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Russian President Vladimir Putin holds a news conference at his country residence of Novo-Ogaryova outside Moscow on March 4.
Russian President Vladimir Putin holds a news conference at his country residence of Novo-Ogaryova outside Moscow on March 4.
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Live Blog: Ukraine On The Brink

Summary

-- U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Kyiv as U.S. officials announced Washington is preparing a $1 billion aid package for Ukraine.

-- Speaking at a press conference at his residence, Russian President Vladimir Putin has called the change of government in Ukraine an "unconstitutional overthrow and an armed seizure of power."

-- Putin also said there are no considerations to annex Crimea and no intentions to provoke separatist sentiment. He said it is up to the citizens of Crimea to determine their own future.

-- In Crimea, there are standoffs between Russian and Ukrainian troops in their bases, with conflicting reports of ultimatums given to Ukrainian troops to surrender that come and pass.

-- Russian Ambassador to the UN Vitaly Churkin has said that Ukraine's ousted President Viktor Yanukovych sent a letter to Russian President Vladimir Putin requesting that he use the Russian military to restore law and order in his country.

-- In eastern Ukraine, pro-Russian demonstrators have occupied part of the regional government building in the city of Donetsk. Meanwhile, a few hundred pro-Russian activists tried but failed to force their way into the regional administration building in the southern city of Odesa.

NOTE: Live blog updates are listed according to local time in Kyiv

-- Glenn Kates / Luke Allnutt / Coilin O'Connor / Dan Wisniewski
10:21 2.3.2014
Elizabeth Arrott, a reporter from our sister network VOA, is on the ground in Crimea. (Here's her report from yesterday.)

10:34 2.3.2014
From Rikard Jozwiak, our correspondent in Brussels:

NATO is to hold an urgent meeting in Brussels to consider the situation in Ukraine. The Sunday meeting of the North Atlantic Council, the alliance’s main political decision-making body, is at the request of Poland and due for 1300 Brussels time.

Warsaw has said it feels threatened by any potential Russian military intervention in neighboring Ukraine.

NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen announced the meeting on Saturday on Twitter, saying: "Urgent need for de-escalation in Crimea." “Russia must respect Ukraine's sovereignty, territorial integrity, & borders," he added.

A meeting of the NATO-Ukraine commission is to be held on Monday in Brussels at 1600 local time.

10:46 2.3.2014
Good piece by Dmitri Trenin, the director of the Carnegie Moscow Center, unpacking the Kremlin's viewpoint:

The Crimea crisis will not pass soon. Kiev is unlikely to agree to Crimea's secession, even if backed by clear popular will: this would be discounted because of the "foreign occupation" of the peninsula. The crisis is also expanding to include other players, notably the United States. So far, there has been no military confrontation between Russian and Ukrainian forces, but if they clash, this will not be a repeat of the five-day war in the South Caucasus, as in 2008. The conflict will be longer and bloodier, with security in Europe put at its highest risk in a quarter century.

10:50 2.3.2014

11:11 2.3.2014
Confirmation from AP and Reuters that Ukraine is mobilizing its reservists:

The head of Ukraine's national security and defense council, Andriy Parubiy, says Ukraine is to call up all military reservists.

Parubiy told reporters that the council had ordered the defense ministry to "call on all those that armed forces need at the moment across Ukraine," adding that the mobilization was to "ensure the security and territorial integrity of Ukraine."

The statement comes after Russia upper house of parliament, the Federation Council, on Saturday gave President Valdimir Putin approval to deploy troops to protect ethnic Russians in Ukraine and Russian naval forces based in the country's Crimea region.

Earlier, Ukraine's Defense Minister Ihor Tenyukh accused Russia of sending 6,000 troops and 30 armored personnel carriers into Ukraine's Crimea region since Friday "without warning or Ukraine's permission."

11:26 2.3.2014

11:32 2.3.2014
Meanwhile in Moscow, there has been a small (couple of hundred maybe) antiwar protest.

11:44 2.3.2014

11:46 2.3.2014
The website of the pro-Kremlin RT was hacked.

11:49 2.3.2014
The key events so far today.

-- Ukraine has called up reservists.
-- NATO will hold an emergency meeting later.

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