CNN
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The Russian military is planning to increase the use of small squads on motorcycles and quadbikes on the frontlines in Ukraine as it plans fresh offensives, according to the Ukrainian military and analysts of the conflict.

The Russian Defense Ministry published video on Saturday showing units practising tactics in groups of two or three motorbikes, with a rider seen navigating a course to the sound of a pulsating electronic soundtrack.

Russian forces have used motorbikes and quads in several areas of the frontlines in an effort to evade Ukrainian drones for more than a year. But the Institute for the Study of War in Washington says the latest Russian video “indicates that the Russian military is likely developing a tactical doctrine for systematic offensive motorcycle usage and may be preparing to issue an increased number of motorcycles.”

Ukraine expects a major Russian offensive in the next few months as Moscow tries to capture more territory before any ceasefire agreement.

The Ukrainian military calls the motorbike assaults ‘banzai attacks.’ One Ukrainian commander, Andriy Otchenash, said earlier this month that the motorcycles are designed for a quick blitzkrieg. “They can advance very quickly, get behind the lines,” he said, but losses on the Russian side were very high.

“It indicates that the enemy does not have a large amount of military offensive equipment, but on the other hand, it is an adaptation to the conditions of war,” said the Ukrainian Center for Strategic Communication.

On Saturday, the Ukrainian military said it had repelled a Russian assault on the village of Bahatyr on the Donetsk frontlines, destroying 15 motorcycles and killing about 40 Russian soldiers. It distributed video of drones eliminating a number of motorbikes in open countryside.

The Ukrainian military reported in February the Russians were using more quadbikes around Chasiv Yar, also in Donetsk, where the frontlines have barely moved over the past year.

One Ukrainian military spokesman, Lt. Col. Pavlo Shamshyn, said the use of motorbikes was a mixed blessing for Russian troops. Their speed and manoeuvrability helped them to evade Ukrainian drones, but the noise of a bike prevented riders from hearing drones.

Russian state media has been promoting the advantages of motorbike units. Russia Today reported last week that motorcyclists were planting mines and interviewed a soldier with the 39th Guards Motorised Rifle Brigade, who is part of a new motorised group.

“Our main advantage is that we can drive directly into [the enemy’s position] and neutralise everyone,” he said. The enemy “hear the roar of the motorcycles, and it causes panic among them. They simply abandon their positions and run away.”

The Russian military is also using motorbikes to evacuate the wounded. The Telegram account of the Defense Ministry’s publication Zvezda reported last week that Russian marines fighting in the Kursk region were using all-terrain motorcycles to evacuate civilians and wounded soldiers. Video showed a soldier being put on the back of a bike in muddy fields.

Last year, the UK’s Defense Ministry said the Russians were increasingly using off-road bikes and all-terrain vehicles for night-time attacks. But it noted that Ukrainian FPV drones, which fly into their target, had already demonstrated how vulnerable such unprotected vehicles were.

Late in 2023, Russian President Vladimir Putin inspected Chinese-made all-terrain vehicles being procured for the Russian army. At that point some 500 were already in service, and the Defense Ministry ordered around 1,500 more.

CNN
 — 

Iranian authorities have not said what caused the massive explosion at the port of Bandar Abbas on Saturday, killing at least 28 people, amid unconfirmed reports of the possible presence of a chemical used to make missile propellant.

Eyewitness accounts and video indicate chemicals in an area of shipping containers caught fire, setting off a much larger explosion. The death toll spiked sharply following the incident, with 800 others also reported injured.

One surveillance video distributed by the Fars news agency shows a small fire beginning among containers, with a number of workers moving away from the scene, before a huge explosion ends the video feed.

CNN has previously reported that hundreds of tons of a critical chemical for fueling Iran’s ballistic missile program arrived at the port in February. Another shipment is reported to have arrived in March.

The state-run Islamic Republic News Agency quoted an official as saying the explosion was likely set off by containers of chemicals, but did not identify the chemicals. The agency said late Saturday that the Customs Administration of Iran blamed a “stockpile of hazardous goods and chemical materials stored in the port area” for the blast.

Iran’s national oil company said the explosion at the port was “not related to refineries, fuel tanks, or oil pipelines” in the area.

Iranian officials have denied that any military materiel was held at the port. The spokesman for the national security and foreign policy committee of the Iranian parliament, Ebrahim Rezaei, said in a post on X Sunday that according to initial reports the explosion had “nothing to do with Iran’s defense sector.”

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian arrived in Bandar Abbas on Sunday afternoon to investigate the situation and oversee relief efforts, according to state media. The president also met with those injured in yesterday’s blast.

The blast comes at a time of high tensions in the Middle East and ongoing talks between Iran and the United States over Tehran’s nuclear programme, but no senior figure in Iran has suggested the blast was an attack.

Videos and images from the scene, some of which have been geolocated by CNN, show orange-brown smoke rising from part of the port where containers were stacked. Such a color would suggest a chemical such as sodium or ammonia was involved.

Fires at the port were still burning Sunday, although Iranian state media said they were 80% contained.

The New York Times reported Sunday that a person “with ties to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said that what exploded was sodium perchlorate, a major ingredient in solid fuel for missiles. The person spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss security matters.”

CNN cannot confirm what was being stored in the area at the time of the explosion and it is unclear why such chemicals would be kept at port for so long.

Other experts suggested more mundane chemicals might explain the huge blast.

“This bears the hallmarks of an ammonium nitrate explosion. Ammonium nitrate is a commodity chemical that is widely used as a fertilizer and as an industrial explosive, but it is well known that poor storage can significantly raise the risk of an explosion in the event of a fire.” said Andrea Sella, a professor of chemistry at University College London.

“Material ignites and burns fiercely less than a minute later followed seconds later by the devastating detonation. It is the supersonic pressure wave from that that would have shattered windows.”

In February CNN reported that the first of two vessels carrying 1,000 tons of a Chinese-made chemical that could be a key component in fuel for Iran’s military missile program had anchored outside Bandar Abbas.

The ship, Golbon, had left the Chinese port of Taicang in January loaded with most of a 1,000-ton shipment of sodium perchlorate, the main precursor in the solid propellant that powers Iran’s mid-range conventional missiles, according to two European intelligence sources who spoke with CNN.

Sodium perchlorate could allow for the production of sufficient propellant for some 260 solid rocket motors for Iran’s Kheibar Shekan missiles or 200 of the Haj Qasem ballistic missiles, according to the intelligence sources.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry told CNN in February that “China has consistently abided by export controls on dual-use items in accordance with its international obligations and domestic laws and regulations,” adding that “sodium perchlorate is not a controlled item by China, and its export would be considered normal trade.”

CNN
 — 

Crowds of mourners waited in line on Sunday for a chance to visit Pope Francis’ final resting place in the Santa Maria Maggiore church in Rome, a day after his funeral service that was attended by world leaders and royalty.

Hundreds were seen filing past his tomb early on Sunday morning, while some 200,000 people were also still in the vicinity of St. Peter’s Square, according to the Vatican.

The Vatican released images of the late pontiff’s tomb, which show a white rose lying on a simple, marble tomb with the inscription “Franciscus.” Above is a crucifix illuminated by a single spotlight.

The simplicity of the tomb is notable compared to that of previous popes – and is fitting with the instructions in the pontiff’s will.

“The tomb must be in the earth; simple, without particular decoration and with the only inscription: Franciscus,” the late pope said in his will, adding that the costs of his burial would be covered “by a sum provided by a benefactor.”

There are nods to Pope Francis’ heritage in its design: the marble used for the tomb came from Liguria, the northwestern Italian region from where his grandparents came.

Pope Francis, who died on Easter Monday, broke with tradition in his choice of a burial site. Popes are usually buried within Vatican City, beneath St. Peter’s Basilica, so Francis is the first pontiff in more than a century to be buried outside the Vatican, with his final resting place being the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore (also known as St. Mary Major) in Rome.

The pontiff was interred at the basilica on Saturday, after his wooden coffin was driven through the streets of Rome on the popemobile, passing the Colosseum and thousands of mourners on its way.

Perched on top of one of the seven hills on which ancient Rome was built, Santa Maria Maggiore is one of four papal basilicas and held a close spot in Pope Francis’ heart. It’s where he began his first full day as leader of the Catholic Church in 2013 and was also the first place he visited after leaving the hospital last month.

Francis revealed his plans to be buried there in December 2023, explaining that he felt a “very strong connection” with the basilica. “I want to be buried in Santa Maria Maggiore,” Francis said. “Because it is my great devotion.”

Previous reporting by CNN’s Lauren Kent and Jack Guy