INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky warned Russia is consolidating and preparing "powerful strikes" in the country's south, including
besieged Mariupol, where a new attempt will be made Friday to evacuate civilians from the devastated city.Russia meanwhile threatened to
turn off its gas taps to Europe if payments are not made in rubles, as U.S
President Joe Biden ordered a record release of strategic oil reserves to ease soaring U.S
prices.Over a month into Russia's invasion of its neighbor, Vladimir Putin's troops have devastated cities like Mariupol with shelling,
and the city of Chernigiv, but Ukrainian and Western officials have dismissed the pledge, saying Moscow's troops were merely
regrouping."This is part of their tactics," said Zelensky in a late-night address."We know that they are moving away from the areas where we
are beating them to focus on others that are very important..
where it can be difficult for us," he said.In particular, he warned, the situation in the country's south was "very difficult.""In Donbas
and Mariupol, in the Kharkiv direction, the Russian army is accumulating the potential for attacks, powerful attacks," he said.Washington
echoed that assessment, with a senior U.S
defense official saying Russia's focus on Donbas could herald a "longer, more prolonged conflict."Military experts believe that Moscow is
ditching efforts to advance simultaneously along multiple axes in the north, east and south, after struggling to overcome
stronger-than-expected Ukrainian resistance.Instead it wants to establish a long-sought land link between Crimea, which Moscow occupied in
2014, and the two Russian-backed Donbas statelets of Donetsk and Luhansk.'Civilians desperately wanting to flee'Mariupol is the main
remaining obstacle to that ambition, and Russian forces have encircled and relentlessly bombarded the city to try to capture it.Instead, it
has been reduced to rubble, with tens of thousands of civilians trapped inside with little food, water or medicine.Previous attempts to
evacuate residents have collapsed, though some have made the dangerous dash to freedom alone, but on Friday Russia says it will allow a
humanitarian corridor organized by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).The ICRC's Ukraine delegation said on Twitter it was
in nearby Zaporizhzhia, where buses from the encircled city are meant to arrive."We hope to be able to facilitate safe passage for civilians
desperately wanting to flee Mariupol
We are also here with two trucks of assistance, hoping that we can also get assistance in," the organization's Lucile Marbeau said in a
video."In these trucks there is food, medicine, relief items, for those civilians who decide to stay," she added.Ukrainian officials on
Thursday sent dozens of buses toward Mariupol, and the local government said on Telegram that civilians would be able to start boarding
Friday morning in neighboring Berdiansk.Russia has moved about 20% of its troops from around Kyiv after failing to capture the city,
officials.But its strikes have continued on Kyiv and Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said is seemed likely troops are "going to be
repositioned, probably into Belarus, to be refitted and resupplied and used elsewhere in Ukraine."Russian troops have also pulled back from
the Chernobyl nuclear plant after weeks of occupation, but have taken a number of captive Ukrainian servicemen with them, according to
officials in Kyiv.Western intelligence has warned that Putin's advisers may be "afraid to tell him the truth" about battlefield losses or
the damage that sanctions have wrought on the country's economy.And Biden suggested Putin may have placed some advisers under house arrest,
though he cautioned "there's a lot of speculation."'I hope all this will end soon'The Kremlin has rejected the claims, with spokesman Dmitry
Peskov saying Western officials "don't understand President Putin, they don't understand the mechanism for taking decisions and they don't
understand the style of our work."With his economy crippled by unprecedented international sanctions, Putin has sought to leverage Russia's
status as an energy power, and warned Thursday that EU members will need to set up ruble accounts from Friday to pay for Russian gas."If
such payments are not made, we will consider this a breach of obligations on the part of our buyers" and existing contracts would be
stopped, Putin said.The EU has joined the United States in imposing sanctions, and European Parliament President Roberta Metsola is expected
in Kyiv soon in a show of support.But the bloc has not imposed an energy embargo, and Germany, which imported 55% of its gas supplies from
Russia before the war, insisted it will pay in euros or dollars as stipulated in contracts.Berlin and Paris were also "preparing" for
Russian gas to simply stop flowing, France's economy minister said.Biden meanwhile moved to mitigate rising domestic fuel prices by
announcing a release from strategic U.S
reserves of 1 million barrels daily for six months.The record release amounts to augmenting global supplies by about 1%.On the ground around
Kyiv, Ukrainian forces have continued to push back Russian troops, capturing territory on the outskirts of the capital as Moscow's advance
stalls.Zelensky praised the advances, but said he was stripping two generals of their ranks for unspecified offenses."Right now I don't have
time to deal with all the traitors, but gradually all of them will be punished," he said.Civilians have been trickling out of devastated
areas, including three-year-old Karolina Tkachenko, who was helped over a pipeline east of Kyiv by Ukrainian troops as she and her family
escaped."The shops are closed, there's no delivery of supplies
The bridge is also blown up, we can't go for the groceries through there," said her mother Karina, holding her daughter in a pink bobble hat
in her arms."I hope all this will end soon, and I will go back to my work."
