April 15, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

In the past two weeks, unaccompanied Ukrainian minors, mostly teenagers, have entered the US through the southern border after leaving their war-torn country, according to a source familiar with the US Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) shelter services.  

Most of the minors have flown into Mexico and then made their way to the US southern border, according to the source.

In some cases, this source says, family members living in the US have met the Ukrainian minors in Mexico, and US immigration authorities have separated the children from their relatives at the border, per government policy.

Under US law, if the relative who is with the minor is not their parent or US legal guardian, the minor is classified as unaccompanied.

How many are in US care? An Health and Human Services (HHS) spokesperson did not answer CNN’s questions about how many Ukrainian children are in US care and where.

While in US government care, unaccompanied children meet with a case manager at least weekly and connect with family at least twice a week, according to HHS.

This source says that in the past two weeks, between 20 and 30 unaccompanied Ukrainian minors have entered the US via the southern border. According to the source, based on the data available it’s difficult to tell a total tally at any one point in time.

According to the latest data, as of April 14, 2022, nearly 10,000 children are in HHS custody. In fiscal year 2021, most of the unaccompanied migrant children in HHS care were from Central American’s northern triangle countries of Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras.

US Customs and Border Protection sent CNN an email saying that the agency is unable to provide comment at this time.

Where are they? The same source says that most of the Ukrainian children are being placed in ORR shelters in the states of Washington, California and New York. Several unaccompanied Ukrainian minors have been reunited with their families in the US since the first child arrived about two weeks ago, the source said.

Some of the children have said that they are in the US to wait out the war and hope to return to their home country once it is no longer at war, this source said.

 

The Russian guided-missile cruiser Moskva rests deep beneath the Black Sea today.

Ukraine claims that it hit Moskva with missiles, causing it to sink. Russia has insisted the reason for the sinking was a fire. On Friday, the United States supported Ukraine's account, with a senior defense official saying that it believes that two Ukrainian Neptune missiles hit the Russian warship in the Black Sea.

But what does the loss of the Moskva mean for the Russian war effort?

The biggest effect may be on Russian morale. As the flagship of Russia's Black Sea fleet, the Moskva was one of its most visible assets in the Ukraine war. Though Moscow carefully manages news about the war in Russia, it will be hard to hide the sudden absence of such a large ship.

And its loss will raise doubts about Russia's warfighting abilities, whether it was due to enemy action or accident.

"Both explanations for the sinking of the Moskva indicate possible Russian deficiencies -- either poor air defenses or incredibly lax safety procedures and damage control on the Black Sea Fleet's flagship," analysts Mason Clark, Kateryna Stepanenko and George Barros at the Institute for the Study of War wrote in their daily war briefing.

Carl Schuster, a former US Navy captain, said the doubts went all the way to the Kremlin.

"It raises questions about naval competence 10 years after (Russian President Vladimir) Putin announced he was going to restore the navy's capabilities, morale and professionalism," Schuster said.

"It seems he has not been able to keep any of his promises for any of Russia's military services," Schuster said, noting Russia had suffered setbacks on land too.

But analysts are split on what impact the sinking will have on the Russian invasion.

The ISW analysts see it as a relatively minor blow, saying the ship was mostly used for cruise missile strikes on Ukrainian logistic centers and airfields. Russia has land-based systems and strike aircraft that can do the same thing, they said.

However, they added that if it was indeed a Ukrainian missile that led to the sinking, the Russian navy would have to rethink its operations, possibly moving ships farther from Ukrainian territory and adjusting their air defenses.

In Washington, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the Moskva's main mission was air defense for the Russian forces in the Black Sea.

Read more about the ship's sinking here.

The prosecutor's office in the northeastern region of Kharkiv says at least 10 people have been killed, including a 7-month-old baby, as a result of shelling by Russian forces.

The office of the gGeneral prosecutor said on Telegram that at about 4:30 p.m. local time Friday, Russian forces used multiple rocket launchers against the industrial district of Kharkiv. 

Earlier, Oleh Syniehubov, head of the Kharkiv region military administration, had reported shelling of residential areas of Kharkiv. He said 34 people were injured, including three children, and seven people were killed.

There has been an increase in attacks on Kharkiv and Ukrainian towns in Donbas to the south in recent weeks as the Russians' focus shifts to the east of Ukraine. Civilian casualties have been rising amid missile, artillery and rocket attacks on several cities and on people trying to leave the region. 

Ukrainian officials on Friday reported Russian strikes across the Donetsk, Luhansk and Kharkiv regions in eastern Ukraine, amid warnings of a major Russian offensive in the coming days.

The situation in the region was "getting more tense," Pavlo Kyrylenko, head of the Donetsk regional military administration, said in a statement on television. "The shelling, airstrikes have increased. Since yesterday in the north of the Donetsk region on the border with Kharkiv region, there have been attempts of breakthrough."

But the attacks were repelled, he added.

CNN was not immediately able to verify the battlefield situation in that region.

Oleh Syniehubov, the head of the Kharkiv region military administration, reported shelling of residential areas of Kharkiv. He said at least 34 people were injured, including three children, and seven people were killed, including a 7-month-old baby. 

Shelling in the city of Severodonetsk damaged the water supply system and destroyed two food warehouses on Friday, said Serhii Haidai, head of Luhansk regional military administration.

"The Russians are cynically hitting infrastructure," Haidai said, adding that Russian fire hit the towns of Rubizhne and Kreminna as well as Severodonetsk.

In a separate statement, Haidai said volunteers bringing humanitarian aid the local population came under fire in the town of Lysychansk, killing one man and injuring his wife. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made a request to US President Joe Biden in one of their recent phone conversations to designate Russia a state sponsor of terrorism, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Zelensky's ask didn't come with the same level of urgency with which he's requested Western leaders provide additional arms and financial assistance, the person said, but he did make it as part of an effort to scale up international condemnation of Russia.

Biden did not offer a firm commitment to Zelensky's request, which was first reported by the Washington Post.

US officials have previously declined to rule out adding Russia to the list of state sponsors of terror, which right now includes North Korea, Syria, Cuba and Iran.

“I don’t have any assessment of that at this point in time. Obviously, we’re continuing to look at the actions on the ground and the actions of leaders,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters at the White House last month.

Adding Russia would be a dramatic move that would escalate economic sanctions and have secondary effects on countries still doing business with Moscow.

Five residents were killed and 15 wounded Friday by cluster munitions scattered on the southern Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv, the city’s governor, Vitaliy Kim, alleged on Telegram.

One of those killed had picked up an unexploded shell, he said. 

“Repeating one more time [...] Do not touch strange objects. It can be fatal," he warned. 

CNN cannot independently verify the governor’s claims, however the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine has previously said it had received credible allegations that Russian armed forces have used cluster munitions in populated areas in Ukraine.

The non-governmental organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) has also confirmed Russia's use of cluster munitions throughout the conflict.

“Cluster munitions pose an immediate threat to civilians during conflict by randomly scattering submunitions or bomblets over a wide area. They continue to pose a threat post-conflict by leaving remnants, including submunitions that fail to explode upon impact becoming de facto landmines," according to HRW.

Remember: In 2008, over 100 countries in the United Nations signed on to ban cluster munitions, according to the UN website. Ukraine and Russia did not sign the agreement.

More than 900 bodies of civilians have been discovered since the Russian army withdrew from the area, the head of the Kyiv regional police said during a briefing on Friday. 

Andrii Niebytov said the bodies were examined and transferred to forensic medical institutions for detailed examination. 

Niebytov also said that the bodies of some people in the village of Shevchenko ​had been identified, adding that "they were ordinary locals, unfortunately also tortured, and we see that they were shot." 

Niebytov said some of the people that were shot had white armbands on them to try to protect themselves from Russian forces.

"During the occupation of our cities, the occupiers forced citizens to wear white armbands as if this person had already been checked and was therefore not treated so meticulously. Therefore, in order to save their lives, our citizens wore these bandages themselves to protect themselves from gunshots," he said.  

He said that wearing white armbands did not always work, "even if they hung white rags on the fences of their apartments," adding that there were also children who were living in those apartments.

As Friday winds down in Ukraine, these are the latest developments in Russia's invasion:

Sunken warship: A senior US defense official said two Ukrainian Neptune missiles hit the Moskva — Russia’s flagship in the Black Sea — earlier this week.

Ukraine claimed it had hit the Russian guided-missile cruiser with anti-ship missiles, while the Russian military acknowledged only that the ship had sunk after a fire on board and the detonation of ammunition.

A spokesperson for the Ukrainian Armed Forces in southern Ukraine suggested that Russian missile attacks in the south since Thursday night were in retaliation for the sinking of the Moskva.

Zelensky speaks to CNN: In an interview with CNN's Jake Tapper in Kyiv, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Friday that "all of the countries of the world" should be prepared for the possibility that Russian President Vladimir Putin could use tactical nuclear weapons in his war on Ukraine.

Military aid on its way: The first flight of the $800 million in new aid for Ukraine from the United States is expected to arrive in the region in the next 24 hours, according to a senior defense official. Officials previously said the most urgent requirements such as howitzers and related ammunition as well as radars will be among the first items to be shipped.

Russia warns US: Meanwhile, Russia this week formally protested the United States’ ongoing shipment of weapons to Ukraine, sending a diplomatic note to the State Department warning of “unpredictable consequences” should the support continue, according to two US officials and another source familiar with the document.

US State Department spokesperson Ned Price said that “nothing will dissuade” President Joe Biden's administration from continuing to support Ukraine.

Two Ukrainian Neptune missiles hit the Moskva — Russia’s flagship in the Black Sea — earlier this week, a senior defense official said Friday.

A more detailed assessment from an American official said that the strike and subsequent sinking of the ship was the result of a Ukrainian missile.

CNN reported yesterday the US believed with “medium confidence” that Ukraine’s version of events regarding a missile strike on the warship — which Moscow has disputed — was accurate, according to a source familiar with the intelligence.