrow morning.”

However, the evacuation appears to be making very slow progress.

Mariupol city council said that buses had not reached the main assembly point yet – a shopping center on the northwest edge of the city.

An evacuation from the besieged city had also been planned for Sunday afternoon but did not get underway.

This general evacuation is different from that involving civilians who have been trapped at the Azovstal steelworks.

As yet there is no word on whether a second phase of that evacuation will get underway Monday.

Evacuees, including civilians who left the area near the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, arrive in the Russian-held town of?Bezimenne,?in the Donetsk Region of Ukraine, on May 1.

Footage and photos posted over the weekend show civilians arriving by bus in the Russian-held town of Bezimenne – about 16 miles east of the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol – in a convoy of Russian tanks emblazoned with the letter Z and United Nations (UN) vehicles.

In the images, published by Reuters on Sunday, women, children and elderly people emerge from buses to an area lined with white tents. Some cling to bags of their belongings. One holds a cat carrier.?Soldiers in unmarked fatigues, carrying rifles, patrol the area.

One woman, an employee at Mariupol’s vast Azovstal steel plant, said that she spent weeks hiding out in the maze of Soviet-era bunkers below the facility – the last remaining holdout in the embattled city. She said that she tried earlier to escape Mariupol in evacuation corridors but was unable to leave due to the relentless shelling.?

An Azovstal steel plant employee who was evacuated from Mariupol arrives in the Russian-held village of?Bezimenne on May 1.

“The shelling was so strong at?it?kept hitting near us. At the exit?of the bomb shelter, on the top few steps one could breathe, as there was not enough oxygen. I was afraid to even walk out and breathe some fresh air,” said the employee.

Over the weekend, both Ukrainian and Russian officials said dozens of civilians were evacuated from the plant and surrounding area by the UN and International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Sunday that about 100 people were rescued from Azovstal and headed to Zaporizhzhia, and there were hopes that more would be able to leave on Monday.

Russia’s defense ministry reported that 46 people left the wider Azovstal complex on Saturday, and that 80 civilians were “rescued” from the works Sunday, before they were taken to?the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR). The ministry said that a number of these people had “voluntarily decided to stay in the DPR,” which has been controlled by Russian-backed separatists since 2014.

While the ministry claimed that civilians evacuated from Azovstal who wished to leave for Ukrainian-held areas were “handed over to representatives of the UN and the ICRC,” it is unclear whether all were given the choice of where to go next.

A CNN investigation in April revealed that Russian forces and allied separatist soldiers were taking Mariupol residents to a so-called “filtration center” set up in Bezimenne, where they were registered before being sent on to Russia – many against their will. Ukrainian government and local Mariupol officials say that tens of thousands of Ukrainian citizens have been forcibly deported to the Donetsk People’s Republic and Russia since the war began.

In April, CNN interviewed 10 people, including local Mariupol residents and their loved ones, who were taken by Russian and DPR soldiers to Russian-held towns against their will before being deported to the Russian Federation.

CNN spoke with two people who were brought to Bezimenne before being sent to Russia. They described a massive military tent, where Russian and DPR soldiers were processing hundreds of people –?they were fingerprinted, photographed, their phones searched, interrogated, passports reviewed and registered into databases.

Maxar satellite images show the tent camp in Bezimenne on March 22.

Satellite images from Maxar Technologies reviewed by CNN show a tent encampment in Bezimenne. According to Mariupol’s mayor Vadym Boichenko, it is one of four “filtration camps” that the DPR and Russia are operating around the city.

A day before, in his nightly address, Zelensky said that the government was continuing to monitor Russia’s “so-called filtration camps” near Mariupol. “The facts of deportation of our citizens to the Russian hinterland, to Siberia, and even to Vladivostok have been recorded,” he said. “Children are also deported. They hope that kids will forget where their home is, but they are from Ukraine.”

The Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits an occupying power from deporting or transferring civilian populations. Ukraine’s prosecutor general and international rights monitors have said that Russia’s forcible removal of civilians could amount to a war crime.

Moscow has continued to claim that it is evacuating civilians from dangerous regions of Ukraine. Russian Colonel-General Mikhail Mizintsev said on Saturday that more than 1 million Ukrainians, including nearly 200,000 children, had been evacuated to Russia so far, according to TASS.

Read CNN’s investigation into Russia deportations here:

An aerial view shows residential buildings that were damaged during Ukraine-Russia conflict in the southern port city of Mariupol, Ukraine April 3, 2022. Picture taken April 3, 2022. Picture taken with a drone. REUTERS/Pavel Klimov TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY

Related article Russia or die: After weeks under Putin's bombs, these Ukrainians were given only one way out

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov attends a news conference in Moscow, Russia, on April 27.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said over the weekend that Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler had “Jewish blood,” prompting a furious response from Israel on Monday.

Lavrov made the comments on Italian television on Sunday, repeating Russia’s claim that its invasion of Ukraine is to “de-Nazify” the country.

He shrugged off the fact that Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky is Jewish.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry summoned the Russian Ambassador to Israel on Monday over Lavrov’s remarks.

Dani Dayan, who chairs the Yad Vashem Holocaust remembrance site in Israel, said it was “completely unfounded” to say Hitler was of Jewish descent.

And he slammed Russia’s labelling of Ukrainians as Nazis.

Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said the remarks made by his Russian counterpart were “heinous.”

A car drives past a destroyed Russian tank on a road west of Kyiv, Ukraine, on April 7.

A quarter of the Russian battalion groups that invaded Ukraine have likely now been rendered “ineffective,” according to the UK’s Ministry of Defence.

According to its figures, Russia committed over 120 battalion tactical groups, approximately 65% of its entire ground combat strength, at the start of the invasion.

Read more on Russian military problems here:

A man ride bike near Destroyed Russian military tank near Brovary, Kyiv area, Ukraine, 15 April 2022

Related article Russia's tanks in Ukraine have a 'jack-in-the-box' design flaw

Smoke rises across the skyline following a shelling in Rubizhne, Ukraine, on April 23.

Russian forces are putting intense pressure on the front lines in Luhansk, Ukraine’s easternmost region, as part of its renewed offensive.

Fighting raged over the weekend in Luhansk, with intense gunfights breaking out street after street and towns pounded by artillery shelling. The Ukrainian military said on Sunday that it was continuing to reinforce the east amid heavy assaults and as Russia continues its two-week-old push in the country’s industrial heartland – pouring in more weapons and military equipment.

Serhiy Hayday, head of the Luhansk region military administration, told Ukrainian television on Monday that Russian forces were laying waste to villages along the front lines of the region and then pressing forward.

That scorched-earth strategy has forced Ukrainian military forces to pull back in some places, to avoid significant losses of life.

“In Kreminna, we understood that if we just held on to the land, the boys would die, and there would be no harm to the enemy, so we regrouped and left,” Hayday said.

Kreminna was abandoned in mid-April by Ukrainian forces. Hayday also ackowledged that most of the town of Rubizhne was now in Russian hands.?

“Rubizhne was destroyed very badly, but it cannot be said that they completely occupied the city, because there are lines of defense on the outskirts and our guys not only keep the defense there, but also constantly harm the enemy. “

Video and images posted Monday appear to show the aftermath of a large explosion close to an airfield in a Russian-occupied part of southern Ukraine.

The footage shows thick, dark smoke rising from the vicinity of a Russian-held airport just outside the city of Kherson at Chornobaivka.

There’s been no comment from the Ukrainian or Russian military on the cause of the explosion, but Russian positions and equipment at Chornobaivka have been hit on several previous occasions.

Last week, the Ukrainian military said that Russian forces had retreated towards Chornobaivka after suffering heavy losses.

Ukrainian?refugees?board the train to Poland from?Ukraine's port city of Odesa on April 25.

At least 5.5 million people have fled Ukraine since the start of the Russian invasion in late February, according to the latest United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) data.??

In addition to the 5,563,959 registered refugees, at least 7.7 million people are internally displaced in Ukraine having been forced to flee their homes, according to the latest report by the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

A projected 8.3 million refugees are expected to flee Ukraine, the UNHCR said Tuesday.

Days after the Russian invasion of Ukraine began, the Russian navy attacked Snake Island off the Ukrainian coast – an episode immortalized by a captured radio exchange in which the defenders told a Russian warship to “go f*** yourself” after being ordered to surrender.

Several of the defenders were thought to have been killed and were even given posthumous military awards by President Volodymyr Zelensky.?

Among those whose fate was unknown was a young soldier of the 35th?Marine Brigade called Valeriy.

It later transpired that Valeriy had been taken prisoner by the Russians, but he was then sent back to Ukraine in a prisoner exchange.

They were married at the weekend in a ceremony attended by Valeriy’s commanding officer, Maksym Zinchenko.

The Facebook page of the military unit announcing their wedding said their feelings for each other “were strengthened?by distance and time, and the separation and uncertainty gave them a real understanding that life is fragile.”

US Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi stands next to Polish President Andrzej Duda as they meet in Warsaw, Poland, on May 2.

US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi met with Polish President Andrzej Duda in Warsaw, Poland, on Monday to discuss further support for Ukraine.

Images show the pair shaking hands and sitting down for talks alongside a Congressional delegation.

The visit comes shortly after Pelosi made an unannounced trip to the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on Saturday, becoming the most senior US official to meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky since the war broke out more than two months ago.

In a statement on Sunday, Pelosi said the meetings with Duda would be “focused on further strengthening our partnership, offering our gratitude for Poland’s humanitarian leadership, and discussing how we can further work together to support Ukraine.”

Two Russian Raptor patrol boats were destroyed near Snake Island by a Ukrainian Bayraktar drone Monday morning local time, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense reported, citing the head of the Armed Forces General.?

“Two Russian Raptor patrol boats were destroyed in the early hours of this morning near Snake [Zmiinyi] Island. #Bayraktar works! Together to Victory!” the MOD tweeted.?

Video of the drone targeting one of the Raptor patrol boats near the island in the Black Sea was included in the MOD post.?

The Bayraktar TB-2 is a Turkish-designed armed drone that has been used to considerable effect by the Ukrainian Armed Forces against Russian targets.

Moscow is yet to confirm or react to the claim.

Read more on Snake Island here:

Related article First on CNN: Satellite image shows damage to Snake Island

New Zealand Foreign Affairs Minister Nanaia Mahuta in Wellington, New Zealand, on March 7.

New Zealand’s government announced further sanctions against Russia on Monday, targeting members of the political elite, as well as the country’s defense sector.?

The new round of sanctions target 170 members of the Federation Council — the upper house of Russia’s parliament.

They also include six companies and organizations, “which have contributed to the assault” in Ukraine, according to a government statement on Monday.

The country also extended the “full suite” of prohibitions to over 400 people previously captured by its travel bans, without specifying details.?

A satellite image shows an overview of the destruction at the?Azovstal?steel plant in Mariupol, Ukraine, on April 29.

A Ukrainian commander inside the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol said his men experienced a turbulent night after the first batch of evacuees were able to leave the plant on Sunday.

It is unclear whether another batch of civilians trapped inside the complex will be able to leave on Monday.

“I will not say anything about the evacuation from Azovstal. We are trying our best to do it, we are begging for it,” Shleha said.

He said there are about 200 people, including 20 children, left on the premises.

Shleha also spoke of the need to get the remaining fighters out of the plant.

“After the evacuation of civilians and the wounded, it is necessary to resolve issues with the garrison. Our men did everything possible and impossible for the state of the world during these 68 days,” he said.

Ukrainian Army medical units unload a shell-shocked and concussed soldier at a medical facility in Kramatorsk, Ukraine, on April 29.

Russian forces are pressing an offensive in the direction of Sloviansk, an important town in the Donetsk region, according to the Ukrainian military.

The offensive involves heavy shelling of Ukrainian defenses, the General Staff said in its daily update.

Some analysts say Russian forces have made modest territorial gains in this region over the past week, but Lyman remains in Ukrainian hands.

The General Staff said Russian forces were attacking a large number of towns in the Luhansk region, and had tried to improve their positions around the town of Popasna by moving one battalion tactical group from Mariupol.

Altogether 10 attacks in Donetsk and Luhansk had been repulsed and Ukrainian forces had destroyed a wide variety of Russian hardware, it claimed.

Three people in Luhansk were killed as heavy shelling persisted in Lysychansk, Zolote and Popasna, according to Serhiy Hayday, head of Luhansk’s military administration.

Heavy prolonged shelling prevented a full-fledged evacuation, he said.

In areas of southern Ukraine where fighting continues, Russian forces were looking for weaknesses in Ukrainian defenses to the south of Mykolaiv as they try to extend their control to the whole of the Kherson region, which borders Crimea, the General Staff said.

Parts of southern Zaporizhzhia have also seen heavy fighting. The regional command said Monday that “the enemy tried to break through in small groups with the support of armored vehicles, tanks and artillery, but failed.”

The towns of Polohy and Orikhiv were among those targeted with shelling, it said.

It also claimed that Russian forces were forcing farmers “under the barrels of machine guns” to sell grain at a steep discount.

There has also been an uptick in attacks on grain stores and elevators.

Valentyn Reznichenko, head of the Dnipropetrovsk regional state administration, said Monday that a grain warehouse had been destroyed in the?Synelnykove district.

In this image provided by the International Committee of the Red Cross, a Red Cross official waves a white flag while approaching the Azovstal steelworks in Mariupol, Sunday.

A convoy supported by the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross will attempt to leave Mariupol on Monday, the city council said in a Telegram post.

The convoy will collect civilians at several pickup points around Mariupol before taking them to two villages near the southern Ukrainian city of Berdiansk, according to the city council.??

Civilian evacuations from Mariupol — which has endured weeks of Russian shelling and airstrikes — were paused by local authorities on Sunday for “security reasons.”

Before the pause, some 100 people were successfully evacuated from the besieged Azovstal steelworks. According to recent estimates, roughly 100,000 civilians still remain in the city.?

Last week during a one-on-one meeting with UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres in Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed in principle to allow the UN and Red Cross to assist in civilian evacuations from Mariupol.?

The South Korean ambassador to Ukraine, alongside some members of staff from the embassy in Kyiv, returned to the city on Saturday and will restart operations on Monday, South Korea’s foreign ministry said.

Ambassador Kim Hyung-tae and the staff members returned to the capital from Chernivtsi, in western Ukraine. The city was one of the two locations where the embassy has been operating temporary offices.

The remaining embassy workers in Chernivtsi and Romania may gradually return to Kyiv, depending on the local situation, the ministry added.

South Korea’s embassy moved out of Kyiv on March 2 because of escalating violence around the capital region and began working from temporary offices in the Ukrainian cities of Lviv and Chernivtsi. The offices in Lviv closed on March 18.

The foreign ministry said there are also temporary offices in Romania.

Russia’s Belgorod region, which borders Ukraine, was hit by two explosions in the early hours of Monday morning, governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said in a Telegram post.?

Monday’s explosions come after a large fire broke out at a Russian Ministry of Defense military installation in Belgorod on Sunday. The cause of the incident was unclear.?

Russian officials have repeatedly accused Ukraine of mounting cross border attacks on fuel depots and military installations, claims which Ukrainian government agencies say are intended to stoke “anti-Ukrainian sentiment.”

First Lady Jill Biden delivers remarks during the Council of Chief State School Officers' 2022 National and State Teachers of the Year event, in the White House, on Apr. 27

First lady Jill Biden will travel to Romania and Slovakia this week in a show of support for displaced Ukrainian families forced to flee bloodshed and violence in their home country in the wake of Russia’s invasion.?

Biden will also use the trip to meet with members of the United States military stationed overseas, as well as top-level government officials in both countries, according to a release from the White House East Wing.?

Her itinerary: The first lady will leave Washington for Romania on Thursday, stopping first at Mihail Kogalniceau Airbase on Friday, where she will meet service members before heading to the capital city of Bucharest on Saturday.?

In Bucharest: Biden will hold meetings with members of the Romanian government, as well as humanitarian aid workers. After Poland, Romania has seen the largest influx of Ukrainian refugees as a result of the crisis, with hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians crossing the border into the country since the war began three months ago.?

She will also spend time in Bucharest with educators who are helping teach displaced Ukrainian children.

In Bratislava: Biden will then travel to Slovakia, where she will meet US embassy staff before leaving the following day for Kosice and Vysne Nemecke, Slovakia, to meet Ukrainian refugees and Slovakians who have opened their homes to families from Ukraine. More than 250,000 Ukrainians have fled to Slovakia, a country of more than five million residents.?

Wrapping up: On Monday, May 9, Biden will wrap up her trip by meeting members of the Slovakian government before leaving for the US.?

The trip will be the First Lady’s second solo foreign trip; in July she went to Japan to attend the opening ceremony of the Olympics.

The Azovstal steel plant in the besieged city of Mariupol came under fire after about 100 civilians were evacuated on Sunday, according to a Ukrainian soldier. It’s estimated hundreds of Ukrainian civilians – dozens of whom are injured – are still trapped in the ruins of the plant.

Here are the latest developments in the war in Ukraine:

Evacuations from Mariupol to resume: The Ukrainian government will continue to evacuate people from Mariupol on Monday, starting at around 8 a.m. local time, the Mariupol City Council said. Evacuations were paused over Sunday night due to “security reasons.”

Shelling of Azovstal threatens evacuations: After a rare period of quiet that allowed about 100 people to be evacuated, the Azovstal steel complex came under fire again Sunday night, according to a Ukrainian soldier. It’s unclear whether the renewed shelling will jeopardize the next stage of the evacuation, due on Monday. The evacuation effort is being coordinated by the UN and the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Pelosi to meet Polish President: US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is set to meet Polish President?Andrzej Duda on Monday. Pelosi met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv on Saturday, saying afterwards during a Congressional delegation’s?visit to Poland?that the visit sent “an unmistakable message to the world: that America stands firmly with our NATO allies in our support for Ukraine.”

Russia shells Kharkiv: Three people were killed and eight injured by Russian shelling in the Kharkiv region on Sunday, according to Oleg Sinegubov, head of the regional military administration. Russian forces have been trying to push south and west from the Izium area, much of which they captured a month ago.

Large fires in Belgorod: Social media video shows fires and columns of black smoke rising from a site near Belgorod in Russia near the Ukrainian border. The governor of the Belgorod region, Vyascheslav Gladkov, said on Telegram that a fire had broken out at a Ministry of Defense facility.

“Catastrophic effect” on global food prices:?Samantha Power, the administrator of the US Agency for International Development, said on Sunday the impacts of Russia’s war in Ukraine include global food shortages and rising prices. She said “our job is to look at it globally” when asked if the worldwide consequences are reflective of a brewing world war.?

Civilians who left the area near the Azovstal?steel?plant in Mariupol at a temporary accommodation centre in the village of Bezimenne in the Donetsk region of Ukraine on May 1.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Sunday about 100 civilians had been evacuated from the Azovstal steel plant, the last Ukrainian holdout in the besieged city of Mariupol, following weeks of heavy Russian bombardment.

Here’s what we know about the situation:

Read more on the situation?in Mariupol here.

A long convoy of vehicles attempting to drive north toward the city of Kryvyi Rih, Ukraine, on May 1.

Hundreds of people who had fled their homes in Russian-occupied Kherson were seen evacuating in a convoy of vehicles Sunday afternoon driving north toward the city of Kryvyi Rih.?

A CNN team on the ground in southern Ukraine counted at least 120 cars coming up through the town of Kochubeivka. Some vehicles had white cloths wrapped around the door handles and side mirrors, while others had banners with the word “children” written on them.

Olga, 17, told CNN her family began their journey early in the morning, for a second time. The first time they tried, it was forbidden to leave, she said.

“I was scared, but there were few checkpoints,” she added about the route to evacuate.

Olga, 17, told CNN her family began their journey early in the morning.

Olga said shops in Kherson were empty, and noted cellphone and internet connections had been cut around 9:15 p.m. on Saturday evening.

The CNN team saw families crammed into cars, many with elderly parents; other evacuees were seen shielding their pets, as artillery fire could be heard in the background and smoke billowed into the sky.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky meets US Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Rep. Jim McGovern, Rep. Gregory Meeks and Rep. Adam Schiff on April 30, in Kyiv, Ukraine.

US?House Intelligence?Committee?Chairman?Adam Schiff detailed the roughly three-hour discussion members of the Congressional?delegation to Kyiv had with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky?Sunday, and said he thinks “it’s only a matter of time” before US President Joe Biden visits Ukraine.

Schiff said the meeting with Zelensky focused on what his priorities are for further assistance, especially as Ukrainians enter a new phase of the war?with more concentrated fighting in the eastern part of the country. Members of the delegation subsequently relayed the information to Biden on the call, Schiff said, and made recommendations to?the President.

Asked what Zelensky thought about the $33 billion price tag Biden requested in his supplemental aid request for Ukraine to Congress, Schiff said: “It’s his job to say that nothing is enough and, you know, we understand that, we respect that. Nonetheless, I think he’s very grateful for what we’re doing.”

Schiff said they discussed a variety of issues, including ensuring he’s getting the military equipment he needs and is getting it quickly. They discussed the?humanitarian crisis, refugees, war crimes, and he said, “I?wanted to make sure as the intelligence chair that he’s getting the intelligence that he needs.”

Schiff said members of the delegation wanted to communicate to Zelensky at the meeting a message of support because, “If Russia can get away with this, this naked aggression, this invasion of their neighbor, you know, what’s to make us think they’ll stop with Ukraine.”

A plant of?the Azovstal?steel works in the southern port city of Mariupol, Ukraine, on April 29.

After a rare period of quiet that allowed about 100 people to be evacuated, the Azovstal steel complex in Mariupol came under fire again Sunday night, according to a Ukrainian soldier in Mariupol.

They were using “all kinds of weapons,” he claimed.?

It’s unclear whether the renewed shelling will jeopardize the next stage of the evacuation from Azovstal, which is due Monday. It’s estimated hundreds of Ukrainian civilians are still trapped in the ruins of the plant.??

Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister, Iryna Vereshchuk, said “hundreds of civilians remain blocked in Azovstal together with the defenders of Mariupol. The situation has become a sign of a real humanitarian catastrophe, because people are running out of water, food and medicine,” she said.

The Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, said in an interview on Italian television Sunday the “Kyiv authorities are trying by all means to achieve the withdrawal of the Ukrainian radicals remaining in Azovstal, since among them there may be Western officers and mercenaries.”

There’s been no firm evidence western nationals are among the fighters at Azovstal.

US Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi during her meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv, Ukraine, on April 30.

US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says a Congressional delegation’s visit to Poland sends “an unmistakable message to the world: that America stands firmly with our NATO allies in our support for Ukraine.”

Pelosi said the delegation was able to meet with troops from the US Army’s 82nd?Airborne Division in Poland, and is looking forward to meeting Polish President?Andrzej Duda on Monday.