LVIV, Ukraine — The mayor of the besieged Ukrainian city of Mariupol says those hiding at a massive steel mill are running out of food, water and medicine.

Vadym Boichenko described the situation at the Avozstal steel plant as dire. The steel mill is the last position held by Ukrainian fighters, who also are with civilians.

The Soviet-era facility has a vast underground network of bunkers able to withstand airstrikes. But the situation has grown more extreme after the Russians dropped a series of so-called “bunker buster” bombs and unguided munitions.

“Locals who manage to leave Mariupol say it is hell, but when they leave this fortress, they say it is worse,” Boichenko said, according to a translator. “They are begging to get saved.”

He added: “There, it’s not a matter of days, it’s a matter of hours.”

Boichenko said he hoped a cease-fire would allow those inside the steel mill to safely leave. Russia earlier offered a truce that was rejected by Ukrainians, who said Moscow previously broke other agreements.

“We hope there’s a slight touch of humanity in the enemy,” the mayor said.

Boichenko spoke Friday in a government-organized video conference.

(DUBAI, United Arab Emirates) — Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov appears to have dismissed the need for the United Nations to help secure humanitarian corridors out of Ukraine’s besieged cities, striking a tough line a day after the U.N. chief toured war-wracked Kyiv with that very aim.

As an interviewer at Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya TV tried to ask Lavrov about U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ proposals for humanitarian assistance and evacuation of civilians, Lavrov cut him off.

“There is no need. I know, I know,” an irritated Lavrov said. “There is no need for anybody to provide help to open humanitarian corridors. There is only one problem … humanitarian corridors are being ignored by Ukrainian ultra-nationals,” he said.

“We appreciate the interest of the secretary-general to be helpful,” he added. “(We have) explained … what is the mechanism for them to monitor how the humanitarian corridors are announced.”

During the hour-long interview, Lavrov also accused the West of sabotaging Russia’s peace talks with Ukraine. He claimed that thorny negotiations in Istanbul last month had been progressing on issues of Russian territorial claims and security guarantees until Ukrainian diplomats backtracked at the behest of the West.

“We are stuck because of their desire to play games all the time,” Lavrov said. “Because of the instructions, they get Washington, from London, from some other capitals, not to accelerate the negotiations.”

When asked about the risks of war spilling into neighboring Moldova after a series of explosions rattled a breakaway border region within the country, Lavrov struck an ominous tone.

“Moldova should worry about their own future,” he said. “Because they’re being pulled into NATO.”

(WASHINGTON) -- A senior U.S. defense official said on Friday the Russian offensive is going much slower than planned in part because of the strength of the Ukrainian resistance.

“We also assess that because of this slow and uneven progress, again, without perfect knowledge of every aspect of the Russian plan, we do believe and assess that they are behind schedule in what they were trying to accomplish in the Donbas,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the U.S. military’s assessment.

He said the U.S. believes the Russians are “at least several days behind where they wanted to be” as they try to encircle Ukrainian troops in the east.

As the troops try to move north out of Mariupol so they can advance on Ukrainian forces from the south, their progress has been “slow and uneven, and certainly not decisive in any, in any event,” the official said.

Ukraine’s ambassador-designate to Canada says Russia must be held accountable for its troops committing sex crimes, including against children.

Yulia Kovaliv told a Canadian House of Commons committee on Monday that Russia is using sexual violence as a weapon of war and said rape and sexual assault must be investigated as war crimes.

She said Russia also has kidnapped Ukrainian children and taken them to Russian-occupied territories and now Russia itself. Ukraine is working with partners to find the children and bring them back.

“Russians, a few days ago, killed a young mother and taped her living child to her body and attached a mine between them,″ the ambassador said. She said the mine detonated.

All of Russian society, and not just President Vladimir Putin “and his proxies," should bear responsibility for the war on Ukraine because more than 70% of Russians support the invasion, Kovaliv said.

WASHINGTON —

President Joe Biden wants to put a spotlight on the spike in food prices from Russia's invasion of Ukraine when he travels to an Illinois farm to emphasize how U.S. agricultural exports can relieve the financial pressures being felt worldwide.

The war in Ukraine has disrupted the supply of that country's wheat to global markets, while also triggering higher costs for oil, natural gas and fertilizer. The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization said its food price index in April jumped nearly 30% from a year ago, though the index did decline slightly on a monthly basis. Americans are also bearing some pain as food prices are up 8.8% from a year ago, the most since May 1981.

The trip to Illinois on Wednesday is an opportunity for Biden to tackle two distinct challenges that are shaping his presidency. First, his approval has been dogged by high inflation and his visit will coincide with the release of the May consumer price index, which economists say should show a declining rate of inflation for the first time since August.

But much more broadly, it's an opportunity to reinforce America's distinct role in helping to alleviate the challenges caused by the war in Ukraine. The trip follows a similar pattern as Biden's recent visit to an Alabama weapons factory highlighted the anti-tank Javelin missiles provided by the U.S. to Ukraine.

"He's going to talk about the support we need to continue to give to farmers to help continue to produce more and more domestically," White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Tuesday. "Just as we are providing weapons, we are going to work on doing what we can to support farmers to provide more wheat and other food around the world."

The president noted in remarks Tuesday about inflation that Ukraine has 20 million metric tons of wheat and corn in storage that the U.S. and its allies are trying to help ship out of the country. This would help to address some supply issues, though challenges could persist.

Several House Democrats, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi, met with Biden on Tuesday after having visited Ukraine. They warned that the food shortage meant the consequences of the war started by Russian President Vladimir Putin would extend well beyond Ukrainian borders to some of the world's poorest nations.

"It's going to result in a hunger crisis, much worse than anybody anticipated," Massachusetts Rep. Jim McGovern following the White House meeting.

An analysis this month for the center-right American Enterprise Institute by Joseph Glauber and David Laborde noted that countries in the Middle East and North Africa are most likely to suffer from the higher prices caused by grain shortages.

There are limits to how much wheat the U.S. can produce to offset any shortages. The Agriculture Department estimated in March that 47.4 million acres of wheat were planted this year, an increase of just 1% from 2021. This would be the fifth-lowest amount of acres dedicated to wheat in records that go back to 1919.

Biden will be traveling with Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to Illinois. After the president speaks at the farm, he will go to Chicago to speak at a convention for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.

BRUSSELS —

It's likely to be the quickest NATO enlargement ever — and one that would redraw Europe's security map. Finnish leaders announced Thursday their belief that Finland should join the world's biggest military organization because of Russia's war in Ukraine. Sweden could soon follow suit.

Should they apply for membership, the move would have far-reaching ramifications for Northern Europe and trans-Atlantic security.

No doubt, it will also anger their large neighbor Russia, which blames, at least in part, its war in Ukraine on NATO's continued expansion closer to its borders. It's unclear how Russian President Vladimir Putin might retaliate. The Kremlin said Thursday that it certainly won't improve European security.

The following is a brief look at what Finland and Sweden's membership in the 30-country NATO alliance could mean, with the Nordic partners expected to announce their intention to join within days.

Finland and Sweden

Not neutral like Switzerland, Finland and Sweden traditionally think of themselves as militarily "nonaligned."

But Russia's war in Ukraine and Putin's apparent desire to establish a Moscow-centered "sphere of influence" has shaken their security notions to the core. Just days after he ordered the Feb. 24 invasion, public opinion shifted dramatically.

Support in Finland for NATO membership has hovered around 20-30% for years. It now stands at over 70%. The two are NATO's closest partners but maintaining good ties with Russia has been an important part of their foreign policy, particularly for Finland.

Now they hope for security support from NATO states — primarily the United States — in case Moscow retaliates. Britain pledged on Wednesday to come to their aid.

The Nordic region

NATO membership for the two, joining regional neighbors Denmark, Norway and Iceland, would formalize their joint security and defense work in ways that their Nordic Defense Cooperation pact hasn't.

NORDEFCO, as it's known, focuses on cooperation. Working within NATO means putting forces under joint command.

Accession would tighten the strategic Nordic grip on the Baltic Sea — Russia's maritime point of access to the city of St. Petersburg and its Kaliningrad exclave.

Finland and Sweden also join them, along with Iceland, at the heart of the triangle formed with the North Atlantic and maritime areas in the Arctic, to where Russia projects its military might from the northern Kola Peninsula. Integrated NATO military planning will become a lot simpler, making the region easier to defend.

NATO

Finland and Sweden are NATO's closest partners. They contribute to the alliance's operations and air policing.

Most importantly, they already meet NATO's membership criteria, on functioning democracies, good neighborly relations, clear borders and armed forces that are in lock-step with the allies. After the invasion, they formally boosted information exchanges with NATO and sit in on every meeting on war issues.

Both are modernizing their armed forces and investing in new equipment. Finland is purchasing dozens of high-end F-35 warplanes. Sweden has top-quality fighter jets, the Gripen.

Finland says it's already hit NATO's defense spending guideline of 2% of gross domestic product. Sweden, too, is ramping up its military budget and expects to reach the target by 2028. The NATO average was estimated at 1.6% last year.

Russia

Putin has demanded that NATO stop expanding and in his May 9 speech blamed the West for the war.

But public opinion in Finland and Sweden suggests that he has driven them into NATO's arms.

If Finland joins, it would double the length of the alliance's border with Russia, adding a further 830 miles for Moscow to defend.

Putin has promised a "military, technical" response if they join. But many troops from Russia's western district near Finland were sent to Ukraine, and those units suffered heavy casualties, Western military officers say.

So far, Moscow is doing nothing obvious to dissuade the two — apart perhaps from a couple of incidents where Russian planes entered their airspace. The Kremlin said Thursday that its response could depend on how close NATO infrastructure moves toward Russia's borders.

Some at NATO worry that the Russians might deploy nuclear weapons or more hypersonic missiles to the Kaliningrad exclave, across the Baltic Sea wedged between allies Poland and Lithuania.

___

Karl Ritter in Stockholm, and Jari Tanner in Helsinki, contributed to this report.

AerCap Holdings, the aircraft leasing giant that is the world's largest owner of jets, lost 113 planes when Russia seized them in response to sanctions triggered by the war in Ukraine.

Related video above: Greek PM to Congress: Russia is testing democracy

The seizures of the planes and 11 jet engines by Russian authorities caused AerCap to take a $2.7 billion pre-tax charge during the quarter, causing the company to report a net loss of $2 billion rather than the $500 million profit it would have made without the hit. But company executives said the quarter was actually a good one and they see better times ahead as global demand for flying continues to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic.

"But for the impact of Russia, this is a strong underlying quarter for the company," said CEO Aengus Kelly in comments to analysts. "Across all our business lines ... we are seeing improving demand, increased utilization of our assets and the improving financial health of our customers."

Investors agreed and shares of Dublin-based AerCap gained 6% in afternoon trading following the report.

The company was able to recover 22 jets and three engines before they were seized by Russian authorities. It has filed insurance claims to seek to recover the lost aircraft, although some of those claims are with Russian insurance companies. Those policies are backed by Western re-insurance companies, but AerCap stated that "the timing and amount of any recoveries under these policies are uncertain."

The company owns a total of 1,624 aircraft, far more than owned or operated any single airline. The jets lost to Russia represented less than 5% of the net value of Aercap's fleet, which grew larger during the pandemic by purchasing rival leasing firm GECAS from General Electric.

Aercap should easily ride out the financial loss of the jets, said Richard Aboulafia, managing director with AeroDynamic Advisory. Even if the war were to end and the sanctions were to be lifted, the planes have lost their operating certificates in the eyes of Western aviation regulators.

"Once the documentation goes, there's very little point in even trying to get them back," he said.

When Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, Russia's air carriers were operating 861 commercial planes, according to data from aviation analytics firm Cirium. Just over half of those planes, with an estimated market value of $9.2 billion, were owned by non-Russian leasing companies.

Sanctions by multiple countries required international aircraft leasing companies that owned the jets to repossess them by the end of March. An estimated 79 jets were repossessed, but Russia announced it was nationalizing hundreds more.

The $40 billion U.S. package of assistance for Ukraine as it tries to fend off Russia's aggression is hitching a ride on a commercial flight to South Korea so it can be signed by President Joe Biden.

The Senate voted Thursday to finalize new military and humanitarian assistance to Ukraine as Biden was making his way to the South Korean capital. A White House official says the bill is being flown to Seoul by a U.S. government official who was already planning to travel to the region on a commercial flight.

As the Associated Press reported, bills that have needed an urgent signature have been routinely flown by White House aides for decades to the location of the sitting president, if they were abroad.

Then-President George W. Bush flew back to Washington from his Texas ranch to in 2005 to sign legislation that would require doctors to continue feeding a comatose Florida woman, Terri Schiavo. Her husband wanted to let her die.

Roman Abramovich’s 19-year ownership of Chelsea is ending after the British government approved the sale of the Premier League club by the sanctioned Russian oligarch.

Los Angeles Dodgers part-owner Todd Boehly will now take over the team.

The government had to be sure that Abramovich, who was sanctioned over his links to Russian President Vladimir Putin, did not profit from the enforced sale of the club.

The reigning FIFA Club World Cup winners and 2021 European champions will be sold for 2.5 billion pounds ($3.1 billion) — the highest price ever for a sports team — once Premier League approval is granted.

Proceeds from the sale will go into a frozen bank account controlled by the government, according to Sky Sports News.

California-based Clearlake Capital will assume the majority shareholding.

The team has been operating under a government license since March, when Abramovich’s assets were frozen.

The license will expire on May 31.

The United States has won the latest round of a legal battle to seize a $325-million Russian-owned superyacht in Fiji, with the case now appearing headed for the Pacific nation’s top court.

Fiji’s Court of Appeal on Friday dismissed an appeal by Feizal Haniff, who represents the company that legally owns the superyacht Amadea.

Haniff had argued the U.S. had no jurisdiction under Fiji’s mutual assistance laws to seize the vessel, at least until a court sorted out who really owned it.

He wants Fiji's Supreme Court to stop U.S. agents from sailing the Amadea from Fiji before the appeal is heard.

The case highlights the thorny legal issues as the U.S. tries to seize assets of Russian oligarchs linked to the war in Ukraine.

The Kremlin-backed leader of Russia’s southern province of Chechnya has posted a video in which he warns that Poland could be next after Ukraine.

Ramzan Kadyrov, who is famous for his bluster, said in the video he posted to his official Telegram page that Ukraine was “a done deal” and that “if an order is given after Ukraine, we’ll show you [Poland] what you’re made of in six seconds.”

Poland, which borders Ukraine, has provided its neighbor with weapons and other aid since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24. It has also welcomed in millions of Ukrainian refugees.

Kadyrov later urged Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to “finally come to his senses and accept the conditions offered by our president [Vladimir Putin].”

Kadyrov has repeatedly used social media to boast about Chechen fighters’ alleged performance against Ukrainian troops and to make other unconfirmed statements about the war in Ukraine.

PARIS — The French news broadcaster BFM TV says a 32-year-old French journalist was killed Monday in Ukraine.

It says the journalist was hit by shell shrapnel while covering a Ukrainian evacuation operation.

BFM TV said Frédéric Leclerc-Imhoff was killed as he was “covering a humanitarian operation in an armored vehicle” near Sievierodonetsk, a key city in the Donbas region.

French President Emmanuel Macron paid tribute to Leclerc-Imhoff.

Macron tweeted he “was in Ukraine to show the reality of the war. Aboard a humanitarian bus, alongside civilians forced to flee to escape Russian bombs, he was fatally shot."

Since Russia began its invasion of Ukraine in late February, at least seven journalists have been killed, according to numbers gathered by Reporters Without Borders.

At least nine journalists have been injured while covering the invasion.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has discussed Ankara's planned military operation in northern Syria and the war in Ukraine with Russia's Vladimir Putin.

In recent days Erdogan has said Turkey will launch a cross-border incursion against Kurdish militants in Syria to create a 30-kilometer (19-mile) deep buffer zone. He told Putin in a phone call that the frontier zone was agreed in 2019 but had not been implemented, the Turkish presidency said on Monday.

Ankara carried out an operation against the People's Protection Units, or YPG, in October 2019. Russia, the Syrian regime and the United States also have troops in the border region.

Day after day, Russia is pounding the Donbas region of Ukraine with relentless artillery and air raids, making slow but steady progress in seizing the industrial heartland of its neighbor.

With the conflict now in its fourth month, it's a high-stakes campaign that could dictate the course of the entire war.

Suppose Russia prevails in the battle of Donbas. In that case, it will mean that Ukraine loses not only land but perhaps the bulk of its most capable military forces, opening the way for Moscow to grab more territory and dictate its terms to Kyiv. A Russian failure could lay the grounds for a Ukrainian counteroffensive — and possibly lead to political upheaval for the Kremlin.

Following botched early attempts in the invasion to capture Kyiv and the second-largest city of Kharkiv without proper planning and coordination, Russia turned its attention to the Donbas, a region of mines and factories where Moscow-backed separatists have been fighting Ukrainian forces since 2014.

Learning from its earlier missteps, Russia is treading more carefully there, relying on longer-range bombardments to soften Ukrainian defenses.

It seems to be working: The better-equipped Russian forces have made gains in both the Luhansk and Donetsk regions that make up the Donbas, controlling over 95% of the former and about half of the latter.

Ukraine is losing between 100 and 200 soldiers a day, presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak told the BBC, as Russia has “thrown pretty much everything non-nuclear at the front.” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy earlier put the daily death toll at up to 100.

When the war was going badly for Russia, many thought President Vladimir Putin might claim victory after some gains in Donbas and then exit a conflict that had seriously bruised the economy and stretched its resources. But the Kremlin has made clear it expects Ukraine to recognize all the gains Russia has made since the start of the invasion — something Kyiv has ruled out.

Russian forces control the entire Sea of Azov coast, including the strategic port of Mariupol, the Kherson region — a key gateway to Crimea — and a large chunk of the Zaporizhzhia region, which could aid a further push deeper into Ukraine. Few expect that Putin will stop.

Russia has a clear edge in artillery in the battle for Donbas, thanks to a more significant number of heavy howitzers, rocket launchers, and abundant ammunition. The Ukrainians have had to be economical in using their artillery, with the Russians constantly targeting their supply lines.

Moscow's earlier territorial gains in the south, including the Kherson region and a large part of the neighboring Zaporizhzhia region, have prompted Russian officials and their local appointees to ponder plans to fold those areas into Russia or declare them to be independent, like the so-called “people's republics” of Donetsk and Luhansk.

Ukrainian officials and Western analysts voiced concern that Moscow could try to press its offensive into the heavily populated and industrialized Dnipro region farther north, an advance that could potentially slice Ukraine in two and raise a new threat for Kyiv.

Such ambitions all hinge on Moscow's success in the east. A defeat in the Donbas would put Kyiv in a precarious position, with new recruits lacking the skills of battle-hardened soldiers now fighting in the east and supplies of Western weapons insufficient to fend off a potentially deeper Russian push.

Ukrainian officials brushed off such fears, voicing confidence that its military can hold out to stem the Russian advances and even launch a counterattack.

Additional reporting by The Associated Press.

“Hearing directly from the people who are working to free BG was helpful!! The State Department stated their support for us as a team & asked for us to keep up our efforts in publicly supporting her,” Griner’s teammate Brianna Turner tweeted.

Russian state media agency TASS reported that WNBA star Brittney Griner had her detention extended through July 2 as U.S. officials continue to demand for her release.

The U.S. State Department considers Griner “wrongly detained.” The Russian government claims that Griner was arrested in February for possessing hash oil.

The 31-year-old has been one of the league’s most prolific stars since her 2013 professional debut. She is a seven-time All-Star and consistently one of the WNBA’s top scorers.

The announcement by Russian officials comes a day after the Phoenix Mercury met with State Department officials about Griner.

TALLINN, Harju County —

A celebrated Ukrainian medic whose footage was smuggled out of the besieged city of Mariupol by an Associated Press team was freed by Russian forces on Friday, three months after she was taken captive on the streets of the city.

Yuliia Paievska is known in Ukraine as Taira, a nickname she chose in the World of Warcraft video game. Using a body camera, she recorded 256 gigabytes of her team’s efforts over two weeks to save the wounded, including both Russian and Ukrainian soldiers.

She transferred the clips to an Associated Press team, the last international journalists in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, one of whom fled with it embedded in a tampon on March 15. Taira and a colleague were taken prisoner by Russian forces on March 16, the same day a Russian airstrike hit a theater in the city center, killing around 600 people, according to an Associated Press investigation.

“It was such a great sense of relief. Those sound like such ordinary words, and I don't even know what to say,” her husband, Vadim Puzanov, told The Associated Press late Friday, breathing deeply to contain his emotion. Puzanov said he spoke by phone with Taira, who was en route to a Kyiv hospital, and feared for her health.

Initially the family had kept quiet, hoping negotiations would take their course. But The Associated Press spoke with him before releasing the smuggled videos, which ultimately had millions of viewers around the world, including on some of the biggest networks in Europe and the United States. Puzanov expressed gratitude for the coverage, which showed Taira was trying to save Russian soldiers as well as Ukrainian civilians.

In a short video posted Saturday on Telegram, Taira thanked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for his efforts to get her released. Addressing Ukrainians still held by Russia, with a catch in her voice, she said: “I know that everything will work out and we will all be home as I am now.”

Zelenskyy had announced Taira's release in a national address.

“I'm grateful to everyone who worked for this result. Taira is already home. We will keep working to free everyone,” he said.

Hundreds of prominent Ukrainians have been kidnapped or captured, including local officials, journalists, activists and human rights defenders.

Russia portrayed Taira as working for the nationalist Azov Regiment, in line with Moscow’s narrative that it is attempting to “denazify” Ukraine. But the AP found no such evidence, and friends and colleagues said she had no links to Azov, which made a last stand in a Mariupol steel plant before hundreds of its fighters were captured or killed.

The footage itself is a visceral testament to her efforts to save the wounded on both sides.

A clip recorded on March 10 shows two Russian soldiers taken roughly out of an ambulance by a Ukrainian soldier. One is in a wheelchair. The other is on his knees, hands bound behind his back, with an obvious leg injury. Their eyes are covered by winter hats, and they wear white armbands.

A Ukrainian soldier curses at one of them. “Calm down, calm down,” Taira tells him.

A woman asks her, “Are you going to treat the Russians?”

“They will not be as kind to us,” she replies. “But I couldn’t do otherwise. They are prisoners of war.”

Taira was a member of the Ukraine Invictus Games for military veterans, where she was set to compete in archery and swimming. Invictus said she was a military medic from 2018 to 2020 but had since been demobilized.

She received the body camera in 2021 to film for a Netflix documentary series on inspirational figures being produced by Britain’s Prince Harry, who founded the Invictus Games. But when Russian forces invaded, she used it to shoot scenes of injured civilians and soldiers instead.

President Vladimir Putin has said at Russia's showpiece investment conference that the country's economy will overcome sanctions that he called "reckless and insane."

Putin began his address Friday to the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum with a lengthy denunciation of countries that he contends want to weaken Russia, including the United States. He says the U.S. "declared victory in the Cold War and later came to think of themselves as God's own messengers on planet Earth."

Russia came under a wide array of sanctions after sending troops into Ukraine in February. Putin said trying to damage the Russian economy "didn't work."

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Friday that it's still "absolutely necessary" for some leaders to talk directly to Russian President Vladimir Putin amid efforts to end the war in Ukraine. He told German news agency DPA on Friday that he and France's president will continue to do so.

Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron have held several telephone conversations with Putin, separately and together, since Russia's invasion began in late February. Those contacts have drawn some criticism — including from Poland's president, who said recently that they achieve nothing and serve only to legitimize the Russian leader.

Scholz said some leaders need to talk to Putin "and it is necessary that they are clear."

President Joe Biden pledged Wednesday that western allies “will not waver” in defense of Ukraine, casting the struggle against Russian aggression as one of the world's central challenges requiring a broad coalition of countries to stand in defense of freedom.

“Our unity will not falter," Biden declared. "I promise you.”

He made the promise at the NATO summit in the capital of Lithuania, a country that he said knows the “transformational power of freedom" after spending decades under Moscow's thumb. He drew parallels between Lithuania's struggle to escape Soviet rule and Ukraine's ongoing fight to repel Russia's deadly invasion, highlighting the importance of rallying allies to take on the challenge.

“America never recognized the Soviet occupation of the Baltic," he said to an outpouring of cheers from a crowd of thousands in a courtyard at Vilnius University draped with American and Lithuanian flags. "Never, never.” More spectators gathered in an overflow area, where a big screen was set up.

Biden spent two days in Vilnius for the annual NATO summit, where members of the western military alliance pledged more support for Ukraine but stopped short of extending an invitation for the besieged country to join the alliance. After meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who entered the summit demanding a clear path for his country toward joining the alliance, something that was initially promised back in 2008, Biden said that other security guarantees agreed to at the summit will be even more significant.

“One thing Zelenskyy understands now is that whether or not he’s in NATO now, it’s not relevant as long as he has commitments," Biden said, comparing the situation to how the U.S. ensures Israel's security edge over its neighbors.

The president pointed to the U.S. and allied response to Moscow's invasion as a model for how to respond to other global challenges, from climate change to the rise of China, saying nations' positions are stronger when they “build the broadest and deepest coalition.”

“Our commitment to Ukraine will not weaken,” he said. “We will stand for freedom today, tomorrow and for as long as it takes.”

The president was headed next to Finland, the newest member of NATO, for a meeting of Nordic leaders. During his speech, Biden hailed an agreement to advance Sweden's membership in NATO after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan agreed to drop his objections.

"President Erdogan kept his word," Biden said, clearing a path for the alliance to have 32 members.

The U.S. president's enthusiasm for expanding NATO has not extended to Ukraine. He's expressed concerns about the country's readiness to join the alliance, as well as fears that the West could be drawn into a wider conflict with Russia.

The competing priorities in the midst of Europe’s bloodiest war in generations created an undercurrent of friction even as Biden and Zelenskyy projected a united front when they met earlier Wednesday. Their public encounter had the vibe of two leaders clearing the air, and each conspicuously heaped praise on his counterpart.

Biden lauded Zelenskyy and Ukrainians for their courage by saying it's “been a model for the whole world to see.” Zelenskyy thanked Biden and the American people for billions of dollars in military assistance, saying that “you spend this money for our lives.”

Wearing a blue-and-yellow-striped tie in the colors of the Ukrainian flag, Biden acknowledged that Zelenskyy has occasionally been unsatisfied by unfulfilled requests for weapons.

“The frustration, I can only imagine," Biden said. "I know that you're many times frustrated about whether things get to you quickly enough, what's getting to you and how we're getting it. But I promise you, the United States is doing everything we can to get you what you need.”

Biden also said the war had created a sense of unity about opposing international aggression.

“It’s bringing the world together," he said. "It’s a hell of a price to pay, but it’s bringing the world together.”

The meeting came after a few other encounters between Biden and Zelenskyy at the summit. They sat close to each other at the inaugural meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Council, a new forum that's intended to give Kyiv a greater voice within the alliance.

And they shared the stage as the Group of Seven, which includes the world's most powerful democratic countries, announced plans for long-term security assistance for Ukraine.

But Wednesday afternoon was the first opportunity for Biden and Zelenskyy to sit down privately with their advisers after their public comments.

And by then, Zelenskyy had softened his tone considerably. En route to Vilnius on Tuesday, he had blasted NATO's vague plans for Ukraine's eventual membership, tweeting, “It’s unprecedented and absurd when a time frame is set neither for the invitation nor for Ukraine’s membership.”

Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser, said everyone “needs to look squarely at the fact” that allowing Ukraine to join NATO at this point “means war with Russia.”

“That is an inescapable fact,” he told CNN.

Sullivan credited Biden with ensuring that NATO is “more unified and more determined and more decisive than at any point.”

“That’s President Biden’s legacy when it comes to NATO, and it’s one that he can be very proud of," he said.

In an interview with The Associated Press before Biden left on his trip, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said the president has been “heading in the right direction but not fast enough” when it comes to supporting Ukraine.

“The weapons transfers never seem to happen as soon as they’re announced,” said McConnell, a Kentucky Republican. Although Ukrainians are “extremely grateful for the help,” he said, the assistance "frequently doesn’t get there soon enough to be the most effective.”

Although McConnell has been a firm supporter of sending help to Ukraine, other Republicans have voiced skepticism, creating uncertainty about Biden's ability to make long-term financial commitments.

WNBA star Brittney Griner tried to call her wife nearly a dozen times through the American embassy in Russia on the couple's fourth anniversary Saturday, but they never connected since the phone line at the embassy was not staffed, Cherelle Griner said Monday.

The couple has not spoken by phone in the four months since Griner's arrest in Russia, where she remains jailed. That was to have changed Saturday when a long-awaited call was to have finally taken place after getting Russian government approval.

But the day came and went without any contact, leaving an anguished Cherelle Griner to wonder what went wrong and to suspect at least initially that Russian authorities had thwarted the call.

On Monday, she said she learned from her wife's lawyers a more distressing truth: Brittney Griner had actually tried to call 11 times over a period of several hours, dialing a number she'd been given at the U.S. embassy in Moscow, which the couple had been told would then patch the call through to Cherelle Griner in Phoenix.

But each time, the call went unanswered because the desk at the embassy where the phone rang was apparently unstaffed on Saturday.

"I was distraught. I was hurt. I was done, fed up," Cherelle Griner told The Associated Press in an interview, recounting how an anniversary she had eagerly anticipated was instead spent in tears. "I'm pretty sure I texted BG's agent and was like: 'I don't want to talk to anybody. It's going to take me a minute to get my emotions together, and just tell everybody I'm unavailable right now.' Because it just knocked me out. I wasn't well, I'm still not well."

The State Department said Monday that "we deeply regret that Brittney Griner was unable to speak with her wife because of a logistical error."

The department reiterated that it has no higher priority than the safety of Americans overseas and that it remains in regular contact with families of hostages and wrongful detainees.

For Cherelle Griner, the experience has exacerbated already simmering frustrations about the U.S. government's response to her wife's case.

Though U.S. officials have repeatedly said they are working behind the scenes to get the two-time Olympic gold medalist home from Russia, she said she is "very pissed" about the snafu, especially since the call had been on the schedule for two weeks and yet no one warned her during that time that it might be logistically impossible because of the weekend.

She added: "I find it unacceptable and I have zero trust in our government right now. If I can't trust you to catch a Saturday call outside of business hours, how can I trust you to actually be negotiating on my wife's behalf to come home? Because that's a much bigger ask than to catch a Saturday call."

Cherelle Griner said a contact in the U.S. government had apologized to her for the error. She said she's since learned that the one number Brittney Griner had been given to dial typically processes calls from prisoners on Mondays through Fridays but not weekends, which is why no one was there to transfer the call.

"But mind you," Cherelle Griner said in the interview, "this phone call had been scheduled for almost two weeks — with a weekend date."

Brittney Griner, a seven-time WNBA All-Star who plays for the Phoenix Mercury, was detained at a Russian airport on Feb. 17 after authorities there said a search of her bag revealed vape cartridges containing cannabis oil.

The State Department in May designated her as wrongfully detained, moving her case under the supervision of its Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs, effectively the government's chief hostage negotiator. Russian state-run news agency Tass reported last week that her detention had been extended until July 3.

Cherelle Griner said she was still hoping to talk to or meet with President Joe Biden, but "at this point, it's starting to feel like a no."

So far, Cherelle Griner says she's had to rely exclusively on others' assessments of her wife's condition. Lawyers and consular affairs officials have been able to speak with the basketball star, but her wife has not.

On the evening before the call, she went to sleep at 5 p.m. so that she'd be awake and alert at midnight to receive the anticipated call from Russia to Phoenix that never came.

"This was such a big moment because this would have been the first time where I truly could tell if she's OK," Cherelle Griner said, describing it as a "life-or-death" opportunity to discern how her wife was actually holding up. "This would have been the first time for me to actually just hear her in real-time and to truly know if she's OK or to know if she's seconds away from not being in existence anymore."

Newsy is the nation’s only free 24/7 national news network. You can find Newsy using your TV’s digital antenna or stream for free. See all the ways you can watch Newsy here.

A regional governor in eastern Ukraine said that the country's troops will retreat from a besieged city to avoid encirclement.

The city of Sievierodonetsk, the administrative center of the Luhansk region, has faced relentless Russian bombardment. Ukrainian troops fought the Russians in house-to-house battles before retreating to a huge chemical factory on the city’s edge, where they holed up in its sprawling underground structures.

Luhansk Gov. Serhiy Haidai said that the Ukrainian troops have now been given the order to leave Sievierodonetsk. Haidai said the Ukrainian forces have “received the order to retreat to new positions and continue fighting there” but didn’t give further details.

The city of nearly 100,000 has been the site of numerous battles since 2014.

At least 15 people were killed when a Russian rocket hit an apartment building in the eastern Ukraine town of Chasiv Yar and more than 20 people may still be trapped in the rubble, officials said Sunday.

The Saturday night rocket assault is the latest in a recent burst of high-casualty attacks on civilian structures. At least 19 people died when a Russian missile hit a shopping mall in the city of Kremenchuk in late June and 21 people were killed when an apartment building and recreation area came under rocket fire in the southern Odesa region this month.

Russia has repeatedly claimed that it is hitting only targets of military value in the war. There was no comment on Chasiv Yar at a Russian Defense Ministry briefing on Sunday.

Pavlo Kyrylenko, governor of the Donetsk region that includes Chasiv Yar, said the town of of about 12,000 was hit by Uragan rockets, which are fired from truck-borne systems.

The Ukrainian emergency services later said the death toll had risen to 15 and that an estimated two dozen people were under the wreckage. Rescuers made voice contact with at least three people trapped in the rubble, it said.

Chasiv Yar is about 20 kilometers (12 miles) southeast of Kramatorsk, a city that is expected to be a major target of Russian forces as they grind westward.

The Donetsk region is one of two provinces along with Luhansk that make up the Donbas region, where separatist rebels have fought Ukrainian forces since 2014. Last week, Russia captured the city of Lysychansk, the last major stronghold of Ukrainian resistance in Luhansk.

After the seizure of Lysychansk, some analysts predicted Moscow’s troops likely would take some time to rearm and regroup.

But “so far there has been no operational pause announced by the enemy. He is still attacking and shelling our lands with the same intensity as before,” Haidai said. He later said the Russian bombardment of Luhansk was suspended because Ukrainian forces had destroyed ammunition depots and barracks used by the Russians.

WASHINGTON —

Related video above: Deadly rocket strike hits Ukraine apartment building

The White House on Monday said it believes Russia is turning to Iran to provide it with “hundreds” of unmanned aerial vehicles, including weapons-capable drones, for use in its ongoing war in Ukraine.

U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said it was unclear whether Iran had already provided any of the unmanned systems to Russia, but said the U.S. has “information” that indicates Iran is preparing to train Russian forces to use them as soon as this month.

“Our information indicates that the Iranian government is preparing to provide Russia with up to several hundred UAVs, including weapons-capable UAVs on an expedited timeline," he told reporters Monday.

Sullivan said it was proof that Russia's overwhelming bombardments in Ukraine, which have led it to consolidate gains in the country's east in recent weeks, were "coming at a cost to the sustainment of its own weapons."

Sullivan's revelation comes on the eve of President Joe Biden's trip to Israel and Saudi Arabia, where Iran's nuclear program and malign activities in the region will be a key subject of discussion.

The U.S. decision to publicly reveal that the two countries' chief regional rival was helping to rearm Russia comes as both Israel and Saudi Arabia have resisted joining global efforts to punish Russia for its invasion of Ukraine due to their domestic interests.

Sullivan also noted that Iran has provided similar unmanned aerial vehicles to Yemen's Houthi rebels to attack Saudi Arabia before a ceasefire was reached earlier this year.

Military analyst Samuel Bendett of the CNA think tank said Russia’s choice of Iran as a source for drones is logical because “for the last 20 years or more Iran has been refining its drone combat force. Their drones have been in more combat than the Russians'.” They are pioneers of so-called loitering munitions, the “kamikaze” drones like the Switchblade that the U.S. has provided Ukraine.

Iran has “a proven track record of flying drones for hundreds of miles and hitting their targets,” Bendett added, including penetrating American-supplied air defenses and striking Saudi oil refineries. He said the Iranian drones could be very effective at striking Ukrainian power stations, refineries and other critical infrastructure.

Bendett noted that before the Ukraine war, Russia had licensed drone technology for its Forpost UAV from a proven supplier: Israel. The Jewish state has remained neutral in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, so that source is no longer available to Moscow.

__

Associated Press writer Frank Bajak in Boston contributed to this report.

VINNYTSIA, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian officials say Russian missiles that struck a city in central Ukraine killed at least 23 people and wounded more than 100 others, including children, while dozens were missing.

Officials say cruise missiles fired from a Russian submarine in the Black Sea struck a medical center, stores and residential buildings in Vinnytsia, a city southwest of Kyiv, the capital.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is accusing Russia of intentionally aiming missiles at civilians and repeating his call for Russia to be declared a state sponsor of terrorism.

One military analyst thinks Thursday's attack mirrors previous ones on residential areas that Moscow has launched "to try to pressure Kyiv to make some concessions."

Thus far, only six bodies have been identified, according to National Police Chief Ihor Klymenko.

Klymenko said 39 people are still missing.

According to Ukraine’s State Emergency Service, out of the 23 people reported dead, including three children under the age of 10.

The emergency service agency said 66 people were hospitalized, including five in critical condition and 34 who suffered severe injuries.

LAUSANNE, Switzerland (AP) — Russia remains barred from international soccer competitions including the Champions League after the Court of Arbitration for Sport rejected appeals by the national soccer federation and four clubs.

CAS upheld decisions by UEFA and FIFA, which excluded Russian national teams and clubs following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Russia was already excluded from men's World Cup qualifying and the women's European Championship and its clubs now won't feature in competitions like the Champions League in 2022-23.

FIFA was initially criticized for not punishing the country enough after they invaded Ukraine, the New York Times reported.

Russia wasn't immediately expelled by the governing body of soccer from World Cup qualifying. FIFA initially was going to allow them to play without its flag and anthem before they reversed course amid the backlash.