Zelenskyy calls for more pressure on Moscow as Ukraine says 15,000 Russian troops have been killed

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres called on Russia to end its nearly one-month-long war in Ukraine.

“Continuing the war Ukraine is morally unacceptable, politically indefensible and militarily nonsensible,” Guterres said from the United Nations headquarters in New York. “It is time to stop the fighting now and give peace a chance. It is time to end this absurd war,” he added.

Guterres said the Kremlin’s war in Ukraine is sending reverberations worldwide in “skyrocketing food, energy and fertilizer prices” with a potential to “spill into a global hunger crisis.”

“Developing countries were already suffocating under the burden of Covid-19 and the lack of access to adequate financing. Now they are also paying a heavy price as a result of his war,” he said.

– Amanda Macias

Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was convicted of fraud and contempt of court and sentenced to nine years in a maximum security prison on Tuesday, in a trial Kremlin critics see as an attempt to keep President Vladimir Putin’s most ardent foe in prison for as long as possible.

A judge also ruled that Navalny would have to pay a fine of 1.2 million rubles (about $11,500). Navalny can appeal the ruling.

Navalny, who is already serving 2½ years in a penal colony east of Moscow, had been accused of embezzling money that he and his foundation raised over the years and of insulting a judge during a previous trial.

— Associated Press

Steel vests are made by vehicle scraps amid Russian attacks in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine. The Kyiv Independent reported that the Ukranian scrap metal association is preparing to reuse the metal from seized Russian military vehicles that are damaged beyond repair.

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said sanctions on Russia need to be stepped up.

Addressing the Italian Parliament via video link on Tuesday, he said: “The Ukraine people supported you during the pandemic. We sent you doctors, and the Italians helped us during the flood [of 2020].”

“We are grateful, but the invasion has lasted 27 days, almost a month, and we need more sanctions, more pressure,” he said, news agency ANSA reported, before telling Italian lawmakers that Russian forces were guilty of crimes like those committed by the Nazis.

Zelenskyy reportedly received a standing ovation of Italian lawmakers both at the start and end of his address, a sign of respect and admiration shown by politicians around the world.

Earlier on Tuesday, Zelenskyy had a telephone conversation with Pope Francis. Zelenskyy tweeted that he had spoken to the head of the Catholic church “about the difficult humanitarian situation and the blocking of rescue corridors by Russian troops.”

He said if the Vatican could play a mediating role in ending the conflict that would be appreciated.

— Holly Ellyatt

Ukraine’s Defense Ministry claims roughly 15,300 Russian troops have been killed since the Kremlin launched its onslaught on Feb. 24.

In an update posted on Telegram, the ministry said 509 tanks, 1,556 armored combat vehicles and 252 artillery systems are among Russia’s military losses through to March 22.

CNBC has not been able to independently verify these figures.

Russia reported on March 2 that 498 of its armed forces had been killed in the fighting. Moscow has not since provided an official update.

The pro-Kremlin Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda reported Monday, citing Russia’s Defense Ministry, that 9,861 Russian soldiers had died since the beginning of the war. It has since deleted the article.

The newspaper’s Kremlin correspondent said Tuesday that the newspaper was hacked and a false story was published on its site, Reuters reported. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said he was unable to comment on the incident.

— Sam Meredith

Ukraine Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said the Kremlin must make concessions if talks are to bring an end to the war, describing Russia’s demands for peace as “simply meaningless.”

In an interview with the French TV channel LCI, Vereshchuk said Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is ready to hold talks with Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

Vereshchuk said Ukraine has demonstrated its readiness for productive diplomacy from the outset of Russia’s invasion, according to a translation provided by the Ukrainian government.

The Kremlin said Monday that peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv had not yet made any significant progress.

— Sam Meredith

The United Nations Refugee Agency said more than 3.5 million people have fled Ukraine since Russia launched its invasion of the country on Feb. 24, Reuters reported.

Over 2 million people are estimated to have crossed the border into neighboring Poland.

— Sam Meredith

Michal Baranowski, senior fellow and director of the German Marshall Fund’s Warsaw office, argues that Russia’s war against Ukraine has reached a precarious moment with President Vladimir Putin desperate for a victory.

Russia’s purported use of hypersonic missiles in Ukraine in recent days is not only a sign that the military could be resorting to using more destructive weaponry, but also an opportunity for Russia to flaunt weapons it says it’s been developing for several years.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Friday that it had deployed “Kinzhal” (meaning “Dagger” in Russian) hypersonic aeroballistic missiles to destroy a large underground warehouse of Ukrainian missiles and aviation ammunition in Delyatin, in the Ivano-Frankivsk region of western Ukraine.

Read more: CNBC has a brief guide to hypersonic missiles and what Russia claims to have used here.

Then on Saturday, the ministry said it had used Kinzhal hypersonic aeroballistic missiles again to destroy a large Ukrainian storage base for fuels and lubricants in the Mykolaiv region; Russia’s Defense Ministry said in a statement it was the main fuel supply base for Ukrainian armored vehicles in combat areas in southern Ukraine.

Russian news agencies said the reported use of hypersonic missiles was the first time Russia’s military had used them in its invasion of Ukraine, which began on Feb.24.

CNBC was unable to immediately verify the claims of hypersonic weapon use. The Pentagon said it wasn’t able to either, but Russia has been flaunting the development of several types of hypersonic weapons for several years.

— Holly Ellyatt

Russia continues to face strong opposition in many parts of Ukraine, the U.K. Defense Ministry said in an intelligence update on Twitter.

“Despite heavy fighting, Ukrainian forces continue to repulse Russian attempts to occupy the southern city of Mariupol,” the ministry said.

“Russian forces elsewhere in Ukraine have endured yet another day of limited progress with most forces largely stalled in place,” the update added.

Still, many cities in Ukraine are suffering heavy Russian air and artillery bombardment, according to the ministry.

— Abigail Ng

U.S. President Joe Biden said on Monday that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “back is against the wall” when it comes to the invasion of Ukraine and that he could resort to using more severe tactics in the country.

Speaking at a Business Roundtable event on Monday, Biden said Putin could resort to using “false flags” to justify a chemical or biological weapons attack on Ukraine.

“Now he’s talking about new false flags he’s setting up … asserting that we in America have biological as well as chemical weapons in Europe, [it’s] simply not true I guarantee you,” Biden said at the business event in Washington.

“They are also suggesting that Ukraine has biological and chemical weapons in Ukraine. That’s a clear sign he’s considering using both of those,” Biden said, without presenting evidence. Biden again reiterated that there would be “severe consequences” if Russia did use such weapons.

Concerns have risen in recent weeks that Russia could resort to using chemical weapons in Ukraine as its invasion has been met by a staunch resistance from Ukrainian forces and civilian volunteer fighters.

Western officials and strategists have warned the threat posed by Moscow and Putin in this regard is credible and serious.

— Holly Ellyatt

Nearly a month since Russia invaded Ukraine, Russian forces have been unable to achieve their objectives, according to the U.S. Department of Defense.

“We’re on day 26 [and] the Russians have clearly not achieved many, or almost all of the objectives that … we believe they were setting out to achieve,” said Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby at a briefing on Monday.

“They wanted to get after population centers so that they could take control of key ports, key cities, key government institutions,” he said, adding that the Kremlin wanted to install a government that is “more friendly to Russia.”

So far, Kirby said, Pentagon leaders believe the Russians have taken Kherson, and the Ukrainians have launched a counterattack there.

“I think what we’re seeing here is the Russians have been flummoxed, they’ve been frustrated. They have failed to achieve a lot of their objectives on the ground,” he added.

— Sumathi Bala 

With Russia’s invasion of Ukraine now approaching its fourth week, President Vladimir Putin’s forces have exerted brutal force and destruction on the Eastern European nation, forcing people to flee and making millions homeless.

But Russia’s economy is now creaking under the immense weight of international sanctions and the costs of war, having largely failed to achieve major military victories in Ukraine.

Close watchers of Moscow, and Putin, say there are increasing signs of desperation in Russia’s military campaign and siege tactics.

“I don’t think Russia can win,” Kurt Volker, a former U.S. ambassador to NATO, told CNBC.

“They’re bogged down. They’re having trouble with supplies. They are having trouble with ammunition. They are not able to take the major cities. They’re not advancing. They are showing a lot of desperate measures like calling in Syrians or asking the Chinese for help, or threatening to attack the NATO countries’ [weapons] supplies [to Ukraine] and raising the specter of biological or chemical or nuclear use,” he noted.

“These are all signs of, I think, desperation,” Volker said, his views echoed by other analysts.

— Holly Ellyatt

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in an interview with Eurovision News that his country will not submit to ultimatums from Russia.

“People will either leave the city or those who cannot leave will fight till the end. Therefore, an ultimatum, is a bad thing because it will lead to genocide and the destruction of the Ukrainian people,” he told the European Broadcasting Union, an alliance of public broadcasters, on Monday.

Whether it comes to Ukraine’s membership to NATO, or other forms of compromises, it needs to be accepted by the people, Zelenskyy added.

“When you talk about certain changes and they can be historic, we are not going anywhere. We will come to the referendum. Our people will have to say and give an answer to certain formats of compromises,” he said. “What will those be? It will be defined by our conversation and understanding between Ukraine and Russia.”

The president said residents of occupied cities such as Melitopol and Berdyansk will continue to resist Russian forces.

“We hate these troops who are destroying us and killing our people, [and we hate] their policy. We don’t care, if we want peace, we need to sit down and talk,” he added. “The right word is to negotiate. Negotiate as you have to. But to negotiate, not to execute ultimatums.”

— Sumathi Bala

The nearly monthlong Russian war in Ukraine is on the verge of entering a stalemate, said a senior NATO intelligence official, with Ukrainian forces preventing Russia from making progress but Russian President Vladimir Putin showing no willingness to back down. 

“If we’re not in a stalemate, we are rapidly approaching one,” said the NATO official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military assessments. “The reality is that neither side has a superiority over the other.”

Belarus, a close Russian ally, may soon attack Ukraine itself and is preparing to potentially let Russia position nuclear weapons on Belarusian soil, the official said. Belarus has already allowed Russia’s military to use its territory to invade Ukraine.

— NBC News