November 24, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

The European Union is preparing a ninth package of sanctions against Russia following Moscow’s latest barrage of strikes on Ukraine, President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen said Thursday.  

Von der Leyen added she was “confident that we will very soon approve a global price cap on Russian oil with the G7 and other major partners,” after the West’s biggest economies agreed in September to impose a cap to reduce Moscow’s ability to fund its war. 

“We will not rest until Ukraine has prevailed over Putin and his unlawful and barbaric war," she continued. 

Western sanctions are taking their toll on Russia, particularly as the cold winter months begin.

“The mood in Moscow and the country is now extremely gloomy, quiet, intimidated, and hopeless,” 34-year-old Lisa, who declined to give her last name and said she was a film producer, told CNN.

“The planning horizon is as low as ever. People have no idea what might happen tomorrow or in a year," she added.

While the shelves in most stores remain well stocked, Western products are becoming increasingly scarce and very expensive, further driving prices that are already hammering many Russian households.

Western sanctions have also sharply curtailed Russia’s ability to replenish the munitions it is using in Ukraine, according to analysis from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence last month.

Read more on the mood in Moscow here.

CNN's Frederik Pleitgen, Claudia Otto and Ana Archen contributed to this post.

The barrage of Russian air strikes against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure Wednesday caused a “blackout” in the country's power system, its energy minister told national television. It was the first time that all four of Ukraine’s nuclear plants were shut down at the same time, he said. 

”We must understand the key thing: yesterday, as a result of shelling, there was a blackout in our power system,” Herman Halushchenko said Thursday.

“The situation is very difficult but, at 4 a.m., we managed to unite the power system. It is now working as a single unit and critical infrastructure facilities throughout the country have been powered.” 

The authorities are now racing to restore electricity across the country. 

“We will increase the volume of power being generated during the day,” Halushchenko said. “We expect that by the evening nuclear power plants will start working and supplying electricity to the grid. This will significantly reduce the deficit.” 

Yesterday was “the first time that all four nuclear power plants were simultaneously shut down,” Halushchenko said. 

Now all nuclear facilities – apart from the besieged plant in Zaporizhzhia, the largest in Ukraine – have been reconnected to the Ukrainian grid and will start to supply it with electricity today. 

“If there is no new shelling, by the end of the day we will be able to significantly reduce the deficit in the power system due to nuclear generation and, accordingly, this will make it possible to proceed to scheduled outages,” the minister added.

One in four houses in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv are without power following Russian shelling in the region, city authorities said on Telegram.

Water supply has been restored on the east bank of the Dnipro river that runs through the city and the administration expects to restore it on the west bank this morning.

Nearly 3,000 miners have been rescued in Ukraine after power outages caused by Russian strikes on the country's energy infrastructure left them trapped underground overnight.

Rescue efforts at mines in the central Dnipropetrovsk region concluded in the early hours of this morning, Oleksandr Vilkul, head of the Kryvyi Rih city military administration, said in a Telegram post.

Regional head Valentyn Reznichenko said "rescue teams were able to extract nearly 3,000 miners to the surface." It was a "tense" night in Dnipropetrovsk, he added.

Reznichenko said half of the region's households have had power restored but "blackouts will continue to minimize the load on the power grid."

Some context: A series of Russian airstrikes against Ukraine on Wednesday destroyed critical facilities, including energy infrastructure, housing, and a hospital maternity ward, where a newborn baby was killed. The large-scale assault also led to widespread blackouts in Ukraine and neighboring Moldova.

Two Russian soldiers walked down a street in Kherson on a spring evening in early March, just days after Moscow captured the city. The temperature that night was still below freezing and the power was out, leaving the city in complete darkness as the soldiers made their way back to camp after a few drinks.

As one stumbled on, the other stopped to relieve himself on the side of the pavement. Suddenly, a knife was thrust deep into the right side of his neck.

He fell to the grass. Moments later, the second Russian soldier, inebriated and unaware, met the same fate.

He says he moved on pure instinct.

“I saw the orcs in uniform and I thought, why not?,” Archie adds, using a derogative term for Russians, as he walks through that same street. “There were no people or light and I seized the moment.”

The 20-year-old is a trained mixed martial arts fighter, with nimble feet and sharp reflexes, who had previously always carried a knife for self-defense, but never killed anyone. CNN is referring to him by his call sign to protect his identity.

Read more here.

French President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday denounced Russian attacks on civilian infrastructure in Ukraine and said the acts "cannot go unpunished." 

A series of Russian airstrikes against Ukraine on Wednesday destroyed critical facilities, including energy infrastructure, housing, and a hospital maternity ward, where a newborn baby was killed. The large-scale assault also led to widespread blackouts in Ukraine and neighboring Moldova.

France plans to hold a donor conference in Paris next month in support of Ukraine and its southwestern neighbor, Macron said.

“With winter approaching, we will mobilize international support for Ukraine on December 13 to help that country remain resilient and to guarantee its energy access. We will not forget Moldova, which was also affected by water and electricity cuts,” Macron tweeted.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky earlier on Wednesday urged the UN Security Council to support the proposed Ukrainian peace formula following the airstrikes, which he dubbed "the Russian formula of terror."

Water supplies have been restored to the left bank of Kyiv, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Thursday, adding that engineers had worked through the night to “restore the capital’s life support.” 

The water supply in the Ukrainian capital was suspended Wednesday after Russian shelling of critical infrastructure in the region that killed at least seven people.

Across the Dnipro River, the water supply remains suspended Thursday in Kyiv's right bank, but plans are in place to restore it in the morning, Klitschko said. 

Power cuts: Meanwhile, 70% of the capital remains without electricity, Klitschko added. 

Emergency power cuts were introduced in Kyiv following Russian strikes on infrastructure facilities, the country’s biggest energy supplier, Yasno, said in a statement Wednesday.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday urged the United Nations Security Council to support the Ukrainian peace formula following a wave of missile strikes against the country that he dubbed "the Russian formula of terror."

Zelensky emphasized the need for "modern and effective air and missile defense systems" after detailing the series of Russian airstrikes that destroyed critical facilities, including energy infrastructure, housing, and a hospital maternity ward, where a newborn baby was killed. 

The large-scale assault on energy infrastructure also led to widespread blackouts in Ukraine and neighboring Moldova, an act Zelensky said was "analogous to using weapons of mass destruction."

US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield was one of several representatives to reiterate their support for Ukraine, with emphasis on condemning Russian attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure. 

"Putin's motive could not be more clear and more cold-blooded. He is clearly — clearly —weaponizing winter to inflict immense suffering on the Ukrainian people. He has decided that if he can't seize Ukraine by force, he will try to freeze the country into submission," Greenfield said.

Negotiations with Kyiv and Moscow on the establishment of a safety zone around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant continue — but in the meantime the director of the UN nuclear watchdog is warning about potential consequences.

Grossi said negotiations are "moving forward" but "this is an active combat zone, therefore getting to agreed parameters for this is not such an easy thing to do."

The IAEA director said he met with a Russian delegation in Turkey earlier Wednesday and spoke with Ukraine's Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba on Tuesday.

"I am having consultations with both. I would not agree with the assessment that we are not making any progress, I think we are," Grossi said. "Of course, we are talking about something which is very difficult. This is war. This is real war and the protection zone that I am proposing is precisely on the front line, on the line where both adversaries are in contact."

When asked who is "playing with fire," referencing Grossi's own remarks from Sunday following powerful explosions that rocked the nuclear power plant Saturday and Sunday, Grossi said "it is very difficult for us to identify from inside the plant who is doing that," adding "by the way, our main goal is to get this to stop, not to get into a game of attribution." 

Later on Wednesday, the plant "once again lost access to external electricity" and was instead relying on its emergency diesel generators for the power it needs for reactor cooling and other essential functions, IAEA said in a statement.