Russia-Ukraine live updates: Kyiv under fire as Ukraine, Russia hold talks and humanitarian crisis grows

TEL AVIV — As the West squeezes Russia’s economy over its war in Ukraine, Israel says it is working to prevent Moscow’s oligarchs, some of whom also hold Israeli passports, from showing up and turning the country into a haven for sanctions evasion.

The most visible among them is Roman Abramovich, the former owner of the Chelsea Premier League soccer team, who has Israeli citizenship and was added to a British sanctions list last week. His private jet landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion Airport on Sunday night, according to Israeli media.

In the weeks since the invasion of Ukraine began, the Foreign Ministry has formed a task force to investigate the influence that some Russian business executives, including those with alleged ties to the Kremlin, have in Israel. Foreign Minister Yair Lapid also warned his fellow cabinet members last month against granting the oligarchs favors. He said such a move would cause diplomatic damage, according to an official present at the meeting who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic.

China accused the United States Monday of spreading “fake news” about its role in the Ukraine crisis, after U.S. officials said the Kremlin had requested military equipment and aid from Beijing.

U.S. officials familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told The Washington Post that Russia had made the requests. They did not describe what kind of weaponry had been requested or whether China had responded.

“Recently the U.S. side has with sinister intentions shared a string of fake news targeting China related to the Ukraine issue,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said on Monday in response to a question about the request. He added that China’s position of urging a diplomatic solution was clear and consistent.

Russia also denied Monday it had asked China for military assistance. “Russia has an independent potential to continue the operation, and, as we said, it is developing according to plan and will be completed on time and in full,” Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for the president, said Monday during a conference call with reporters.

China and Russia’s deepening alignment is being tested by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, which Beijing refuses to recognize as an act of aggression. Last week, Zhao lent support to Russian conspiracy theories to suggest, without evidence, that the United States was involved in bioweapons development at labs in Ukraine.

Zhao on Monday again challenged the United States to publish more information about the labs, asking “if the U.S. side claims this is fake news, then why does it not release detailed data to prove its innocence?”

White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan will be meeting with China’s top diplomat, Yang Jiechi, in Rome on Monday, and the issue of China helping Russia weather U.S.-led sanctions is expected to be on the agenda.

A high-voltage power line at the former Chernobyl nuclear plant site has once again been damaged by Russian forces, Ukraine’s nuclear agency said Monday, just one day after Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko announced that power had been restored following a Russian attack last week that disconnected the site from the electricity grid.

“Reliable power supply to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant is critical from the point of view of nuclear safety,” Ukraine’s nuclear agency said.

Ukrenergo, the Ukrainian utility that carried out the repairs over the weekend, said in a Facebook post Monday that the power line has again been damaged by “the occupants.” The company said its workers would have to return to the site to continue restoration.

Officials have expressed concern that a lack of power at the plant and surrounding area would jeopardize cooling systems for more than 20,000 spent nuclear fuel rods that remain at the closed Chernobyl plant, the scene of a 1986 disaster.

The possibility that the Russian state could default on its debt obligations is no longer so remote, according to the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, as the full effects of Western sanctions in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine come into focus.

“In terms of servicing debt obligations, I can say that no longer we think of Russian default as [an] improbable event,” IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva told CBS’s Margaret Brennan in an episode of “Face the Nation” that aired Sunday. “Russia has the money to service its debt, but cannot access it.”

Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said Sunday on state television that Russia cannot access about half of its foreign exchange reserves because of sanctions. “The total volume of our reserves is about $640 billion, and about $300 billion are in such condition that we can’t use them now,” he said.

Russia will pay its obligations in rubles “until our foreign exchange reserves are unfrozen,” Siluanov said.

The World Bank’s chief economist, Carmen Reinhart, told Reuters in an interview last week that Russia and Belarus are “in square default territory.”

Georgieva told CBS she does not believe that Russia’s economic struggles could lead to an imminent global financial crisis, because the financial system’s exposure to the Russian markets — about $120 billion — is “definitely not systemically relevant.”

Georgieva is “more concerned,” she said, about the “consequences that go beyond Ukraine and Russia.” European economies could take a hit from the rising commodity prices caused by the conflict in Ukraine, particularly oil and gas, which could contribute to already high inflation there.

Meanwhile, the economies of the countries that border Russia and Ukraine, and that trade heavily with both, could also be harmed. These countries, such as Moldova, Kazakhstan and Georgia, “have yet to recover from the covid-induced economic crisis,” she said. “For them, this shock is particularly painful.”

A residential building in Kyiv’s Obolon district was struck by Russian shelling Monday, according to the Ukrainian State Emergency Service, forcing residents to flee as firefighters tried to extinguish the flames and rescue those trapped inside.

Officials said the explosions killed at least one person and injured several more were injured.

Photos taken Monday showed residents climbing out from the rumble as thick plumes of smoke escaped blackened windows and doors. At least 70 people were evacuated, officials said.

A video recorded by the State Emergency Service showed rescue workers moving burned-out vehicles and using ladders to reach elderly residents trapped inside their apartments high in the building.

Emergency workers also helped evacuate pets.

In the Kurenivka neighborhood, the wreckage of a rocket also landed in a street on Monday, killing one person and injuring six others, according to the mayor of Kyiv, Vitali Klitschko.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba has called on other nations to fully isolate Russia and avoid being “dragged into WWIII” by issuing more sanctions and providing Ukraine with weapons to help its forces win the war that Vladimir Putin launched Feb. 24.

Taking to Twitter on Monday, Kuleba appealed to world leaders, writing: “We need you to help us fight. … Help Ukraine force Putin into failure and you will avert a larger war.”

Ukrainian lawmaker Lesia Vasylenko also urged governments around the world to do more, telling the television program “Good Morning Britain” that Putin would likely grow “more greedy in terms of territory.”

“Everybody is scared of the nuclear bomb and that Putin will press that red button, but in fact he’s already got his finger and pressing a million red buttons,” she said. She called on the United Kingdom to take the lead in establishing an “anti-Putin coalition” that could help limit loss of life and further chaos in Ukraine and beyond.

Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne said Monday that the government is clamping down on key Russian figures by issuing fresh sanctions that target more than 30 Russian oligarchs, including Chelsea football club owner and billionaire Roman Abramovich.

Other countries, including the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, have already issued sweeping sanctions against Russia and key figures following the invasion of Ukraine.

“Many of these oligarchs have facilitated, or directly benefited from, the Kremlin’s illegal and indefensible actions in Ukraine since 2014,” Payne said, according to Reuters. “In some cases the sanctions also include immediate family members.”

Australia’s announcement that it would impose sanctions on 33 individuals comes after Russia targeted a military base near the Polish border over the weekend.

Other individuals targeted by Australia in its fresh round of sanctions include the chief executive of Russian gas giant Gazprom, Alexey Miller, and the chairman of Bank Rossiya, Dmitri Lebedev, the Guardian reported.

Ukrainian officials said Monday they would attempt to evacuate civilians from besieged cities through 10 humanitarian corridors and renew their efforts to get a s