for more we want to bring in cnn's claire sebastian live from london. good to see you, claire. next hour sweden and finland will work toward an application to join the western alliance. what is the process ahead for both nations and how long will this likely take, and especially with turkey insisting on additional guarantees from nordic nations. >> once both parliaments have ratified the decision, which the swedish ruling party announced only this weekend, then the talks will take place in brussels. it seems to be clear they will move ahead. they already meet most of the criteria, and very modern military thriving democracies, for example, and then it moves to the nato members themselves, all 30 parliaments had to ratify the succession and they have to have unanimity. the one potential is turkey, he is accusing them of housing kurdish terror groups. having said that, the nato general secretary does not see that as a block, and nato is holding further talks with turkey, and this could move ahead. it could take up to a year for those two countries to succeed to nato, and this wou

as cnn's claire sebastian following developments. she joins us now live from london. g to you, claire. so russia says it will only reopen those ukrainian ports if some sanctions are lifted, and that isn't going to happen. so what could be the consequences of this? >> a multi-year food crisis, rosemary, that's how the ukrainian minister put it talking in davos this week. not only the current grain stocks not being exported but the next harvest currently being planted. the world food program has pointed out this is already leading to instability in some countries. food related riots as we've seen in the likes of peru, indonesia, sri lanka, that could intensify if this continues. on the one hand it doesn't seem russia is particularly inceptvised to help. yesterday they were blaming sanctions for this and yesterday saying sanctions -- that sanctions being lifted could be part of the solution here. that of course an admission sanctions are affecting them. another admission of that interestingly this week is that president putin announced on wednesday he was going to raise t

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cnn's claire sebastian a long time viewer, joins us live from london. d i have witnessed, you reported out of moscow for many years. give me a sense of what you took away not just from the speech, but from the show of military power and military might here today. >> reporter: yeah, it's very similar to what we've seen in past years. as i have said, the amount of military hardware that is on display has been accelerating throughout putin's sort of 22 years in power. it looked very similar to previous years. but i think what the speech really showed us, we've seen this from president putin before, when the expectations are high for him to do something, to perhaps retaliate or make an announcement, there are occasions when he doesn't and that is perhaps on purpose to keep people guessing to fuel speculation, and turn around and do something again later. that may be what we're looking at here. what stood out he to me what he said was the facilities sis on the donbas region, talking about that in particular, conflating the fighters in the donbas region with t

let's bring in cnn's claire sebastian who is live in london for us. ouse hoping to accomplish with this? >> reporter: laura, this is an effort to sort of stifle funding to the kremlin's propaganda machine. they are some of the biggest networks in russia, if not the biggest. and the media in russia, don't forget, is not independent. and even less so since russia passed a law in march which criminalized any, what they call false information about their so-called special military operation in ukraine. even calling it a war is punishable by up to 15 years in prison. so sanctioning these companies will sort of in theory stifle some of the funding to the broadcast networks that are propounding the kremlin line and not broadcasting elements of the conflict the kremlin doesn't want the russian public to see. according to a senior administration official, these companies received last year more than $300 million from western countries in terms of advertising rev news. the sanction wills cut them off not only from advertising revenues, but from receiving western

and cnn's clare sebastian following developments and joins us live from london. so, clairerts if some sanctions against it are lifted, which clearly won't happen. so what are the consequences if russia doesn't lift its blockage of ukrainian crop exports? >> reporter: rosemary i think it's a potential global catastrophe. the ukrainian foreign minister said the prospeck was a multiyear food crisis if these ports are not unblocked because it would disrupt the whole agricultural cycle, not only the current facilities filled with grain that can't be exported. the head of the world food program has said 49 million people in 43 countries are already on the brink of famine. this could tip some of them over the edge. they've warned we're already seeing food price related riots in a number of countries. all of that could intensify, and there is an international effort under way to try to find a solution to export those grains, unblock the black sea ports for which most of the grain wa traditionally exported, but russia does not seem to be incentivized here to help. one, cnn has uncov

claire sebastian is standing by with reaction. and first, let's go to nic robertson live in helsinki. a vote will come on whether to join nato, and probably that's a forgone conclusion. how does the process move on from here? >> reporter: it is a forgone conclusion, and the president yesterday, when he spoke at a joint press conference with the prime minister noted not only that this is a historic moment in finnish politics and finnish life, and the politicians have had debate. really, what we will see unfold in parliament is the completion of the democratic process and the conversations in parliament are expected to last as long in essence there are politicians that want to debate it. it is very much expected to be a yes vote, possibly today, possibly tomorrow. more than 100 members -- more than 180 members of the parliament, and 200 total are expected to jvote in favor of joining nato, and the conclusion, as you say, is a forgone conclusion at this time, as well. here outside the finnish president's residence, he will meet with

buyers >> very good, pointe claire sebastian joining us live from london, many thanks. and we will get the latest updates from the battlefield in ukraine, including a look at russia's push to capture a city that is already in ruins, that is next here on cnn newsroom. when you order the new lemon ricotta blueberry protein pancakes with 37 grams of protein, you get a smile onon your plat. only from ihop. download the app and join the rewards program today. pre-rinsing your dishes? you could be using the wrong detergent. and wasting up to 20 gallons of water. skip the rinse with finish quantum. its activelift technology provides an unbeatable clean on 24 hour dried-on stains. skip the rinse with finish to save our water. >> russian forces are gaining ground in the eastern donbas region of ukraine and moving into the city of severodonetsk the ukrainian military governor says that russian troops are gradually moving towards downtown, but have not captured the whole city. ukraine's defense ministry reports that battles have reached maximum intensity, with artillery strikes al

claire sebastian joins us live on london on this part of the story.se have we learned from this british intelligence assessment? >> reporter: this would be a significant problem for the russian forces in ukraine in if they lost a third of their ground forces. the latest estimate before this was there were 15,000 russian casualties at the end of april. imagine there were about 150,000 russian troops on the border of ukraine. that would be a significant uptick, about a third of but they're talking about critical losses of equipment, thanks like bridging equipment, jones. everything that enables a swift advantage they're saying the russian forces have lot of a suggest amount and that coupled with low morale is slowing them down. that's leading dramatically accelerate their advance over the next 30 days. so clearly a difficult situation as they try to focus on the donbas and the ukrainian reas soon as it and. >>> just ahead for you, the u.s. governor pushing for a total abortion ban, no exception. and the u.s. senate candidate who just revealed he recover

clair sebastian is with us now. what does it mean about this oil embargo? >> we don't exactly know.now that germany is looking to get this done, to show unity in this time of aggression. they are to approve all oil product by the end of this year. the eu commission president said it would happen within weeks. the german vice chancellor said to cnn and davos that he believes it could be days, but we still have serious opposition from hungary saying it really needs guarantees for its own energy security before it commits to any sanctions. it relies on russia for about 60% of its oil imports. the prime minister hinted that there might be funds coming from the eu budget to sort of pay for infrastructure in countries like hungary to compensate them in some way, but now i think attention turns to eu leaders and a meeting happening at the end of this month. there is focus on that to see if they can get something done then. >> moving fast but not so much at the same time. it's good to see you, clare, thank you. >>> let's turn now to the critical situation on the mexican border. the rule kno

. >> reporter: i'm claire sebastian in london.cized russia's war in ukraine on state tv this week now appears to be contradicting his own message. on monday, mikhail khodarenok said he believed ukraine could mobilize a million fighters, he said things will get worse for russia on the ground, and that the whole world is against russia in this fight. then on wednesday, he went on tv again and this time saying that talk of ukraine's ability to mount a counterattack was exaggerated and russia's army had plans that would give ukraine, a quote, unpleasant surprise in the very near future. >>> a nato military official tells cnn the momentum in the war shifted slightly in favor of ukraine, but that no major battlefield gains are expected for either side in the coming weeks. joining me now to discuss retired u.s. army major mike lyons. a little bit of hope, i guess, or somewhat positive thinking in terms of that assessment from that nato official for ukraine, but the fact that we're stuck in this sort of back and forth for the next several