Russia's war in Ukraine

For women and children stuck in the bunker of the Azovstal steelworks, daylight is a rarity.

"I want to get out of here and see the sun. We’ve been here for two months now and I want to see the sun," said one boy.

As the barrage of Mariupol continues, the plant is among the last significant holdouts of Ukrainian forces in the city and is sheltering hundreds of soldiers and civilians.

"Because they switch the lights on and off here. When they rebuild our houses we can live in peace. Let Ukraine win this war because Ukraine is our dear home," he added.

Some background: Ukrainian officials have said more than 100,000 people still remain in Mariupol. The Russian government claims to control the strategic port, but Ukrainian fighters remain holding out in the city's massive Azovstal steelworks.

On Friday, Russian troops also continued to launch air strikes on Mariupol and ​restrict Ukrainian units in the area of the Azovstal plant.

The situation at the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol is “close to a catastrophe," Yuriy Ryzhenkov, the CEO of the company that owns the plant, told CNN on Thursday.

Ryzhenkov said originally there had been enough supplies for two to three weeks but they were almost eight weeks into the blockade. He added that those still there “were not giving up.” 

Evacuation corridor "thwarted": The evacuation of civilians from the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol has been "thwarted" by the Russian military, an adviser to the mayor of Mariupol said on his official Telegram account Saturday. 

At 11 a.m. local time (4 a.m. ET) Saturday, at least 200 residents had gathered near a shopping center in Mariupol, waiting to be evacuated to Zaporizhzhia. But "instead of the buses promised by the Russian side, the Russian military approached the Mariupol residents and ordered them to leave because 'there will be shelling now,'" Petro Andriushchenko said. 

Russian opposition leader. Anti-corruption campaigner. Assassination attempt survivor. Prisoner.

Alexey Navalny's crusade against the Kremlin has brought him many labels.

And with the eyes of the world now on Russian President Vladimir Putin amid his brutal invasion of Ukraine, Navalny's message of resistance is finding new weight inside and outside of Russia, even as he remains behind bars.

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing," he says, reprising the famous quote of unknown origin, in the new CNN film "Navalny," which premieres this Sunday, April 24, at 9 p.m. ET on CNN. "So don't be inactive."

Here's what you need to know about Navalny's political rise, attempted assassination and future in Russia:

Rise to prominence Navalny first gained visibility in 2008, when he started blogging about alleged corruption within Russian state-run companies. By 2011, he had emerged as one of the leaders of the massive protests that had broken out after allegations of fraud in parliamentary elections.

"Those who have gathered here can kick these thieved ass***** out of the Kremlin tomorrow," Navalny said at one 2011 protest.

He posted his first YouTube video, a step-by-step instruction guide showing how to build an "agitation cube," a boxlike tent structure with his image emblazoned on the side, in July 2013. The clip marked the start of the Russian dissident's campaign to be elected Moscow mayor, and the humble beginning of his YouTube revolution.

But his movement was blunted when he was convicted on embezzlement charges, just as he was preparing to run for mayor. Navalny has denied the charges and called them politically motivated. A retrial in 2017 barred him from running for public office — this time for president against Putin.

While Navalny is most well known as an activist, it's his investigations that have been the biggest thorn in the side of some of Russia's powerful people. His videos about the apparent unexplained wealth of top government officials have particularly raised the ire of the Kremlin.

One video about former Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev drew more than 35 million views on YouTube.

But with increased results came increased risks. In March 2017, that video lit a spark under the biggest anti-government protests Russia had seen in years. Thousands joined rallies in almost 100 cities across Russia. Navalny himself was arrested and jailed for 15 days.

The following month, he was splashed with an antiseptic green dye, damaging his vision in one eye.

"Listen, I've got something very obvious to tell you. You're not allowed to give up. If they decide to kill me, it means that we are incredibly strong," Navalny said to his supporters in the CNN film.

Poisoning and recovery By 2020, there were signs that the ground was shifting beneath Navalny's opposition movement.

The Kremlin had taken on a more publicly confrontational posture toward its chief critic, culminating in accusations of a poisoning attempt in August of that year.

Navalny had started feeling unwell on a return flight to Moscow from the Siberian city of Tomsk. Loud groaning can be heard in video footage apparently recorded on the flight he took. More video apparently recorded through the airplane window showed an immobile man being taken by wheeled stretcher to a waiting ambulance.

Navalny was treated at a Berlin hospital, and the German government later concluded he had been poisoned with a chemical nerve agent from the Novichok group.

A joint investigation by CNN and the group Bellingcat implicated the Russian Security Service (FSB) in Navalny's poisoning, piecing together how an elite unit at the agency had followed Navalny's team throughout a trip to Siberia, when Navalny fell ill from exposure to Novichok.

The investigation also found that this unit, which included chemical weapons experts, had followed Navalny on more than 30 trips to and from Moscow since 2017. Russia denies involvement in Navalny's poisoning. Putin himself said in December that if Russian security services had wanted to kill Navalny, they "would have finished" the job.

Nevertheless, several Western officials and Navalny himself have openly blamed the Kremlin.

"It's impossible to believe it. It's kind of stupid that the whole idea of poisoning with a chemical weapon, what the f**k?" Navalny says in the new CNN film. "This is why this is so smart, because even reasonable people they refuse to believe like, what? Come on ... poisoned? Seriously?"

News that Navalny had fallen gravely ill sent a fresh shock wave through Russian society, raising worrying parallels with some of the more brazen political killings in Russia's recent past.

Western governments, independent researchers and Russia watchers have noted a consistent pattern of Russian state involvement in assassinations both inside Russia and abroad.

Click here to read the full story.

Tune in tomorrow at 9 p.m. ET to watch the CNN Film “Navalny” on CNN.

The evacuation of civilians from the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol has been "thwarted" by the Russian military, an adviser to the mayor of Mariupol said on his official Telegram account Saturday. 

At 11 a.m. local time (4 a.m. ET) Saturday, at least 200 residents had gathered near a shopping center in Mariupol, waiting to be evacuated to Zaporizhzhia. But "instead of the buses promised by the Russian side, the Russian military approached the Mariupol residents and ordered them to leave because 'there will be shelling now,'" Petro Andriushchenko said. 

The Russian military brought buses to another location about 200 meters away from the agreed evacuation point, and when residents had already been loaded on the buses, they were told they'll be evacuated to the city of Dokuchaevsk, "i.e. in the occupied territories," Andriushchenko said. 

"Yes, once again, the Russians disrupted the evacuation. Brazenly using the efforts of Mariupol residents to return home and the honesty of the Ukrainian army in a ceasefire to organize their own plans," he added. 

The Ukrainian parliament also tweeted that the evacuation was "disrupted."

"About 200 Mariupol residents were going to leave, but when they arrived at the assembly point, the [Russian] military told them to disperse because 'there will be shelling now'," according to the parliament's official account. 

Five civilians died and 18 were wounded in Russian missile strikes on the southern port city of Odesa, according to a senior Ukrainian official, as another official denounced them as "Easter gifts from Putin."


"Five Ukrainian citizens were killed and 18 wounded," Andriy Yermak, the head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, said in a statement. "These are only those who were found. And most likely, there will be more."

Yermak said one of the dead was a 3-month-old baby, adding: "A child who had to celebrate his first Easter with his parents. Nothing is sacred. Absolutely. Evil will be punished."

Many Ukrainians celebrate Easter according to the Julian calendar, with Easter Sunday falling this year on April 24.

Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to the minister of internal affairs of Ukraine, said Russian forces launched at least six cruise missiles at Odesa.

"City residents heard the blasts in different districts of the city. These were the rockets strikes as well as the work of our air-defense system," he said.

Gerashchenko added that at least one missile had landed and exploded, residential buildings were hit and one person was burned inside their car in the yard of one of the buildings.

​Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba condemned the strikes, saying, "The only aim of Russian missile strikes on Odesa is terror. Russia must be designated a state sponsor of terrorism and treated accordingly. No business, no contacts, no cultural projects. We need a wall between civilization and barbarians striking peaceful cities with missiles."

Ukrainian officials have warned of potential Russian attacks during Easter holiday observances in Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin recently claimed Russian forces have "liberated" the Azov Sea port of Mariupol, although Ukrainian defenders are holding out in a massive steel works in the city. 

Ukraine's Air Command South said in a separate statement that missiles also struck a military facility and were launched by Russian bombers:

While in prison, Kremlin critic Alexey Navalny used social media to denounce the Russian invasion of Ukraine, advocating for anti-war protests across the country as "the backbone of the movement against war and death," according to Reuters.

In a tweet, Navalny said: "I am very grateful to everyone for their support. And, guys, I want to say: the best support for me and other political prisoners is not sympathy and kind words, but actions. Any activity against the deceitful and thievish Putin's regime. Any opposition to these war criminals."

Thousands in Russia have been detained for anti-war demonstrations in the weeks since, including in Moscow and St. Petersburg. 

One young woman CNN met on the margins of the first night of protest last month was near tears explaining that she loves Russia but not her leader, and so has concluded she must leave the country.

There is real frustration in that generation, but they are a minority — less than 10% of the nation.

​Indeed, the latest polling by the Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM), a state-owned but nevertheless internationally respected organization, found that 68% of people say they support the decision to carry out the "special military operation," which Putin had announced alongside false accusations of Nazism and genocide in Ukraine; 22% oppose it and 10% had difficulty answering.

It is a sobering assessment that when Putin puts his finger in the wind of public opinion, he can be reasonably sure it is blowing in the direction he instructed his state organs to set it.

"We need to utilize this power, to not give up, to remember we are a huge power that is being oppressed by these bad dudes. We don't realize how strong we actually are," he said.

Click here to read the full story.

Tune in tomorrow at 9 p.m. ET to watch the CNN Film “Navalny” on CNN.

Valentyn Reznichenko, head of the Dnipropetrovsk regional military administration, said Saturday that a Russian strike hit a gas pipe on the outskirts of a village in the region.

"We have an 'arrival' in the Dnieper district," Reznichenko said on Telegram. "The rocket landed on the outskirts of a village and left a huge funnel more than 4 meters deep in the ground. A low-pressure gas pipe was damaged. Specialists are at work on the scene."

Rezhnichenko said there were no casualties.

"The occupiers continue to target 'strategic' targets," he said. "'Demilitarize' our fields and gardens."

Europe is discussing a sixth round of sanctions on Russia, including a hit on Russia's energy market, a top official from the European Commission and Lithuania’s finance minister said on Friday.

European Commissioner for Trade Valdis Dombrovskis said one of the issues under consideration concerns an oil embargo. There have been discussions about “smart sanctions” that might include tariffs rather than a full embargo at first.

“So there may be some nuances, but this work is ongoing,” Dombrovskis told reporters in Washington, DC. 

In a separate interview with CNN in the US capital, Lithuanian Finance Minister Gintarė Skaistė said she discussed a possible next tranche of sanctions with US Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo.  

Skaistė said the sanctions must be coordinated for them to have an impact. “If we won’t agree on the sanctions together, the United States with all Western allies, it won't work,” she said.

Dombrovskis said that “technically speaking, approval of sanctions can be very quick view, can be done in a matter of one or two days.”

“The question here is basically is that sanctions require unanimity among member states, so those political discussions are ongoing in parallel, so it's important to reach unanimous political agreement,” he said.

Skaistė said it was too early to say when there will be agreement on that next round of sanctions. She noted that there is both a shorter-term and longer-term goal for the sanctions: to draw Russian President Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table and to weaken Russia’s economy so it is unable to reinforce its military.

“If there will be no possibilities to reinforce their army, we would like to think that there will be no war in Europe,” she said.

Dombrovskis said it is important that existing sanctions are actually enforced, noting they are working with EU member states as well as the broader international community.

“It's a fact that not all countries have joined those Western sanctions,” he said, noting that Beijing is “hedging its bets,” and they are trying to nudge China and other nations “to be closer to our approach to Russia.” 

Skaistė said they are also focused on helping Ukraine’s government survive in the shorter-term, and in the longer-term how to rebuild Ukraine more efficiently, which she believes “should be closely engaged with the process of Ukraine's accession to European Union.”

Both Skaistė and Dombrovskis expressed concern about Putin’s future targets if he is not decisively stopped in Ukraine.  

Skaistė told CNN that Russia is trying to impose its influence on neighboring countries, noting it’s “not the first time.”

Asked if Europe would respond with the same unity if Moldova were attacked by Russia, Dombrovskis said they needed to focus on Ukraine right now, “because Putin will go as far as we will let him to go.”

CNN's Kylie Atwood contributed reporting to this post.

The Ukrainian government announced new curfews for Easter weekend amid warnings from authorities about the potential for increased Russian military activity during holiday celebrations. 

Many Ukrainians celebrate Easter according to the Julian calendar, with Easter Sunday falling this year on April 24.

Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of the Ukrainian president’s office, announced the curfews in a statement on Saturday. Curfew hours will be in place from 7 p.m. local time Saturday until 5 a.m. local time Sunday in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia, Mykolaiv and Kherson regions, all of which have seen active fighting. 

In other regions of Ukraine, including the capital of Kyiv, curfew will run from 11 p.m. local time on Saturday until Sunday at 5 a.m.

Earlier this week, officials in Luhansk and Sumy regions urged residents to attend virtual services online, saying that possible Russian "provocations" could happen and that many churches have been destroyed as well.

A Russian missile strike hit Ukraine's southern port city of Odesa, the city's official Telegram channel said Saturday.  

"A missile strike was launched in Odesa," the statement said. "Infrastructure facilities were hit. Do not share photos and videos, do not help the enemy. The information is being clarified."

The purported strike comes as top Russian military officials revealed that the goal of the invasion of Ukraine is to take "full control" over southern Ukraine as well as the eastern Donbas region.

Maj. Gen. Rustam Minnekaev, the acting commander of Russia's Central Military District, said that control over Ukraine's south would give Russian forces access to Transnistria — a separatist statelet in Moldova, where a contingent of Russian forces has been stationed since the early 1990s — according to TASS, a Russian state news agency.