say at this point more than 20 people were injured in that blast. the ukrainian president zelenskyy said dozens killed. we re waiting for confirmation for that. at this point we hear more people are still trapped in the rubble. zelenskyy called the attack an act of terror and told europe s parliament moments ago that every square in ukraine should be called freedom square. this attack was on freedom square in kharkiv. zelenskyy says every square in ukraine is freedom square. also this morning, russia s military is closing in on the ukrainian capital of kyiv. we have new satellite imagery which show this russian military convoy, it stretches for more than 40 miles. and it reaches the outskirts of the city. u.s. lawmakers were told in classified briefings this new wave of russian troops could consolidate their positions in ukraine and by sheer numbers overwhelm the resistance that we ve seen so far from ukrainian citizens. video from one town shows
act of fire power around particularly these urban centers. we ll see more of this frankly in the coming days. not a bug. this may be a feature that horrifying video we just saw might be a feature of the russian attack in the coming hours and days. jim, what does this mean as we see this 40-mile long convoy of material, military vehicles moving ever closer to kyiv? you can see the convoy here. only about 20 mile gap separates the end of the convoy from the city center in kyiv. could what happened in kharkiv happen in kyiv? reporter: absolutely. in fact, that s the u.s. understanding of the russian plan. it has been the u.s. assessment of the russian plan for some time. we ve been reporting it for weeks that the plan would be, as you assault in the east, you also come down from the north and surround the city kyiv to do a decapitation operation and surround a city of millions of people you need a lot of forces and fire power. what s truly remarkable, john, we re seeing it play out be
on the capital, the very real fear is that this city will soon be completely encircled and that it will be extremely difficult to move supplies, to move food, to move humanitarian assistance in and out. and one more thing i want to mention because it also sent a shiver down my spine, the russian defense minister accusing the ukrainian military once again today of using civilian infrastructure as a shield for military hardware. this is the kind of propaganda we have heard from the russians many times before. and unfortunately it is usually a precursor to attacking or hitting civilian targets under the guise that they re being used to protect military hardware. john, brianna? yeah and zelenskyy got at that. he said children have been killed. what kind of military factories do they work in?
way i can describe it to cluster and systems designed to kill people, to kill lots of people and very quickly. it is also the u.s. assessment that president putin and the commanders under him will become less hesitant and maybe really the better phrasing is more willing to commit collateral damage. what does that mean? that means kill civilians. that means therefore more direct targeting of non-military targets, frankly civilian targets, inside urban centers. and that s why that video that you just played there, john, is indicative of that to see an administrative building, it s not a military target, administrative building the middle of kharkiv, a city of more than a million people struck with a high power weapon that is now we know killed ten people. a sign of what russia is willing to do. it s concerning, right? because they have a tremendous
consider this country has been able to stand up and keep them back for a moment. but that he will up the ante and that he is unafraid of bombarding and killing civilians. remember, grozny, aleppo, this is putin and his war machine. civilians all the way. that s how they do it. that s how they try to win. and it is something that is going to be very difficult for the world to tolerate. and that is what volodymyr zelenskyy is standing up in the face of, speaking to the european parliament. christiane amanpour, thank you so much. and new day continues right now. announcer: this is cnn breaking news. welcome to our viewers in the united states and all around the world. it is tuesday, march 1st. overnight, a devastating aerial attack on kharkiv. this is ukraine s second largest city. you can see while it was a direct hit on a government building in the historic freedom square of that city, ukrainians