he said what many people think. secretary blinken, of course, is right. this is not a change in policy. this is there is no u.s. policy that calls for regime change. president biden didn t say that. president biden said this man cannot stay in power. that s a commonly held view, probably around the world. maybe even in russia, but it s certainly the case that it was a moral statement. it was not a policy statement. however, does it carry more weight because it is the sitting president of the united states, the commander in chief? of course it does. of course it does. and the sitting president of the united states, the commander in chief, has a responsibility to lead this nation. and he s doing that. and he s leading it in a moral way. this war that the russia is fighting against ukraine in the first instance but against all of us in the second interest is immoral. it s unjustified.
the united states says putin is a butcher, that gets through to the russian people.dougherty is right. the russians don t want to get this out. they don t want their people to hear that the president of the united states thinks that their president is a war criminal or a butcher or shouldn t remain in power. so i think this is actually a message, not just to president putin, but to the russian people. following these talks in europe, involving the united states president. we didn t really hear out loud commitments that have now come as a result of these discussions, bilateral talks. but in your view, what perhaps may have been solidified as a result of these meetings so as to anticipate what might be next in ukraine? so one thing that i was very interested to hear was when
we ll have more in a live report in just a bit. let s go to john berman who is anchoring our coverage from lviv, ukraine, and so glad, john, it remains quiet. quite the contrast to yesterday. indeed. quiet here in the western part of ukraine in lviv. no strikes here today. the fires are out. but a lot of activity elsewhere. and ukrainians, the people you talk to on the streets, they re so proud of the efforts being made by the ukrainian military and the ukrainian government continues to tout successes on the battlefield. joining me now here in lviv is cnn s selma abdulazeez. we have no way to confirm all the information the ukrainian government gives us, but they give us all these examples of towns they partially have retaken. russian equipment they say they ve destroyed. right. so we re seeing this counteroffensive that s been described as nimble, creative, as tactical. able to make small gains. take some villages back.
war and, of course, they want to win this war, but in order to win this war, we keep hearing from the president of ukraine who says, yes, they need resources. they need it now. they may not have reiterated it within the last 24 hours. the need for the no-fly zone or even air power. clearly they still need a lot in order to win, in order to get to this securing of security later, post war. fredricka, you re exactly right. you re exactly right. so the spigot of military equipment, of stingers, of javelins, of armored vehicles. we haven t seen many armored vehicles. they need armored vehicles. that spigot needs to go wide open. turn it totally open. and it needs to go as you just said it needs to go now. it is not good enough to come in two weeks or three weeks even. it needs to go now. that spigot needs to be flowing these equipments as well as
two bags of whatever belongings they can grab and trying to figure out what the next couple of days is going to look like for them. that takes so much strength to get over the border to poland. we met people because they stop here before they get to you there. and ed, right there, welcome to lviv. welcome to ukraine. there s your first air raid siren. this is why they are going. they re going to flee the danger that s in this country because once you get over the border in poland, you are safe. there s a sense of relief you see from people. there s a sense of confusion. there s also a place where i think i think they start grasping for the first time just how much help and how much attention they re getting around the world. you cross the border and there s about a 300-yard kind of path that takes you to the buses. and that s lined with an array of international aid organizations that is really starting to see you have groups of indian sikhs cooking food for