Biden to meet with EU's von der Leyen; U.S. says China has not given Russia weapons

A senior Russian diplomat warned that increasing Western support for Ukraine could trigger an open conflict between nuclear powers.

Speaking at the U.N. conference on disarmament, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov denounced the U.S. and its allies for openly declaring the goal of defeating Russia in a "hybrid" war, arguing that it violates their obligations under international agreements and is fraught with the war in Ukraine spilling out of control.

Ryabkov warned that "the U.S. and NATO policy of fueling the conflict in Ukraine" and their "increasing involvement in the military confrontation is fraught with a direct military clash of nuclear powers with catastrophic consequences."

He emphasized that Russian President Vladimir Putin's move to suspend the 2010 New START treaty, the last remaining nuclear arms pact with the U.S. came in response to the U.S. and NATO action on Ukraine.

— Associated Press

The White House said it has not yet seen China supply Russia with weapons for the war in Ukraine.

"We haven't seen the Chinese make a decision to move in that direction," National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said when asked about any potential weapons transfers.

"Ultimately it's their choice to make," Kirby added, declining to elaborate on potential U.S. retaliatory actions.

— Amanda Macias

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni urged India to play a central role in facilitating negotiations to end Russia's war against Ukraine.

India, with the rotating presidency of the Group of 20 industrialized and developing countries, could represent the needs of less-developed nations in such a process, Meloni said in a statement following talks with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

She condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine and underscored its adverse impact on developing countries in terms of food and energy security.

"India may play a central role in facilitating a negotiating process for cessation of hostilities" in Ukraine, Meloni said.

Modi reiterated his cautious stand by reaffirming that peace can be achieved only through diplomacy and dialogue, saying, "India is ready to support a peace initiative in that direction."

So far, India has refrained from directly criticizing Russia's invasion. The two have been allies since the Cold War era, and New Delhi depends on Moscow for nearly 60% of its defense equipment. India has increasingly scooped up Russian oil since the invasion a year ago, initially facing scrutiny from the U.S. and other allies over its growing purchases. That pressure has since waned. India has continued to abstain from voting in U.N. resolutions that condemn Russia's war against Ukraine.

— Associated Press

Cindy McCain will become the new executive director of the United Nations world Food Program, Secretary-General António Guterres and Food and Agriculture Organization Director-General Qu Dongyu announced.

McCain succeeds David Beasley, a former Republican governor of South Carolina, who held the role for six years. McCain is currently the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Agencies for Food and Agriculture in Rome.

"McCain, a champion for human rights, has a long history of giving a voice to the voiceless through her humanitarian and philanthropic work," a spokesman for Guterres said in a statement.

McCain is the widow of John McCain, the longtime U.S. senator and 2008 Republican presidential nominee.

— Amanda Macias

The White House said U.S. President Joe Biden will welcome President Ursula von der Leyen of the European Commission next week. 

"The leaders will review the strong cooperation between the United States and the European Union to support Ukraine as it defends its sovereignty and democracy and to impose costs on Russia for its aggression," White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre wrote in a statement.

"The leaders will take stock of the joint Task Force on Europe's Energy Security that they established one year ago, which has helped the EU reduce its dependence on Russian fossil fuels and accelerate its green transition," Jean-Pierre added of the upcoming March 10 visit.

Biden and von der Leyen are also expected to discuss security challenges posed by China.

— Amanda Macias

Six ships carrying about 249,290 metric tons of grain and other food products left Ukraine's Chornomorsk port, the organization overseeing the export of agriculture from the country said.

Two of the vessels are carrying wheat and barley and are destined for Turkey, and another two ships are loaded with sunflower meal and corn and will sail to China. The remaining ships are headed to Spain and Belgium.

The Black Sea Grain Initiative, a deal brokered in July among Ukraine, Russia, Turkey and the United Nations, eased Russia's naval blockade and saw three key Ukrainian ports reopen.

So far, more than 770 ships have sailed from Ukrainian ports.

— Amanda Macias

Kidsave Ukraine, a nonprofit dedicated to helping children affected by Russia's war, launched a new project dubbed Flat Sasha to raise awareness about the need for financial support for its ongoing work in the war-weary country.

"Flat Sasha represents a 12-year-old orphan displaced from their home in Mykolaiv due to the war, like so many other children in the country. Flat Sasha can be printed out, colored in and decorated. Once you've created your Flat Sasha, we encourage you to hang them up in your school, office, home, car, or bring them along with you on a brand new adventure," wrote Kidsave Ukraine in a statement.

Financial donations are used to supply families with food, medicine, shelter, fuel and counseling services. Funds also support Kidsave's efforts to rebuild Ukraine by training volunteers and staff on trauma therapy.

Flat Sasha has met Ukraine's Ambassador to the United States Oksana Markarova in Washington, D.C., and traveled to see the St. Louis arch, Mt. Rushmore and even Kyiv.

— Amanda Macias

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff U.S. Army Gen. Mark Milley spoke with his Ukrainian counterpart, the Pentagon said in a brief readout of the call.

"They discussed the unprovoked and ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine and exchanged perspectives and assessments. The chairman reaffirmed unwavering support for Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity," U.S. Army Col. Dave Butler said in a statement.

— Amanda Macias

The U.N. Children's Fund, or UNICEF, said that more than 7 million children in the regions near Ukraine are in critical need due to Russia's war in Ukraine. Of those, more than 4 million children are in need inside Ukraine.

A little over 3 million children are in need in refugee response countries, according to data collected by the United Nations.

UNICEF wrote in a report that so far more than 3.35 million children and caregivers were provided with access to mental health and psychosocial support. Additionally, nearly 1.5 million children were given access to formal or non-formal education, including early learning. 

— Amanda Macias

At least 20 torture centers in the recently liberated Ukrainian city of Kherson have direct financial links to the Kremlin, according to a team of international lawyers helping Ukraine investigate Russian war crimes. 

"Working closely with Ukraine's Office of the Prosecutor General, a paper trail has been exposed that shows that the main torture chambers in Kherson and those administering them do so through the financial support of the Russian state," Wayne Jordash, an international human rights lawyer and managing partner of the law firm Global Rights Compliance, told CNBC.

Jordash adds that the team of lawyers, experts and investigators uncovered that the torture sites were directly managed by several Kremlin security agencies including Russia's Federal Security Services, known as the FSB.

Read the full story here.

— Amanda Macias

Ukraine is distancing itself from an incident in Bryansk earlier on Thursday that Russia described as a terrorist attack, with one official saying Russians are fighting President Vladimir Putin's regime from within.

Russian news agencies reported earlier, according to Reuters, that a group of Ukrainian saboteurs had taken hostages in the Russian border region of Bryansk, while the regional governor said one person had been killed after the group fired at a car. Putin called the purported incident a terrorist attack.

Ukraine rejected the reports with Mykhailo Podolyak, the adviser to the head of the Ukrainian President's Office, saying on Twitter that "the story about sabotage group in RF [the Russian Federation] is a classic deliberate provocation" and added that Russia's partisan movement was "getting stronger and more aggressive."

Ukrainian Defense Intelligence Directorate spokesperson Andriy Yusov told local media outlet and NGO, Hromadske that Russians who opposed Putin's regime were behind the incident, saying "these are people who, with weapons in their hands, are fighting against Putin's regime and against those who support him," according to an NBC translation of the comments.

— Holly Ellyatt

A view of the site as search and rescue efforts continue in the debris of an apartment building after Russian forces launched a missile attack on Zaporizhzhia in southern Ukraine.

At least four people were killed and eight injured in the attack.. A rocket fired by the Russian military hit a five-story building, the Ukrainian National Police said in a statement.

- Getty Images

The Kremlin says it is seeking to destroy "terrorists" who it said were behind what it called "an attack by terrorists" on the border region of Bryansk while Ukraine denied responsibility.

Russian news agencies reported earlier that a group of Ukrainian saboteurs had taken hostages in the Bryansk region, Reuters reported, while the regional governor said one person had been killed.

Ukraine rejected the reports with Mykhailo Podolyak, the adviser to the head of the Ukrainian President's Office, saying the claims by Russia were a "deliberate provocation."

Meanwhile, Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov told reporters earlier Thursday that Russia viewed the incident as a terrorist attack. "We are talking about an attack by terrorists. Now measures are being taken to destroy these terrorists," he said, according to comments reported by state news agency Tass.

Russian President Vladimir Putin had received reports from security agencies about the incident, he said, adding that "we are talking about the events that are unfolding in the Bryansk region in connection with an attack by Ukrainian militants."

"The security forces report on the actions that the security agencies ... are taking to counter terrorists," he said.

Earlier this week, Russia accused Ukraine of carrying out several drone attacks on its territory, one of which it said had targeted Bryansk which borders Ukraine, although no damage was done and no one was hurt by the attack, a regional official said. Ukraine has not confirmed it was behind the attacks and, on Wednesday, a Ukrainian official said Kyiv does not strike at Russian territory.

— Holly Ellyatt

Russia's foreign ministry said Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke "on the move" at a G20 meeting in India, but did not hold negotiations or a meeting, Russian news agencies reported on Thursday.

A senior U.S. State Department official earlier said the pair had spoken for less than 10 minutes on the margins of the conference.

— Reuters

A Russian missile slammed into a five-story apartment building in the city of Zaporizhzhia in southeastern Ukraine on Thursday killing at least four people, Ukrainian officials said.

Rescue workers carried away the wounded on stretchers and clambered through the ruined building looking for survivors after the early-morning strike, a Reuters television crew on the scene said.

The upper floors of the apartment block had been destroyed and cars parked nearby had been crumpled. Fallen debris lay around the building. 

"The people were screaming from under the rubble. It was hard to hear. We were shocked," Yuliia Kharytenko, a 36-year-old woman who lives in the apartment block, told Reuters.

"We ran out in whatever we were wearing. Our cat is left there, scared. We don't know if it is alive."

The Ukrainian state prosecutor's office said four people had been killed and eight wounded in the attack. Another five were unaccounted for, it said. Seven of those rescued were being treated in hospital, and three of then were in a serious condition, said Anatoliy Kurtev, a senior city council official.

Among those who survived was a 30-year-old man who rescue workers said had been sleeping on a couch at the time of the attack and was trapped under a concrete slab. "For almost three hours rescuers worked to recover him from under the slab. He is alive and well, everything is fine," said volunteer rescue worker Ivan Zdorovets.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy condemned the attack in a Facebook post, saying Ukraine would drive out the Russian forces who invaded Ukraine in February last year. Moscow did not immediately comment on the events in Zaporizhzhia. It denies deliberately targeting civilians, but has devastated towns and cities across Ukraine in missile and drone strikes.

— Reuters

Rising temperatures in Ukraine that are bringing in the country's infamous muddy season are beginning to limit cross-country movement, Britain's Ministry of Defense said Thursday — and that could help Ukraine in defending territory.

Thawing winter temperatures and the ensuing muddy conditions, known as "rasputitsa" in Russian and "bezdorizhzhia" in Ukrainian, are well known in Ukraine and thwarted Russian forces (and often Ukrainian forces too) on numerous occasions last year as they tried to traverse the country's boggy fields and roads early on in the invasion in spring.

The ministry noted that daytime soil temperatures have risen and are now largely above freezing and that warmer than average conditions for the remainder of winter and spring could further reduce cross-country movement.

"Poor CCM [cross country movement] typically provides some military advantage to defending forces," the ministry said in its intelligence update on Thursday.

"It is almost certain that by late-March, CCM will be at its worst following the final thaw. This will add further friction to ground operations and hamper the off-road movement of heavier armoured vehicles, especially over churned-up ground in the Bakhmut sector," an area heavily defended by Ukraine's forces as Russia looks to seize more territory in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine.

— Holly Ellyatt

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken accused Moscow of repressing domestic critics and called on U.N.- mandated investigators to keep documenting Russia's alleged abuses in the Ukraine war in a speech to the Human Rights Council on Thursday.

Blinken described Russia's civil society crackdown as a "systematic muzzling" and also urged U.N.-appointed investigators to continue documenting Russia's Ukraine abuses to provide "an impartial record of what's occurring, and a foundation for national and international efforts to hold perpetrators accountable".

His video address comes ahead of an expected speech by a senior Russian official Sergei Ryabkov who is due to appear before the same Geneva-based body for the first time since Moscow invaded Ukraine more than a year ago.

— Reuters

There will be consequences if countries choose to give weapons to Russia to help it prosecute the war in Ukraine, the Netherlands' Foreign Minister Wopke Hoekstra told CNBC Thursday.

"All others should clearly refrain from helping out Russia militarily, that would be a problem if countries, would cross that bridge ... that will have a consequences if countries go across that line in my opinion," Hoekstra told CNBC's Tanvir Gill.

There have been concerns that China is contemplating giving Russia weapons to help it continue its war in Ukraine, although Beijing has rebuffed those claims. The U.S. has signaled it could impose economic sanctions on China if it does help Moscow.

Speaking to CNBC on the sidelines of the Group of 20 summit taking place in New Delhi, Hoekstra refused to be drawn on whether sanctions could be imposed on China but said he was due to meet U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken this afternoon at the summit. Ukraine would be discussed, he noted, saying "we all are facing the effects of this tremendous crisis for which Russia, and Russia alone, is responsible."

For his part, Blinken has said he has no plans to meet his Russian and Chinese counterparts at the meeting.

Asked when he believed the war could end, Hoekstra was pessimistic it could come to a conclusion anytime soon.

"I think we have to be realistic here. All of us would want to have a peace on Ukrainian terms, ASAP, but the reality might well be that, that this war will stay with us for a very long time," he said.

"Just bear in mind that the Russians waged war for nine years in Afghanistan, that they were decades in Eastern Europe. So what I'm saying to the public at home, I would I would like to convey to you as well, we have to be prepared for the long run. And as long as is necessary, we will continue to help out Ukraine."

— Holly Ellyatt

Tensions higher than ever between the U.S. and Russia, both countries appear to be keeping their distance as Group of 20 (G-20) meeting takes place in New Delhi on Thursday.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that he has no plans to meet Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov at the summit, which comes after Russia's invasion of Ukraine entered a second year last month.

Relations between the U.S. and Russia soured further in recent weeks after President Vladimir Putin announced that Russia was suspending its participation in the New START nuclear arms control treaty, the last remaining arms treaty between Moscow and Washington.

Russia's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said it wasn't surprising that a meeting wouldn't take place on the sidelines of the G-20 ministerial meeting.

"In my opinion, the position of the United States was clearly and long ago indicated. They are in favor of the escalation of conflicts in principle around the world, diplomacy, unfortunately, they, apparently relegated to the background," Zakharova told reporters, news agency Interfax reported Thursday.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock on Thursday called on her Russian counterpart to return to the full implementation of the new START nuclear arms control treaty.

— Holly Ellyatt

Russian forces appear to be tightening the noose around the city of Bakhmut in Donetsk, prompting questions in Ukraine over whether a withdrawal by Ukrainian forces must be seriously considered.

Standard Russian units and mercenary fighters belonging to the Wagner Group have been slowly advancing on the industrial city in eastern Ukraine in recent weeks and reports suggest routes into the city are now being cut off.

Both Russia and Ukraine have thrown masses of manpower and equipment into capturing, and defending, Bakhmut, respectively. But given Russian forces are closing in on the city, Ukrainian military analysts are now openly questioning whether a tactical withdrawal should take place before it's too late.

"I believe that sooner or later, we will probably have to leave Bakhmut. There is no sense in holding it at any cost," Ukrainian member of parliament Serhiy Rakhmanin said on NV radio late on Wednesday in comments translated by Reuters.

No lines of defense should be allowed to collapse, Rakhmanin said, according to the news agency. "There are two ways to approach this — an organised retreat or simple flight. And we cannot allow flight to take place under any circumstances," he said.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian military analyst Oleg Zhdanov said in a post on YouTube that "there is a danger that our garrison in Bakhmut will be encircled," assessing the situation as "critical," Reuters reported.

"The enemy is attempting to sever the routes used to supply our forces in Bakhmut and halt all movement along them," he said. "The Russian forces cannot win street battles in Bakhmut or take the city by attacking head-on. The only way they can take the city is to surround it."

Ukraine's military said Thursday morning that over the past 24 hours, its forces had repelled more than 170 enemy attacks in the area of Bakhmut and surrounding settlements "where Russian troops are focusing efforts and conducting active offensive operations."

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said this week that his forces were under "insane pressure" and said battles around Bakhmut were intensifying day by day. Both sides claim that they are inflicting hundreds of losses on each other on a daily basis.

— Holly Ellyatt