Ukraine live briefing: U.S. announces new round of military aid for Ukraine

Here’s the latest on the war and its ripple effects across the globe.

Key developments

• The Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing Wednesday titled “Holding Russian Kleptocrats and Human Rights Violators Accountable for their Crimes Against Ukraine.” In his opening statement, the panel’s chairman, Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), invoked the importance of “defending an American legacy” of bringing war criminals and perpetrators of crimes against humanity to justice — a legacy that started with the Nuremberg Trials after World War II, he said. “As a result of glaring gaps in our criminal laws, many human rights violators have evaded justice. Some have even — shockingly — found safe haven on American soil,” Durbin said, urging his colleagues to enact a crime-against-humanity statute, which would close legal loopholes that prevent the United States from being able to federally prosecute many war criminals.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he spoke with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) about his country’s “defense needs and capabilities,” and said he “raised the issue of F-16” fighter jets. The United States has been reluctant to provide Kyiv with the warplanes, and President Biden said in January that he would not send the jets. Zelensky again invited McCarthy — whose party includes influential members who are averse to continued U.S. assistance — to visit Ukraine.
• Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin urged Turkey to make a decision about Sweden’s accession to NATO “sooner versus later,” as Turkey and Hungary continue to block the process. Austin said he “won’t second-guess” Turkey’s leadership or “predict” when it will decide. Speaking with his Swedish counterpart at Musko naval base, Austin said he was “confident” that Sweden will join the defense alliance before a NATO summit in July.
• The United Nations has lodged a formal complaint with the United States over its apparent bugging of Secretary General António Guterres’s office, made evident in intelligence documents among those leaked on the chat app Discord. In a written protest, “we have made it clear that such actions are inconsistent with the obligations of the United States” as host of U.N. headquarters in New York, Guterres spokesman Stéphane Dujarric said in a Tuesday briefing. The leaked documents, taken from top-secret intercepts of Guterres’s private interactions with aides and foreign leaders, “were basically distorted summaries of the secretary general’s conversations,” Dujarric said.
• Karine Jean-Pierre, White House press secretary, said Russian President Vladimir Putin’s Monday trip to occupied regions in Ukraine “seems like an indication that they know things aren’t going well for Russia. They know that. Mr. Putin seems to know that very clearly.” She added in her Wednesday briefing that he is “likely trying to shore up his own populace,” given that his military is “underperforming and struggling.”

Global impact

• South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol said he is open to sending military aid in case of a large-scale attack on civilians in Ukraine. Yoon told Reuters that under certain extreme scenarios, including a “massacre or serious violation of the laws of war, it might be difficult for us to insist only on humanitarian or financial support.” The statement marked a potential shift, as Yoon had maintained that his government’s policy prohibits sending lethal aid to nations at war. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov criticized what he called Seoul’s “unfriendly stance” and said that sending weapons would “indirectly mean a certain stage of involvement in this conflict.”
• Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov continued his diplomatic tour of Latin America, meeting Wednesday with leaders of Nicaragua after stopping by Venezuela the previous day. Lavrov and Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro reaffirmed their intention to more closely coordinate together “in the interests of … creating a more just polycentric international order, and maintaining global stability and security,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a release.
• Swedish vodka brand Absolut said it would immediately halt exports to Russia. The reversal came amid backlash after Absolut’s owner told Agence France-Presse this month that it had resumed exports after halting them last year following the invasion.
• Poland’s prime minister said Warsaw has reached an agreement allowing Ukrainian grain to be transported across its borders, although the goods are still not allowed to remain in the country. Poland has expressed concern that cheap Ukrainian grain could hurt its domestic producers.
• The United States charged four Americans over their roles in an alleged campaign to push pro-Kremlin propaganda and influence U.S. politics. They are accused of working for a Russian operative who had sought to promote the invasion of Ukraine.

Battleground updates

• Disinformation is a “major element” of Russia’s war strategy, Britain’s Defense Ministry said. But this strategy comes in different forms, it added — including “narrative laundering, whereby Russia promotes information from proxies, or unverified social media sources, which then permeates to more mainstream or state-run media.” The goal is to obscure the fact that the original information comes from Russian state actors to make it more credible. “Their current priorities almost certainly include discrediting the Ukrainian government and reducing international support for Ukraine,” the ministry said.
• Russian forces are making gains in Bakhmut, analysts at the Institute for the Study of War think tank said, citing Russian and Ukrainian military sources in their assessment. The Russian Defense Ministry said forces of the Wagner mercenary group have advanced into the eastern city, which has been the site of a fierce, months-long battle for control. According to the ISW, Ukrainian authorities have said that Russian forces are stepping up attacks on Bakhmut and are not running out of artillery ammunition. Ukrainian service members have complained of shortages on the front line.

Analysis from our correspondents

Brazil’s Lula reaches out to China and Russia, stoking U.S. unease: Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has diverged from the West over the war in Ukraine, hewing closer to Beijing’s and Moscow’s rhetoric, Ishaan Tharoor writes.

Lula, in a visit to China last week, accused the United States and the European Union of “encouraging war” and urged them to “start talking about peace.” White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters in Washington that “in this case, Brazil is parroting Russian and Chinese propaganda without at all looking at the facts.”

The Brazilian leader’s comments were welcomed by Moscow. “As for the process in Ukraine, we are grateful to our Brazilian friends for their excellent understanding of this situation’s genesis,” said Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who was in Brasília this week as part of a four-nation tour of Latin America.

Karen DeYoung and Matt Viser contributed to this report.