because we are 10 km from sloviansk and they are ahead of us in the direction of raisin what is thatthe direction of the estuary, uhu. that is, we, the slavs, are building these structures together, we understand that, in principle, the russian plan failed. and now one of the leaders of the militants with the surname pushylin announced that they are canceling the may 9 parade that they planned to be held in donetsk well, according to this criminal, the reason lies in the fact that they are afraid of shelling from the side of our artillery, and in fact we understand that they have nothing to show off. that is, all their plans are based on the fighting spirit and readiness to give eternity on the part of our armed forces but surely some information is coming from behind the ledge to you, you mean we understand that the people of donetsk communicate with each other despite the front line, you know well , i agree with you. there will be a report on the ninth of may, because they will not take the kramatorsk slavs. i am sure that this will never, never, never happen. we believe in our arm

the fact that this night passed peacefully, yesterday the city came under fire, the head of the slovianskitary administration, vadym lyakh, said especially about the evacuation it is worth thinking about for citizens who are not very mobile. it is not excluded that the city may be left without communication due to the shelling. the head of the luhansk region, serhii gaidai, also said that today the evacuation buses will again try to evacuate people from north donets' lysychansk, rubizhnoy popasna, and also from the villages in these communities. for these people , they will create something that, for example, nailed high- voltage wires. there are still solutions to the big question, so i urge you to evacuate, especially people with chronic diseases and those with low mobility. the 63rd day of the heroic resistance of the ukrainian people to the russian military invasion has begun. the enemy is trying to establish full control over the donetsk and luhansk regions and to break through the land corridor occupied crimea reports in the general staff of the armed forces that russians are raidin

e-e with the big land and the enemy also managed to get out from the other side of sloviansk to theay that goes to seversk and further to bakhmut. in this way, it is obvious that the enemy wants to divide our troops and surround the group located in severodonetsk and lysychansk, and the second cluster is the slavic kramatorsk group in the north, but in order to do this, we need to carry out an offensive operation in the south , and we we see that the enemy is now very strongly and powerfully shelling our positions in the entire area from the dnipro, in fact, to donetsk, on the other hand , he has practically no success there. a very powerful, powerful counterattack and are moving into counterattacks, as was the case under gulyaipol literally yesterday evening. and you have to understand that the enemy is not succeeding. i will say that according to our estimates, more than a week has already passed, and we are not observing such a sharp advance, which can be called a successful offensive, that is why the next couple weeks, it is precisely in the donbass that they will be so very pow

we believe in our army and our victory, and tt the combat operations won't reach sloviansk.will stay here till the very last moment. >> while those combat operations have not yet struck sloviansk, a russian missile attack less than 10 miles away in kramatorsk killed at least one person today. it's part of russia's fresh offensive to seize the donbas region in eastern ukraine an area moscow-backed separatists have been trying to capture for the past 8 years. as the assault unfolded overnight, president volodymyr zelenskyy remained defiant. >> no matter how many russian soldiers are driven there, we will fight. we will defend ourselves. >> local officials have urged residents to evacuate, but for the third day in a row no agreement was struck to open humanitarian corridors. in this front-line village, the vulnerable and elderly bear the brunt of the hardship. gregory is being evacuated by workers at his *hospice*. too weak to move by himself, he thanks those who helped him escape. >> the main difficulty is that people that can't move, had to be evacuated. very ill people, who

they are trying to take kramatorsk and sloviansk in the eye east region while blocking kharkiv.icult, you can imagine for ukrainians, who have stayed behind. as russian forces continue spreading across the country, our reporter spoke with one woman who is trying to convince others to leave and doing all she can to help those who refuse. a 21, maria stern is a war veteran. she's been up volunteer on ukraine's front line in the donbas for five years. for today, she is delivering medicine and food to villages within range of russian artillery. a new phase in vladimir putin's invasion of ukraine is underway. and, it's sometimes hard to understand why people stay in frontline villages. [interpreter] >> i'm asking people specific question. i am ready to hear children cry and say, mom, i am scared to die. it gives me the creeps to hear them say. [end of translation] >> russian forces have captured her a few miles in the north. pounding nearby towns with artillery and rocket. they are slowly advancing south near sloviansk and the city of kramatorsk, russia's aim is to capture this terri

russian troops are advancing south from izyum into the donbas region, near sloviansk and kramatorsk.cow continues to strike frontline cities, stretchingar west to mykolaiv. the u.s. says russia's next stage is conventional warfare in the donbas, away from urban spaces and onto rural terrain, using tanks, artillery and planes. in moscow, president putin said russia test-launched a new intercontinental ballistic missile, something he said his enemies wouldn't be able to match. but also today, at a choreographed kremlin event for nonprofits, the russian president delivered a contradictory message of peace for eastern ukraine. >> the tragedy that was happening in donbas, including the luhansk people's republic, forced russia to start this military operation everyone knows about now. first of all, the goal of this operation to help our people living in donbas. amna: but for the people of donbas, this is the reality of putin's war. in kramatorsk, a journalist filmed the remnants of a school hit by russian missiles - now reduced to scattered shrapnel. for weeks, kramatorsk has been under de

bridge, a district town in donetsk region, it passes across the river siverskyi donetsk and leads to sloviansk, it is in this direction that the occupiers in donbas are trying to advance together with the bridge to the bottom of the river and a russian train with freight wagons, so now they will experience greater difficulties with logistics and bringing ammunition, fuel equipment and provisions for their troops with a battery of hurricanes, several transport charging machines and several units of military automobile equipment, as well as a little more ammunition, were destroyed by the soldiers of the 30th brigade named after prince konstantin ostrozky the video was posted on his telegram channel - the head of the luhansk regional military administration, serhii gaidai, ukrainian soldiers turned scrap russian equipment into literally in a few minutes solar batteries and energy conservation systems tesla powerwall was handed over to ukraine by elon musk this state-of-the-art equipment is very popular in the usa, generators and solar batteries have high autonomy and provide back-up power during

it passes through the siverskyi donets river and leads to sloviansk, it is in this direction that the occupiers in donbas are trying to advance, together with the bridge, a russian freight train went to the bottom of the river wagons, so now they will experience even greater difficulties with logistics and transporting ammunition, equipment, fuel and provisions for their troops in kyiv detained two alleged fire adjusters. this was reported by the first deputy minister of internal affairs yevgeny yenin, according to his words . after the rocket attack in the capital on thursday, these people were photographed destruction and sent to russian numbers after examining their phones also found out that it turned out that those people are subscribed to separatist resources and groups in social networks, the cyber police is currently analyzing their smartphones, also for the subject of deleted files, i will remind you that on the evening of april 26, on april 28, russian rockets hit a high-rise building in the shevchenkivskyi district of kyiv, as a result, one person died and four were hospita

front, the enemy wants to take full control of the front line in order to further advance on the sloviansk and periwinkle limans. this was reported by the general staff, active battles are taking place. practically along the entire line of contact in the donetsk direction, the enemy is conducting active fighting practically along this line of contact does not stop, airstrikes and artillery bombardment of the positions of the ukrainian defenders, the main efforts of the enemy are focused on the introduction of offensive actions on the lyman in the north-donetsk popasnya and kurakhiv directions with the aim of taking full control of the population centers of rubizhne popasno and probably carrying out a further offensive on liman slavyansk and barvinkovo, the general staff informed today's evening summary, i will remind you today , april 30 well, just now, petro kuzyk of the combat battalion is in touch with us teroborony er i know that mr. petro is now literally on the front line, so we won't see him, but er, we still hope to hear him now, sir petre, how do you hear ukraine's heroes? kudos t

thousand of them now in izyum, they are really trying to break through in the direction of the city of sloviansk and move through the settlements that you just mentioned, but they have been doing this for almost three weeks and still have not of real success, that is, as i have already mentioned, they cannot even reach the administrative border between the kharkiv and donetsk regions, they are now in various plantings, ravines and fields of the raisin region where our armed forces restrain them and constantly do not let them rest and advance deep into ukrainian territory. khrestina and i raised the topic of the land of lizev gunner so much that we would like to believe that part of the self-propelled guns has already reached izyum in the direction of do you now feel any drastic improvement in the situation in particular regarding the provision of heavy artillery to our soldiers now in izyum to deter the russian occupiers, our armed forces use all available means, all types of weapons that are currently only possible to use, so that they go very fiercely no even for a few minutes so that there we

many directions, in particular there, directly to mine, we are expecting there lyman severodonetsk slovianskdirections they will move along a wide front, and with a significant amount of armored vehicles , everything else now. we are just waiting for this offensive. the question arises that we actually have the potential of our weapons and directly there, the line of defense allows you to protect yourself from these attacks because there is no clearly expressed quantitative advantage, and even more so due to our reserves, which can be transferred quickly enough, we have every reason to provide in the teeth of a russian orc and to disrupt all these plans, but gerasimov arrived. broadleaf, just from a series of fantasy, and suddenly something will fly in. well, it could be a war and not gerasimova. i also hope for this, because there are cases that always show that god on our er-er should not have given up on two blows either neptune, but that's why the cruiser moscow is a new attack on the bridge in the bay of the city, which we talked about yesterday, and our attack on the snake. well, it's

yesterday, they are very, very powerful more than nine rockets were fired at us, three cities near slovianskatorsk was sent, unfortunately, we were wounded, well, more or less, or the tragic events that happened in kramatorsk on the railway station, as for the city of kramatorsk, the city of kramatorsk, which druzhkivka lives peacefully, the military administration has coped with the challenges that exist . i can hear the artillery working, well, it looks like what in our artillery it warms the heart, we are constantly engaged in volunteering, uh, i am directly involved in humanitarian aid. of the front line to the outskirts, what is being done, it is very nice to see our equipment, which is constantly coming here to the front line and strengthening our positions, well, the shelling in donetsk region is simply off the scale, in the past day, 9 settlements were shelled , and as a result of 11 russian shelling , three local e the peace of civilians in donetsk region was reported yesterday by the press service of the national police, more than 27 civilian objects were destroyed, that's it, myko

went to zarichne is a dangerous situation for our troops who are defending themselves in the area sloviansk lysychansk, because the russians can in principle attack in two directions, and in fact the enemy has been given the opportunity to coordinate their actions in several of these directions and at the same time break through as if to a banknote and cut the communication of the armed forces of ukraine between bakhmut and the severodonetsk district, it can also break through to the estuary and the district to the southeast of it, and this is not very good, well, actually. battles for the donbass because who will be able to hold out there well, actually well, it will control this territory by and large russians, because they are passing through. heavy equipment there are armored vehicles. and after that, for example , there is a certain area. let’s say that the area is where they pass after that. there is no one, that is, not ours, not theirs. there is no one at all. the infantry forces don't go there, i don't know if this is such a separate story or if it's generally typical of them now,

taking full control of the rubizhnye area and developing an offensive on the lyman severodonetsk and slovianskn direction, the enemy established control over the village of zarichne and carried out assaults in in the area of ​​the settlement of yampil in the north donets direction, the karbniki have established control over the settlement in otoshkivske, they are advancing in the direction of the settlements points nizhnye and orikhove in the mariupol direction, the enemy carries out massive fire. the influence and blockade of our units in the area of ​​the azovstal plant in the city, the occupiers continue to carry out filtering measures against the civilian population in the south-buzka and tauriy directions, the enemy uses the available forces and means to concentrate the main efforts on keeping the occupied ahead of the lines and carried out the effect of fire on the positions of our troops in the mykolayiv kryvyi rih and zaporizhzhia directions of the enemy is trying to improve its tactical position. to this end, it is regrouping its units, building up a system of fire damage and also con

it passes through the siverskyi donetsk river and leads to sloviansk. it is in this direction that the occupiers are trying to advance in donbas, along with the bridge to the bottom of the river, and the russian train with freight wagons also went, so now they will experience even more difficulties with logistics and transporting ammunition, fuel, and provisions for his troops, a battery of hurricanes, several transport loaders and military vehicles, as well as a lot of ammunition destroyed the soldiers of the 30th brigade named after prince konstantin ostrozhsky, the head of the luhansk regional military administration, serhii gaidai, posted a video on his telegram channel to a friend of russian equipment - ukrainian soldiers turned into a friend literally in a few minutes, the russians fired six times on friday from the zelenodol community in the dnipropetrovsk region the head of the region , valentina reznichenko, said this: the villages of velyka and mala kostronka were hit by hurricanes, several residential buildings were damaged, people were not i

state emergency service in six locations in the donetsk region, including places like kramatorsk and sloviansky have these items available to reach people who are now sitting in bomb shelters and trying to shelter from the offensive. we are also present in areas like dnipro and poltava, where displaced people are transiting through or arriving, to try and stop and find shelter and relief items as they figure out where to go next. so what is in those relief packages, and how easy is it to get them to the people that need them? so, it includes items like tarpaulin that people use to kind of seal broken windows and doors from the elements. it is blankets, mattresses, and hygiene items. and it is challenging to get them to those areas that are really targeted by the offensive but that is why we work closely with the local authorities and actors like state emergency service or partners on the ground who are still as unfair. in the areas where the displaced people are arriving, there it is easier to reach people. there we work with local authorities to see with them what capacity is needed to expand

they went for a walk in i think he's in sloviansk and two missiles landed like literally a few hundred meters away from them. so he got a scratch as well. he sent me pictures of the resulting hole in the ground. and, you know, it's very dangerous. and, you know, this war is far from over. i've spoken to friends from the presidential office and they said like a lot of interviewers are asking now since you won, what's next? we haven't won this war. the worst unfortunately is yet to come. and people should not forget about ukraine. everyone should stay united in support of ukraine so we can win this war. >> we're also hearing about russian forces using referendums. how can they hold a referendum in a city that doesn't want them there? >> they do worse than that. they try to conscript men to get them to fight against the regular ukrainian army. imagine just living in the village, you're a ukrainian and you have to fight your brothers or they kill you. it's really horrible. but i think at the moment putin is making things up as he goes along. the initial plan was taking kyiv and destroying

in fact, you'll see the city of sloviansk will be pivotal.re going to try to link the donbas region with not just the east but the south towards odesa. and what they're going to want to do is claim that as a victory in time for the 77th anniversary of the end of world war ii, which is may 9, 1945. so what they're going to try to do is link the two and they may claim the two. >> as we watch this play out on the battlefield nato foreign ministers are meeting now. the ukrainians are saying great. we need more military hardware. we need more offensive weapons. you have been sending, they're telling the west, weapons to help us defend but if we're going to kick the russians out of the red areas, retaking land requires a different set of weapons. what should nato do now? >> well, i believe that what nato is doing is certainly not enough. at this point the goal should not be just to end the fighting. the goal should be for ukrainian forces to actually win. in order to do that they'll need more than just tanks here, drones there, javelin missiles. th

people are being essentially bussed to the north of here in the city of sloviansk, with the trains are still running. now, we saw one of the trains leaving from there yesterday and it was impact. because, almost everybody as i said before, has left the city. because we kramatorsk is basically in the middle of a pincers. russian forces to the north, russian forces to the south. this is one of the cities it is believed that the russians will try to encircle, besieged and perhaps in the process, probably, destroy. breonna? >> it's a horrific aftermath there ben wedeman, thank you so much for that report. i do want to bring in cnn military analyst and retired army -- david petare. he is the author of hunting -- sir, let's talk for us about this new general who surged, was a key figure in russian's involvement in syria. he doesn't have much regard for civilian life which i would say, what's new than? but, what is your expectation with him now being the lead? >> well, good morning breonna. yes, you are right. general alexander has -- enough caring about civilians when he was in charge of rus

gotten indications that the russians are trying to push from the north, heading toward a town called sloviansk, about a 25-mile drive from here, and up from the south. if they manage to do that, they will be able to seal off a large area where the ukrainian forces are already concentrated. so i think that's the thing. they want to encircle the large military presence in the eastern part of the country, and then do something, eliminate them, perhaps. jake? >> ben wedeman in kramatorsk. thank you. >>> in case there was ever any question about vladimir putin's intentions, he has now awarded a title to the military aid accused of committing those war crimes in bucha. for weeks we've brought you the horrific images. the mass graves, dead bodies thrown out with the trash after they were bound and shot in the head. the new cemeteries full of unmarked graves. so many of the victims, women, children, civilians. now putin is praising the soldiers who decimated bucha for their great heroism and courage, and for, quote, protecting russia's sovereignty and interests. joining us to discuss, long time critic

and you can see sloviansk and kramatorsk are right in the middle of the area they are trying to take over. and you have to think about their frame of mind. they lost many of their co comrades. they may well be on a deadline. may 9th, just over a month from now, that is the russia victory day parade celebrating the victory in world war ii over the nazis. this may be when they want to declare victory and perhaps declare a cease-fire. but they have to take a lot of territory in eastern ukraine before they do that. . >> just to be clear, again, as you're looking at this, kramatorsk is right in the middle where fighting could get fierce. also where thousands and thousands have been evacuating every day. they have been told to leave. they were there. everyone knows they're there. now they have fallen victim to this. talk to me about the unique characteristics of what the fighting might be like in these parts of the country. . >> the problem is the terrain lends itself to russian tank warfare. it is flat, unlike the rest of the country where there was a lot of urban fighting and some areas

a bridge linking across the river to sloviansk.sion all over the country and it has proved highly effectively. but ultimately, as sources say, the mayor believes the main russian' effort is likely to begin next week. perhaps, approaching may the 9th with the signature day of victory day in the former-soviet union. on top of that, of course, there has been significant troop' provements on the russian side and also on the ukrainian side. sam kiley, cnn, in kramatorsk. >>> an emotional moment at the pentagon friday. during the afternoon press briefing, pentagon spokesman john kirby choked up when speaking about the atrocities in ukraine. kirby was asked if he believed russian president vladimir putin is a rational actor. here is part of what he said. >> it's difficult to look at the -- sorry -- it's difficult to look at some of the images, and imagine that any well-thinking, serious, mature leader would do that. so i can't talk to his psychology but i think we can all speak to his depravity. >> and kirby also spoke about putin trying

from the ukrainians about a week ago and use that as a launching pad to get into a place called sloviansk. they'll then be able to encircle the donbas area and that's going to be a very, very big fight. it's a pivotal city to get that area and all the people here know what it's going to take to fight the russians. the ukrainians are saying we need much more advanced hardware to push the russians back. we need aircraft, we need tanks to fight them and they still haven't got that kind of hardware. you also listen to any ukrainian, they know the reputation of dvornikov, the new general, the ground commander here. they have seen what he's done in syria. those tactics have already been employed here in ukraine. you speak to people here now and they think those will just be done on a much broader canvas, much more ruthlessly on them to gain battlefield momentum. >> courtney, let me turn to you. you heard ali mention that new russian general. you've done a lot of reporting on that so-called butcher of syria. we heard from john kirby in the last bit. i want to play what mr. kirby had to say. watc

sloviansk will be a place to watch as the battle plays out. it is key because it allows the ukrainians to defend along this access and here from donetsk. it is a race, can the russians resupply quicker on this axis or can the ukrainians resupply quicker in terms of the defense. when you zoom out and look at the east, it is going to a battle -- this is not going to kick off for another month or so. remember, it is warming there. there's mud. that means russian armor is tied down to roads. this is going to be a very slow battle. i think what we want to watch is how quickly can ukrainian military can take all of the new weaponry they're getting in, push it to this front and can they hold off another armored advance on another set of cities in the east. >> the question is obviously mariupol is so important, there's such significance to that, clint, i'm curious. are the ukrainians unable to send reinforcements? are they unable to figure out a way to get supplies in to those that are trapped inside that steel facility? >> yeah. joe, right now from t