September 17, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

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The infrastructure of at least 30 areas across the country was damaged due to Russian attacks on Saturday, according to the Ukrainian military.?

“The enemy struck military and civilian facilities on the territory of Ukraine four times with missiles, 15 times with aviation and more than 20 times with multiple-launch rocket systems,” Oleksandr Shtupun, spokesperson of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine spokesman, said in a video briefing.

Shtupun said most areas affected by Russian attacks were Kharkiv, Siversk, Druzhkivka, Kostiantynivka, New York, Marinka, Krasnohorivka, Poltavka, Kryvyi Rih, Zaporizhzhia, Nikopol, Orikhiv, Myrolyubivka and Ochakiv.

At the same time, Ukrainian aviation struck 10 areas “of concentration of enemy manpower and equipment and three positions of anti-aircraft missile systems,” Shtupun added.

He didn’t specify the location of those areas.

For the first time, Finland and Sweden attended the Chiefs of Defence meeting at the NATO Military Committee Conference, according to a readout of the meeting from the US Defense Department.

Meeting in Talinn, Estonia, on Saturday, the NATO military officials “discussed military strategic developments within the Alliance, to include implementation measures for decisions agreed upon during the NATO Madrid Summit in June 2022,” according to the statement.

Finland — which shares a land border with Russia — and Sweden applied for membership in the 30-nation alliance, abandoning decades of foreign policy neutrality in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

NATO allies signed their accession protocol this summer to allow the two countries to join, and it must be ratified by the parliaments of all its members before Finland and Sweden can be protected by the NATO defense clause, which considers an attack on one member an attack against all.

Only three countries have yet to ratify the addition of Finland and Sweden into NATO: Hungary, Slovakia and Turkey.

A Russian serviceman patrols the territory of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Station in Energodar on May 1, 2022.

Today, the International Atomic Energy Agency said that one of the main power lines in the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant was repaired and is once again supplying the plant with electricity from the Ukrainian grid.

Ukraine relies heavily on nuclear power – about half of its electricity comes from 15 nuclear reactors at four plants across the country, according to the World Nuclear Association.

The Russian-controlled plant, with six reactors, is the largest nuclear power station in Europe. It was mostly built in the Soviet era and became Ukrainian property after its declaration of independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.

The Zaporizhzhia plant is located on the eastern bank of the Dnipro river in Ukraine. The area, and the nuclear complex, has been under Russian control?since the beginning of the war, but the plant is still mostly?operated by Ukrainian workers.

Each of Zaporizhzhia’s reactors would cost $7 billion to replace, making the plant a target for Russians to capture undamaged, with hopes of serving its own electricity market, according to analysis by defense and security intelligence firm Janes. Should Russia keep it, Ukraine would lose 20% of its domestic electricity generating capacity.

What does its position on the front line mean?

Shelling in the surrounding towns as well as near the power plant has been common, according to local reports.

Both Ukraine and Russia have accused each other of shelling the site. CNN cannot independently verify either government’s claims.

The international community has been on high alert about nuclear safety, yet experts believe?a Chernobyl-style disaster is unlikely. Yet risks remain, one of which is potential damage to nuclear waste stored openly on site – in ponds of water and in casks, according to Petro Kotin, president of Energoatom, which runs nuclear power plants in Ukraine.

IAEA visit

On Sept. 1, a team from the IAEA visited the plant for the first time since Russia’s invasion on Feb. 24. The team saw damage to the roofs of various buildings, to the special building that houses fresh nuclear fuel and solid radioactive waste storage facility. They also witnessed shelling during the visit and called on both sides to cease hostilities in the area.

IAEA head Rafael Grossi has since called for a nuclear safety zone around the plant and surrounding area. Two IAEA members remain at the site.

Russian forces are preparing retreat routes from the Kherson region, Ukraine’s military claimed in an update Saturday.

In today’s update, a Ukrainian military spokesperson claimed Russians sunk nine?railway cars?to construct a crossing in the city of Kakhovka.

Kherson is considered crucial to controlling Ukraine’s southern coast and access to the Black Sea. It was one of the first areas to be occupied by Russian forces when they invaded nearly seven months ago.

Last week, Ukraine claimed it had inflicted further losses on Russian forces in the south, including in Kherson.

Senior US and Ukrainian officials told CNN earlier this month that Kyiv set an ambitious goal of taking back most of Russian-occupied Kherson by the end of the year.

These are the latest areas of Russian and Ukrainian control in Russia’s war in Ukraine.

This month brought huge strategic losses for the Kremlin as Ukraine carried out counteroffensives in the northeast and south. Ukraine’s military has?recaptured a total of 8,000 square kilometers?(about 3,088 square miles) of land, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Wednesday.

A Russian all-terrain armored vehicle is parked outside the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant during the visit of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) expert mission on September 1.?

One of the four main power lines in the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant has been repaired and is once again supplying the plant with electricity from the Ukrainian grid, according to a statement from the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog.

“Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) is once again receiving electricity directly from the national grid after engineers repaired one of the four main external power lines that have all been damaged during the conflict,” International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Grossi confirmed Saturday.

Grossi said that the restored line is now “providing Europe’s largest nuclear power plant with the electricity it needs for reactor cooling and other essential safety functions.”

“With the main line’s re-connection yesterday afternoon, the three back-up power lines are again being held in reserve,” according to the IAEA. “The three other main external 750 kV (kilovolt) power lines that were lost earlier during the conflict remain down.”?

“All the ZNPP’s six reactors are in a cold shutdown state, but they still require power to maintain necessary safety functions,” Grossi added, according to the statement.

He also warned that the situation around the plant is still dangerous.

On Friday, Ukraine’s state nuclear company Energoatom said it delivered urgently needed parts to “repair the damaged power lines as well as additional fuel supplies for the plant’s emergency diesel generators that can be used as a back-up power source.”

Some background: Grossi called for a safety zone around the nuclear plant after he and his team visited the Russian-held site earlier this month.

The plant and the area around it, including the nearby city of Enerhodar, endured persistent shelling that has raised fears of a nuclear accident. Each side accuses the other of acts of nuclear terrorism, and CNN has been unable to verify either government’s claims.

Two members of the 14-person IAEA team remained behind as part of the agency’s plan to establish?a continuous presence at the plant.

In his Friday night address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the exhumation of bodies at a mass burial site in Izium was continuing.

“As of now, more than 440 graves have been identified. It is too early to speak about the total number of people buried there, [but] the investigation continues,” the president said.??

He also said a number of civilians, including foreigners, who were held against their will by Russian forces in occupied cities and towns, have been found alive.?

Zelensky said seven students from the Republic of Sri Lanka were among foreigners who were rescued. They were studying in Kupiansk Medical College but were captured by Russian soldiers back in March and held in a basement, he claimed.

Zelesnky said investigations are also underway in other recaptured areas of Ukraine.

Speaking about the Russian forces, Zelensky said “evidence of their guilt is being collected.”??

Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrive for the 2017 BRICS Summit in Xiamen, China on September 5, 2017.

India and China — the biggest customers of Russian oil — both said they have “concerns” this week over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In a striking rebuke on Friday, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who had remained quiet about the war, told Russian President Vladimir Putin that “today’s era is not of war.”

Putin was quoted by the Kremlin as telling the Indian leader, “I know your position regarding the conflict in Ukraine, your concerns which you continuously express. We will do everything for all of this to end as soon as possible.”

Modi’s apparent criticism of Russia’s invasion is only the latest setback for Putin, whose forces have suffered a series of major defeats on the battlefield in recent weeks. Ukraine claims to have recaptured some 8,000 square kilometers (about 3,000 square miles) of territory.

Just a day earlier, during a meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping,?Putin acknowledged Beijing’s “questions and concerns” about the conflict.

Some background: China has so far refused to outright condemn Russia’s attack on Ukraine while?stepping up economic assistance to its neighbor, boosting bilateral trade to record levels in a boon to Russian business amid Western sanctions.

New Delhi, like Beijing, has?strong ties with Moscow?dating back to the Cold War and so far has largely steered clear of condemning outright the invasion by Russia, which remains India’s biggest arms supplier.

US reaction: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday said that the concerns of China and India are reflective of global apprehension about the months-long conflict, and said he believes “it increases the pressure on Russia to end the aggression.”

“I think what you’re seeing is just a manifestation of the fact that this aggression has been an aggression against the interests of people across the planet,” Blinken said at a press conference at the State Department.

CNN’s Jennifer Hansler contributed reporting to this post.

Paul Whelan, a former US marine accused of espionage and arrested in Russia in December 2018, stands inside a defendants' cage as he waits to hear his verdict in Moscow on June 15, 2020.

Paul Whelan’s sister said she has “complete faith” that the White House “is fully engaged” in the effort to free her brother after meeting with US President Joe Biden Friday.

In a statement released this morning, Elizabeth Whelan also called on the Russian government to “engage in full faith, and free Paul Whelan.”

Paul Whelan has been imprisoned in Russia for more than three years after being convicted on espionage charges that he vehemently denies. He was sentenced in June 2020 to 16 years in prison in a trial US officials denounced as unfair.

Where the negotiations stand: A senior administration official told CNN Thursday that there has been “movement but not breakthrough” on the efforts to free Whelan and WNBA star Brittney Griner.

The official said that the United States has urged Russia to put forward “a serious counteroffer” to the proposal on the table to secure the release of the two, but “we’ve not gotten a serious response back.”

Cherelle Griner, wife of WNBA player Brittney Griner, speaks during a news conference in Chicago on July 8.

After meeting with US President Joe Biden Friday, the wife of WNBA star Brittney?Griner?said the White House visit was reassuring at a time of increasing concern for her partner’s well-being.

Cherelle Griner?said the conversation with Biden, which lasted over an hour, gave her more confidence in the administration’s efforts behind the scenes.

“It wasn’t a meeting where the President told me the news that I want to hear,” she told CNN. “It wasn’t that, but it was one of those still pivotal meetings where … it?allowed me to have confidence in what he’s doing right now.”

Cherelle said she continues to hear from her wife in letters, but that Brittney has been affected mentally and physically.

Individual graves are seen throughout the site, some with names and numbers handwritten on the wooden crosses. One grave CNN saw had the number as high as 398.

Even the heavy rainfall couldn’t erase the smell of death in the pine forest in Izium on Friday afternoon, as Ukrainian investigators worked their way through a mass burial site found in the eastern Ukrainian city after its?recapture from?Russian forces.

Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said at least 440 graves were found in the city in recent days. The country’s President Volodymyr?Zelensky?said Friday that some of the bodies found in Izium showed “signs of torture,” blaming Russia for what he called “cruelty and terrorism.”

When CNN arrived to the mass burial site on Friday afternoon, officials were transporting body bags, including one that appeared to be holding something very small, into a refrigerated truck.

Most graves at the burial site are individual graves, with wooden crosses placed at the head of the dirt mounds. Some with names and numbers handwritten on them. One had a number as high as 398. Another with the name of an 82-year-old man. One official at the site told CNN that investigations would have to determine when these people died.

Further down in the forest lies what appeared to be a former military position, with tank positions dug deep into the ground.

A policeman at the scene told CNN that the spot is a mass grave where 17 bodies were found.

Ukraine’s Center for Strategic Communications said on Thursday that some of the graves discovered at Izium were “fresh,” and that the corpses buried there were “mostly civilians.”

An Izium resident living across the street from the mass burial site told CNN the Russians first hit a nearby city graveyard with an airstrike and then moved in.

“They brought their special machines. They dug some trenches for their vehicles. We only heard how they were destroying the forest,” Nadezhda Kalinichenko told CNN.

She said she tried not to go out during the time the city was under the Russian occupation because she was too scared.

Some background: Izium was subject to intense Russian artillery attacks in April. The city, which sits near the border between the Kharkiv and Donetsk regions, became an important hub for the invading military during five months of occupation. Ukrainian forces took back control of the city on Saturday, delivering a strategic blow to Russia’s military assault in the east.

Mass burial site in Izyum, Ukraine. (Office of the President of Ukraine)

Related article Some bodies found at mass burial site in Izium show 'signs of torture,' Ukraine says | CNN

Brittney Griner (left) and Paul Whelan

US President Joe Biden?met separately with the families of Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan at the White House on Friday, marking his first time personally meeting with them since their loved ones were detained in Russia.

Biden reiterated “his continued commitment to working through all available avenues to bring Brittney and Paul home safely,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement on Friday.

Some background: Griner was detained in February for carrying vape cartridges containing cannabis oil in her luggage. The two-time US Olympic basketball gold medalist pleaded guilty to drug charges and said she accidentally packed the drugs while in a hurry. She has been sentenced to nine years, along with a fine of about $16,400. Her legal team in Russia has appealed the sentence.

Whelan has been imprisoned in Russia for more than three years after being convicted on espionage charges that he vehemently denies. He was sentenced in June 2020 to 16 years in prison in a trial US officials denounced as unfair.