September 16, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has posted a photograph of the ongoing exhumation of bodies at a mass burial site near the city of Izium.

In a text accompanying the photograph on his Telegram channel, Zelensky wrote: "The whole world should see this. A world in which there should be no cruelty and terrorism. But all this is there. And its name is Russia."

As the exhumation continues, it's unclear how each victim died and when. Scores of civilians and soldiers were killed in the weeks-long bombardment of Izium by Russian forces in March and April. A CNN team at the site said that the graves they saw were predominantly of individuals, some marked only with numbers and others with full names and other details.

The governor of the Kharkiv region, Oleh Syniehubov, said that "the scale of the crimes committed by the invaders in Izium is enormous. This is bloody brutal terror."

"450 bodies of civilians with traces of violent death and torture were buried in a forest belt. It is difficult to imagine something like this in the 21st century, but now it is a tragic reality in Izium," he said.

"About 200 law enforcement officers and experts are currently on the scene. The bodies will be sent for a forensic examination to determine the exact cause of death. After identifying the faces of the dead, they will all be buried with due respect," he said.

"Each death will be investigated and become evidence of Russia's war crimes in international courts," Syniehubov said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin told Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi that Russia would "do everything" to end the conflict in Ukraine, according to a statement from the Kremlin.

The two leaders met at the end of a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in Samarkand, Uzbekistan.

Putin blamed Ukraine for the continuation of the conflict. Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24.

The Kremlin statement quoted Putin as telling Modi Friday:

Some context: Earlier in the war, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky repeatedly called on Putin to hold negotiations with him. Last week, Zelensky said negotiations with the Russian Federation surrounding the end of the war are currently "impossible."

On Thursday, in a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Putin also acknowledged China’s “questions and concerns” regarding the conflict in Ukraine. 

At the United Nations General Assembly next week, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will find themselves in the same city for the third time in three months, but there are no current plans for the two diplomats to meet, a senior administration official said.

But US State Department spokesperson Ned Price would not rule out the possibility of a meeting if it could fuel efforts to bring home Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan, two wrongfully detained Americans in Russia.

Lavrov and Blinken are likely to be in the same room for a UN Security Council meeting next week. But being in the same room doesn’t ensure direct contact — though it could mean awkwardly avoiding one another.

Earlier in the week, Price reiterated that US President Joe Biden's administration does not believe it can do business as usual with the Russians, but the Biden administration has put an emphasis on getting the Americans home as public pressure has mounted. Price would not say if the administration feels that a meeting with Lavrov and Blinken could move the ball forward.

Blinken spoke to Lavrov by phone in late July for the first time since the Russian war in Ukraine began on Feb. 24, and "pressed the Kremlin to accept the substantial proposal that we put forth on the release of Paul Whelan and Brittney Griner,” the top US diplomat said at the time.

Blinken and Lavrov were in the same cities for international summits just weeks before that phone call and just weeks after it – in Bali in early July and in Cambodia in early August – but Blinken and Lavrov did not meet. In Cambodia, they were just seats away from one another for an Association of Southeast Asian Nations foreign ministers meeting and attended the same dinner, but they did not speak at the dinner, CNN reported at the time.

The Biden administration has repeatedly said that they will not engage in diplomacy with Russia unless they think that it can be productive, and Russia has signaled no desire to diplomatically engage.

Biden is set to meet with the families of Griner and Whelan today at the White House.

Switzerland is suspending its exchange of tax information with Russia to prevent “inappropriate” use of sensitive information as the war in Ukraine continues, the Swiss Federal Council announced in a statement on Friday.

“Due to the unclear and uncertain situation in the in connection with Russia's military aggression against Ukraine, there is no guarantee that the sensitive information to be exchanged will not be used inappropriately,” a spokesperson for the State Secretariat for International Finance told CNN.

Switzerland is “reacting in the same way, as for example, all European Union member states, the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom,” the spokesperson said.

According to the council’s website, tax authorities exchange information — for example, on financial accounts and advance tax rulings — “in order to increase transparency and prevent cross-border tax evasion.”

Much of Ukraine's Kharkiv region has been retaken by Ukrainian forces, but the military said liberated areas are now being heavily shelled by Russian artillery.

The Kharkiv regional civil military administration said Friday that "during the past day, the enemy massively shelled the recently liberated settlements of the Kharkiv region in the Kharkiv, Kupyansk, and Izium districts. Residential buildings were destroyed; there are injured."

The administration said 10 people were injured in the Kupiansk district, including two children. One more person was wounded in the Izium district, and one was injured in the Kharkiv district, it said.

Areas of Kharkiv near the Russian border also came under attack, it said, adding that there had been rocket attacks on the village of Zolochiv north of the city of Kharkiv.

Elsewhere, in Luhansk: The administration in the eastern Luhansk region said battles continue along the line of contact but there had been no further change in territory held by Ukraine. It said long-range artillery strikes by Ukrainian forces had inflicted heavy casualties on Russian units in the Perevalsk area, some 50 kilometers (31 miles) behind the front lines.

Donetsk: In Donetsk, regional authorities said Russian forces continued to shell settlements around Bakhmut, Avdiivka and Toretsk, killing five civilians. Despite a mandatory evacuation from the region, thousands of civilians have not left their homes.

Dnipropetrovsk: Further south, in the Dnipropetrovsk region, the cities of Kryvyi Rih and Nikopol have come under fire. Local authorities reported widespread damage in Nikopol from Russian rocket attacks. "The Russians aimed their missiles at critical infrastructure. There is severe destruction of hydraulic structures," Valentyn Reznichenko, head of Dnipropetrovsk regional military administration, said about Kryvyi Rih.

Earlier this week, missile attacks on water infrastructure caused flooding along the Inhulets river, which runs south from Kryvyi Rih. 

Kherson: The regional military administration in the southern Kherson region implied there had been little further progress for Ukrainian forces there, saying "the situation in the region remains difficult."

It said Russian forces had tried to conduct an assault toward the town of Ivanivka but retreated with losses. It also said Ukrainian rocket and artillery units performed 140 fire missions.

The head of the Russian-backed administration in occupied areas of the Zaporizhzhia region said a senior official there has been killed.

Yevgeniy Balitsky, head of the Russian-appointed administration, said that Oleg Boyko — a senior official in the city of Berdiansk — and his wife had been killed.

"A tragic event happened last night. The deputy head of the administration of Berdiansk Oleg Boyko and his wife Lyudmila, who worked as the chairman of the Berdiansk election commission, were vilely killed," Balitsky said.

The circumstances of their deaths are unknown. 

German armed forces must become Europe’s “best equipped,” with the country ready to take on a “leading responsibility” in guaranteeing Europe's security, Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Friday.

"We are making it convincingly clear: Germany is ready to take on leading responsibility for the security of our continent," Scholz went on to say.

Scholz said Russian President Vladimir Putin currently poses ''the biggest threat'' to the NATO alliance.

The German Chancellor said that the German armed forces had for too long taken on other roles like "drilling wells, ensuring humanitarian help, stemming floods, also helping with vaccinations during the pandemic."

"But that is not your core mission," he said, adding "the core task of the Bundeswehr [the German armed forces] is the defense of freedom in Europe."

Scholz also said that Europe must take on a lot more responsibility within NATO, amid Russia's ongoing war in Ukraine.

"We, Europeans, must however assume significantly more responsibility within NATO," Scholz said.

"NATO remains responsible for the collective defense of the entire alliance with a focus on Europe. Credible deterrence remains the core element,'' Scholz concluded.

A United Nations source told CNN that a team from the UN’s human rights monitoring agency, the OHCHR, would be going to Izium and areas around it as soon as possible.

The war crimes investigation team may follow after that, the source said. Their specific destination remains unclear at this time.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Thursday that a mass burial site had been discovered in Izium, in the country's Kharkiv region, after the area was recaptured last weekend from Russian forces. The Ukrainian Defense Ministry said that at least 440 graves had been found.

A day after meeting his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping called for countries of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) to “promote the development of the international order in a more just and rational direction,” in remarks given at a summit of the organization in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, on Friday. 

Created in 2001, SCO includes China, Russia, four Central Asian states (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan), India and Pakistan.

Xi said countries should “support each other’s efforts to safeguard security and development interests, prevent foreign forces from staging color revolutions, and jointly oppose interference in the internal affairs of other countries under any pretext.”

He added China is willing to train 2,000 law enforcement officers for member states over the next five years and establish a training base for Chinese SCO counter-terrorism professionals.