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Russia moves to encircle and capture critical cities in Ukraine.
Russia's push to seize key Ukrainian cities accelerated on Wednesday, with the Russian military claiming that its forces were fully in control of Kherson, a port near the Black Sea, where the mayor said the city was "waiting for a miracle" to collect bodies and restore basic services.
Ukrainian officials disputed Russia's claim, saying that while the city of about 300,000 people was surrounded, the municipal government was still in place and the battle was continuing. But conditions inside the city were dire, with food and medicine running out and "many wounded civilians," Gennady Laguta, the head of the regional security office, wrote on the Telegram app.
If captured, Kherson would be the first major Ukrainian city to fall to Russia since President Vladimir V. Putin launched his invasion last Thursday. Russian forces were also bearing down on several other cities, including Kyiv, the capital, where blasts were reported overnight and Russian forces appeared to be moving closer toward encircling the city. Here are the latest developments:
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Russian troops are steadily moving to surround key cities in Ukraine's south and east, with attacks reported on hospitals, schools and critical infrastructure. They continued to lay siege to central Kharkiv, where a government building was hit by an apparent rocket strike on Wednesday morning, and where supplies of food and water are running low in the city of 1.5 million.
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More than 2,000 Ukrainian civilians have died during the first 160 hours of the war, the country's emergency services agency said in a statement, though that number could not be independently confirmed.
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Overnight, Russian troops surrounded Mariupol, a port city in the southeast. More than 120 civilians were being treated for injuries in hospitals, the mayor said. Residents baked 26 tons of bread to help withstand the coming onslaught, according to the mayor.
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President Biden predicted that the invasion of Ukraine would "leave Russia weaker and the world stronger" during a fiery State of the Union address on Tuesday night. He said the United States planned to bar Russian planes from American airspace and that the Justice Department would try to seize the assets of oligarchs and government officials allied with Mr. Putin, part of a global push to isolate Russia.
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A second round of talks between Russia and Ukraine was scheduled to take place on Wednesday after a meeting on Monday failed to make progress in ending the fighting.
March 2, 2022, 5:25 a.m. ET
Turkey says Russia will comply with its request not to send warships into the Black Sea.
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ISTANBUL — Russia's invasion of Ukraine has presented Turkey with an acute dilemma: how to balance its status as a NATO member and ally of Washington with its strong economic and military ties to Moscow.
The difficulty is accentuated by geography: Both Russia and Ukraine have naval forces stationed in the Black Sea basin, but a 1936 treaty gives Turkey the right to restrict access to the sea for vessels belonging to parties to a war, unless those vessels are based there.
For now, at least, it appears to have threaded the needle.
Turkey asked Russia in recent days not to send three warships to the Black Sea. Russia has now withdrawn its request to do so, the country's top diplomat said late Tuesday.
"We, in a friendly way, told Russia not to send the vessels," Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told the broadcaster Haber Turk. "And Russia told us that the vessels would not pass through the straits."
The demand from Russia, which came on Sunday and Monday, concerned four warships, Mr. Cavusoglu said. Only one was registered to a Black Sea base and was therefore eligible to pass, according to the information Turkey had.
But Russia withdrew its request for all four vessels, and Turkey officially informed all of the parties to the 1936 Montreux Convention — under which Turkey regulates passage via two straits from the Mediterranean Sea into the Black Sea — that Russia had done so, according to Mr. Cavusoglu.
He emphasized that Turkey would apply the treaty's rules for both sides of the Ukraine conflict, as the accord demands.
"Right now there are two parties to the war, Ukraine and Russia," he said. "Neither Russia nor others should be offended here. We will apply Montreux today, tomorrow, as long as it stands."
The government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is also trying to assess the potential damage to its own economy caused by Western sanctions on Russia. The country has urged Moscow to stop its aggression against Ukraine but has not issued sanctions of its own.
March 2, 2022, 4:57 a.m. ET
Reporting from Sochi, Russia
Aleksei A. Navalny, the most prominent Russian critic of President Vladimir V. Putin, called on Russians to take to the streets to protest "the aggressive war against Ukraine unleashed by our obviously insane czar." In a statement from prison, Mr. Navalny said that Russians "must, gritting our teeth and overcoming fear, come out and demand an end to the war."
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March 2, 2022, 4:47 a.m. ET
An Indian student was killed while getting food for others sheltering in Kharkiv.
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NEW DELHI — The death of an Indian student in the fighting in Ukraine on Tuesday has brought into focus India's challenge of evacuating nearly 20,000 of its citizens who were stranded in the country when Russia's invasion began.
Naveen Shekharappa, a fourth-year medical student in Kharkiv, was killed when he left a bunker on Tuesday to fetch food, Indian officials and his family members said.
As of late Tuesday, about 8,000 Indian citizens, mostly students, were still trying to make it out of Ukraine, according to India's Foreign Ministry. The evacuation process has been complicated by active fighting, with the students struggling to make it to jammed border crossings.
"Many of my friends were on the train last night to get out of Ukraine. It was scary, as the Russian border is barely 50 kilometers from our place and Russians were firing to capture territory," said Stuti Kashyap, a second-year medical student who made it back to India on Feb. 21.
As the conflict has intensified in recent days, Indian students have walked miles in freezing temperatures to cross into neighboring countries. Many posted videos from their underground bunkers and hostel rooms, pleading for help. Other students accused security forces at the borders of racism, saying they were made to wait longer only because they were Indians.
India has a huge young population and an increasingly competitive job market. Seats in Indian government-run professional colleges are limited, and degrees at private universities are expensive. Thousands of students from the poorer parts of India pursue professional degrees, particularly in medicine, in places like Ukraine, where the cost can be half, if not less, of what they pay in India.
March 2, 2022, 4:46 a.m. ET
Reporting from Sochi, Russia
A Kremlin spokesman said that Russia would send its delegation for a second round of talks with Ukrainian representatives late Wednesday afternoon. The spokesman, Dmitri S. Peskov, did not disclose where the talks will take place.
March 2, 2022, 4:10 a.m. ET
Russia claims to control Kherson, a strategic city, but Ukraine says the battle for it isn't over.
The Russian military said on Wednesday that it fully controlled Kherson, a regional Ukrainian center with a strategically important location at the mouth of the Dnieper River, just northwest of Crimea.
The claim could not immediately be verified, and Ukrainian officials said that while the city was surrounded, the battle for it was continuing.
If Russia does take Kherson, it would become the first major Ukrainian city captured by Russia during the war.
"The city is not experiencing shortages in food and essential goods," the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement. "Negotiations are ongoing between the Russian command, the administration of the city and the region to address issues of maintaining the functioning of social infrastructure facilities, ensuring law and order and the safety of the population."
Russia has sought to portray its military assault as one that is welcomed by most Ukrainians, even as the invasion touches off enormous human suffering.
Oleksiy Arestovich, a military adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, said that fighting for Kherson, which provides strategic access to the Black Sea and is near a Soviet-era water canal leading to Crimea, was continuing.
Mr. Arestovich also said that Russian forces were attacking the city of Kryvyi Rih, about 100 miles northeast of Kherson. The city is Mr. Zelensky's hometown.
March 2, 2022, 3:58 a.m. ET
Reporting from Lviv, Ukraine
The Ukrainian Navy accused the Russian Black Sea Fleet of using civilian vessels for cover — a tactic that it said Russian ground forces were also using. The Ukrainians accused the Russians of forcing a civilian ship, the Helt, to enter the dangerous zone of the Black Sea "so that the occupiers can cover themselves with a civilian ship as a human shield."
The Ukrainian Navy said the Russians had threatened to fire on the ship if it did not comply.
"This is nothing but 21st-century piracy," the Ukrainians said.
March 2, 2022, 3:45 a.m. ET
Reporting from Paris
Russia's war on Ukraine is already creating "significant" economic spillovers to other countries, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank said, warning that a spike in the prices of oil, wheat and other commodities risks fueling already high inflation, which is likely to affect poor people the hardest. Disruptions in financial markets are likely to get worse if the conflict persists, and Western sanctions imposed on Russia and the flow of refugees from Ukraine are also likely to have major economic repercussions, the agencies said in a statement. The I.M.F. and World Bank added that they were working on finance assistance packages worth a total of over $5 billion to support Ukraine.
March 2, 2022, 3:17 a.m. ET
China's top financial regulator, Guo Shuqing, said Wednesday at a news conference in Beijing that China would not join financial sanctions against Russia and would maintain normal trade and financial relations with parties in the Ukraine conflict. He repeated China's opposition to sanctions.
March 2, 2022, 3:15 a.m. ET
Reporting from Lviv, Ukraine
President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine sought to rally the nation on Wednesday after yet another sleepless night punctuated by explosions and violence.
"Another night of Russia's full-scale war against us, against the people, has passed," he said in a message posted on Facebook. "Hard night. Someone spent that night in the subway — in a shelter. Someone spent it in the basement. Someone was luckier and slept at home. Others were sheltered by friends and relatives. We've hardly slept for seven nights."
Still, he said that Ukraine would fight on.
"Today you, Ukrainians, are a symbol of invincibility," he said.
March 2, 2022, 3:13 a.m. ET
The Russian military says it now controls Kherson, a strategically important city at the mouth of the Dnieper River that would be the first major Ukrainian city that Russia has captured. The claim could not be immediately confirmed, and Ukrainian officials said that while Russian forces had surrounded the city, the battle for control was continuing.
March 2, 2022, 2:18 a.m. ET
Reporting from Hong Kong
Poland's border guard agency said Wednesday that more than 453,000 people had fled into its territory from Ukraine since Feb. 24, including 98,000 people who entered on Tuesday. The U.N. refugee agency said Tuesday that 677,000 people had fled Ukraine, and more than four million people could eventually be forced to leave.
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March 2, 2022, 1:52 a.m. ET
A family in Kyiv prepares for battle with Russia.
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KYIV, Ukraine — For days, Natalia Novak has sat alone in her empty apartment, watching news of the war that is unfolding just outside her window.
"There will be a battle now in Kyiv," Ms. Novak reflected on Tuesday afternoon after learning of President Vladimir V. Putin's plan to further attack the capital.
Half a mile away, her son, Hlib Bondarenko, and her husband, Oleg Bondarenko, were stationed at a makeshift civilian checkpoint, inspecting vehicles and searching for possible Russian saboteurs.
Hlib and Oleg are part of the newly formed Territorial Defense Forces, a special unit under the Ministry of Defense that is arming civilians to help defend cities across Ukraine.
"I don't get to decide if Putin is going to invade or to launch a nuclear weapon," Hlib said. "What I get to decide is how I'm going to react to the situation around me."
Across the country, people are being forced to make split-second decisions in light of Russia's invasion: stay, flee or take up arms to defend their country.
"If I sit at home and just watch the situation unfold, the cost is going to be that the enemy might win," Hlib said.
At home, Ms. Novak was preparing for the possibility of a long battle. She had taped her windows, drawn her curtains and filled her bathtub with an emergency supply of water. The silence around her was regularly punctured by sirens or explosions.
Despite her worst fears, Ms. Novak supports her family's decision to fight.
"I am the mother of my son," she said. "And I don't know if I will see him again or not. I can cry or feel sorry for myself, or be in shock — all of it."
She added: "But we're past this phase. There are more important things in front of us now."
March 2, 2022, 1:49 a.m. ET
Reporting from Hong Kong
An Australian air force transport plane left for Europe on Wednesday carrying military equipment and medical supplies, the joint operations command of the Australian military said on Twitter. Prime Minister Scott Morrison of Australia said on Sunday that his country would provide weapons to Ukraine through NATO, supplementing nonlethal equipment and supplies it had already contributed.
Following the Prime Minister of Australia's announcement on 27 February that Australia will provide defensive military assistance to Ukraine. An @AusAirForce C-17A Globemaster III departed Australia for Europe on 2 March carrying critical military equipment and medical supplies. pic.twitter.com/6D2KibU6M3
— Joint Operations Command (@hqjoc) March 2, 2022
March 2, 2022, 12:58 a.m. ET
Reporting from Seoul
The Canadian Embassy in China posted a photo on Twitter that it said showed two new Chinese-language banners hanging outside its building in Beijing. They said "We stand with Ukraine" and "We support Ukraine."
March 2, 2022, 12:40 a.m. ET
Reporting from Seoul
Russia's Central Bank said that the Moscow stock exchange would remain closed to trading on Wednesday. The Central Bank closed the exchange on Monday as the Russian ruble cratered, and later extended the closure to Tuesday.
March 2, 2022, 12:21 a.m. ET
Reporting from Seoul
After the Ukrainian tennis player Elina Svitolina defeated Anastasia Potapova of Russia in the first round of the Monterrey Open in Mexico, she said she would donate any prize money that she wins at the tournament to the Ukrainian army. Svitolina, who is ranked 15th in the world, is the top seed at the Monterrey Open and won the event in 2020.
March 1, 2022, 11:51 p.m. ET
Reporting from Hong Kong
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia banned people from taking more than $10,000 worth of foreign currency abroad starting Wednesday, the official Tass news agency reported, as the country struggles to contain the widespread financial shock from sanctions over the Ukraine invasion. Russia's currency has plunged in value this week, and long lines formed at A.T.M.s as residents tried to withdraw cash. Russia has tried to control the damage by more than doubling the key interest rate on Monday and forcing exporters to sell 80 percent of foreign currency revenue.
March 1, 2022, 11:19 p.m. ET
Biden says Putin 'badly miscalculated' by invading Ukraine.
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President Biden said in his State of the Union speech on Tuesday that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had "badly miscalculated" by invading Ukraine, and vowed to make Moscow pay a steep economic "price" even as he repeated his pledge to avoid a direct military confrontation.
The speech, originally seen as an opportunity for a struggling president to send a reassuring message on the economy to a domestic audience, was hastily repurposed to send a stark warning to a foreign leader.
As had been widely expected, Mr. Biden announced several new moves to further punish Mr. Putin, including a ban on Russian aircraft in U.S. airspace and the creation of a task force inside the Justice Department to aggressively identify, locate and seize the assets of Russian oligarchs and officials in Mr. Putin's inner circle.
"We're joining with European allies to find and seize their yachts, their luxury apartments, their private jets," Mr. Biden said. "We're coming for your ill-begotten gains, and tonight I'm announcing that we will join our allies in closing off American airspace to all Russian flights, further isolating Russia and adding additional squeeze on their economy."
Mr. Putin, the president added, "has no idea what's coming."
Mr. Biden was repeatedly interrupted by applause from members of both parties as he addressed the crisis during the opening moments of his speech.
But the Republican cheering dissipated when he warned Americans to expect economic blowback in the form of higher energy prices resulting from the sanctions. To cushion that blow, he said the United States, in conjunction with 30 allies, would release 60 million barrels of oil from reserves, with half coming from domestic supplies.
"We're going to be OK," he said.
What Mr. Biden did not say was equally noteworthy.
He made no mention of the nation's nuclear deterrence capabilities in response to Mr. Putin's menacing references in recent days to putting Russia's arsenal on a war footing. He also did not offer any clear way out of the crisis, or even a possible offramp for an increasingly bellicose and isolated Mr. Putin, short of pulling Russian troops out of Ukraine immediately.
While Mr. Biden committed to providing Ukraine with enough weaponry, supplies and humanitarian assistance to "fight for freedom," he said again he was not prepared to directly confront Russian troops by moving NATO forces into Ukraine or imposing a no-fly zone, as some Democrats have suggested.
"Let me be clear: Our forces are not engaged and will not engage with the Russian forces in Ukraine," he said.
"Our forces are not going to Europe to fight Ukraine but to defend our NATO allies in the event Putin decides to keep moving west," Mr. Biden added. "For that purpose, we have mobilized American ground forces, air squadrons and ships."
March 1, 2022, 11:10 p.m. ET
A Ukrainian soldier recited a Persian love poem on the eve of battle. It went viral.
Poetry lives even on the battlefield.
Zhenya Perepelitsa, a Ukrainian soldier with the civilian territorial defense forces, wearing military fatigue and standing in an open field covered in snow, looked into the camera and recited a verse of poetry in Persian: "What are you thinking? Who would believe, your love burned to ashes the jungle of my soul."
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The video went viral. Shared across social media platforms like Telegram and Twitter, mostly by Iranians and Ukrainians, it touched a common nerve, a reminder that literature, particularly poetry, has the power to bond people.
Everyone it seemed, was impressed that Mr. Perepeitsa resorted to poetry — and to a poem in a language other than his native tongue — to capture the mood of the moment. His choice of poem was also poignant. It is a Persian poem by Hamid Mosadegh addressing a lover and titled, "Who will tell you the news of my death?"
Mr. Perepelitsa is a resident of Kyiv, a husband and a father of a little boy. He is a businessman who until last week was working in exports. He had lived in Tehran for a year and half and studied Persian, according to Alex Lourie, an American photographer in Ukraine who recorded the video.
Mr. Lourie said in a telephone interview that he had been shooting photographs of soldiers in the outskirts of Kyiv when he and Mr. Perepelitsa started chatting. They both realized they spoke a little Persian and were familiar with Iranian culture and poetry.
Out of the blue, Mr. Perepelitsa broke out reciting poetry. Mr. Lourie filmed it to share with his Iranian friends. He posted it on his Instagram page, tagging Mr. Perepelitsa, who has since told him that he is getting flooded with messages from Iranians in support and solidarity.
The last post from Mr. Perepelitsa's Instagram page, a landscape photograph of Ukraine, had 1,468 messages written Tuesday after the video went viral. Nearly all of them are from Iranians. "Love and prayers from Iran," said one. "Iranians love you," said another, "I wish you victory," and "Our hearts are with you."
"It's pretty weird for an American and Ukrainian to be speaking Farsi in the middle of an invasion by Russia," Mr. Lourie said. "He was such a smart and kind guy."
Here is the poem translated into English:
At times I wonder
Who will tell you the news of my death?
The moment when you hear of my death, from someone
I wish I could see your beautiful face
Shrugging your shoulders, carefree
Waving your hands — it's no matter
Nodding your head, "Wow! He died! How sad!"
I wish I could see it
I ask myself
Who would believe
Your love burned to ashes
The jungle of my soul
March 1, 2022, 11:01 p.m. ET
Reporting from Seoul
At a U.N. General Assembly meeting on Tuesday, the representative from North Korea blamed the conflict in Ukraine on the United States and other Western countries, saying that they had undermined Europe's security by resisting Russia's demands and continuing NATO's eastward expansion. South Korea's representative denounced Russia's actions, saying the war was a choice made by the Russian Federation.
March 1, 2022, 10:40 p.m. ET
Reporting from Seoul
Air strikes in Zhytomyr, a city less than 100 miles west of Kyiv, damaged 10 homes and the windows of a hospital, the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington said late Tuesday, citing the country's State Emergency Service. At least two people were killed, three others were injured and three of the 10 homes caught fire, the embassy said.
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March 1, 2022, 10:28 p.m. ET
Here's what Biden had to say about the war in Ukraine.
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President Biden strongly condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine during his annual State of the Union address on Tuesday. Here are some excerpts from his prepared remarks, as released by the White House.
PRESIDENT BIDEN: Six days ago, Russia's Vladimir Putin sought to shake the foundations of the free world, thinking he could make it bend to his menacing ways. But he badly miscalculated.
He thought he could roll into Ukraine and the world would roll over. Instead he met a wall of strength he never imagined.
He met the Ukrainian people.
From President Zelensky to every Ukrainian, their fearlessness, their courage, their determination, inspires the world.
Groups of citizens blocking tanks with their bodies. Everyone from students to retirees teachers turned soldiers defending their homeland.
In this struggle as President Zelensky said in his speech to the European Parliament, "Light will win over darkness." The Ukrainian ambassador to the United States is here tonight.
Let each of us here tonight in this chamber send an unmistakable signal to Ukraine and to the world.
Please rise if you are able and show that, yes, we the United States of America stand with the Ukrainian people.
Throughout our history we've learned this lesson when dictators do not pay a price for their aggression they cause more chaos.
They keep moving.
And the costs and the threats to America and the world keep rising.
That's why the NATO Alliance was created to secure peace and stability in Europe after World War II.
The United States is a member along with 29 other nations.
It matters. American diplomacy matters. American resolve matters.
Putin's latest attack on Ukraine was premeditated and unprovoked.
He rejected repeated efforts at diplomacy.
He thought the West and NATO wouldn't respond. And he thought he could divide us at home. Putin was wrong. We were ready. Here is what we did.
We prepared extensively and carefully.
We spent months building a coalition of other freedom-loving nations from Europe and the Americas to Asia and Africa to confront Putin.
I spent countless hours unifying our European allies. We shared with the world in advance what we knew Putin was planning and precisely how he would try to falsely justify his aggression.
We countered Russia's lies with truth.
And now that he has acted, the free world is holding him accountable.
Along with 27 members of the European Union, including France, Germany, Italy, as well as countries like the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, Korea, Australia, New Zealand, and many others, even Switzerland.
We are inflicting pain on Russia and supporting the people of Ukraine. Putin is now isolated from the world more than ever.
Together with our allies — we are right now enforcing powerful economic sanctions.
We are cutting off Russia's largest banks from the international financial system. Preventing Russia's central bank from defending the Russian ruble, making Putin's $630 Billion "war fund" worthless.
We are choking off Russia's access to technology that will sap its economic strength and weaken its military for years to come.
Tonight, I say to the Russian oligarchs and corrupt leaders who have bilked billions of dollars off this violent regime, "No more."
The U.S. Department of Justice is assembling a dedicated task force to go after the crimes of Russian oligarchs.
We are joining with our European allies to find and seize their yachts their luxury apartments their private jets. We are coming for your ill-begotten gains.
And tonight I am announcing that we will join our allies in closing off American air space to all Russian flights, further isolating Russia and adding an additional squeeze on their economy. He has no idea what's coming.
The Ruble has lost 30 percent of its value.
The Russian stock market has lost 40 percent of its value, and trading remains suspended. The Russian economy is reeling, and Putin alone is to blame.
Together with our allies, we are providing support to the Ukrainians in their fight for freedom. Military assistance. Economic assistance. Humanitarian assistance.
We are giving more than $1 billion in direct assistance to Ukraine, and will continue to aid the Ukrainian people as they defend their country and help ease their suffering.
But let me be clear: Our forces are not engaged and will not engage in conflict with Russian forces in Ukraine.
Our forces are not going to Europe to fight in Ukraine, but to defend our NATO Allies — in the event that Putin decides to keep moving west.
For that purpose we've mobilized American ground forces, air squadrons, and ship deployments to protect NATO countries including Poland, Romania, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia.
As I have made crystal clear: The United States and our allies will defend every inch of territory of NATO countries with the full force of our collective power. Every single inch.
And we remain cleareyed. The Ukrainians are fighting back with pure courage. But the next few days, weeks and months will be hard on them.
Putin has unleashed violence and chaos. But while he may make gains on the battlefield, he will pay a continuing high price over the long run.
And a proud Ukrainian people, who have known 30 years of independence, have repeatedly shown that they will not tolerate anyone who tries to take their country backward.
To all Americans, I will be honest with you, as I always promised I would be. A Russian dictator, invading a foreign country, has costs around the world.
And I'm taking robust action to make sure the pain of our sanctions is targeted at Russia's economy. And I will use every tool at our disposal to protect American businesses and consumers.
Tonight, I can announce that the United States has worked with 30 other countries to release 60 million barrels of oil from reserves around the world.
America will lead that effort, releasing 30 million barrels from our own Strategic Petroleum Reserve. And we stand ready to do more if necessary, unified with our allies.
These steps will help blunt gas prices here at home. And I know the news about what's happening can seem alarming.
But I want you to know that we are going to be OK.
When the history of this era is written, Putin's war on Ukraine will have left Russia weaker and the rest of the world stronger.
While it shouldn't have taken something so terrible for people around the world to see what's at stake, now everyone sees it clearly.
We see the unity among leaders of nations, a more unified Europe a more unified West. And we see unity among the people who are gathering in cities in large crowds around the world even in Russia to demonstrate their support for the people of Ukraine.
In the battle between democracy and autocracy, democracies are rising to the moment, and the world is clearly choosing the side of peace and security.
This is a real test. It's going to take time. So let us continue to draw inspiration from the iron will of the Ukrainian people.
To our fellow Ukrainian Americans who forge a deep bond that connects our two nations we stand with you.
Putin may circle Kyiv with tanks, but he will never gain the hearts and souls of the Ukrainian people.
He will never extinguish their love of freedom. He will never weaken the resolve of the free world.
March 1, 2022, 10:16 p.m. ET
Reporting from Hong Kong
Oil prices continued to climb and markets in Asia fell on Wednesday as Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the impact of expanding sanctions continue to unnerve investors. The Nikkei 225 in Japan was down 1.9 percent by midday, while the Hang Seng index in Hong Kong fell 0.9 percent. The Kospi composite index dropped 0.1 percent. Oil futures were up sharply, with American West Texas intermediate crude futures rising 5.2 percent, while the Brent benchmark was up 5.7 percent.
March 1, 2022, 9:18 p.m. ET
Reporting from Washington
President Biden began his speech by acknowledging Ukraine's ambassador to the United States, Oksana Markarova, who stood in the House gallery, one hand over her heart and the other holding a small Ukrainian flag. "Bright, strong, resolved," he said of her as the chamber offered a standing ovation to Ms. Markova, who stood next to the first lady, Dr. Jill Biden. "We the United States of America stand with the Ukrainian people."
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March 1, 2022, 8:38 p.m. ET
Boeing and Ford suspend operations in Russia.
Two major U.S. manufacturers, Boeing and Ford Motor, have suspended their business activities in Russia as the country escalated its war in Ukraine.
Boeing said on Tuesday that it had halted major operations in its Moscow office and temporarily closed another office in Kyiv, Ukraine. The company also said it had ceased providing parts, maintenance and technical support services to Russian airlines. In recent days, countries around the world have imposed sanctions on Russian carriers, limiting their ability to use leased planes; fly over Western Europe; or buy spare parts.
Boeing employs several thousand people in Russia, Ukraine and a handful of former Soviet states, an operation that includes a major design center in Moscow. The company also runs a flight training campus and research and technology center in the city and has a joint venture in Russia with VSMPO-AVISMA, Boeing's largest titanium supplier.
Boeing has been trying to diversify its titanium supply in recent years, and it said it had enough of the metal on hand to keep making commercial aircraft in the near term.
Ford, which once had three plants in Russia, is suspending its remaining operations in the country indefinitely because of the invasion. The automaker is part of a joint venture that makes small delivery vans at a plant in Yelabuga, more than 600 miles east of Moscow. It also works with a distributor that sells imported Ford vehicles.
"Ford is deeply concerned about the invasion of Ukraine and the resultant threats to peace and stability," the company said in a statement. "The situation has compelled us to reassess our operations in Russia."
Ford shut down its three plants in Russia in 2019 as part of an effort to turn around its struggling European operation.
March 1, 2022, 8:18 p.m. ET
Videos verified by The Times show devastated apartment buildings in a town just northwest of Kyiv.
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Videos verified by The New York Times on Tuesday show major damage to at least two large apartment buildings in the town of Borodyanka, about 35 miles northwest of Kyiv. The videos show that parts of both five-floor buildings had collapsed, including a section roughly 65 feet wide.
The buildings surround a large courtyard containing Pinocchio Kindergarten, whose playground was also damaged. The country's schools have been closed since Feb. 21 according to the Ukrainian government.
Ukrainian news media outlets did not immediately report fatalities or numbers of injured. But witnesses in the videos said they were searching for survivors after hearing voices under rubble. Witnesses and Ukraine's deputy foreign minister said that the damage was the result of Russian airstrikes.
Other videos and photos posted on social media on Tuesday showed heavy fighting throughout Borodyanka. In a roundabout next to the devastated apartment buildings, other structures were damaged, and a vehicle identified by open source researchers as a Russian Tornado-G multiple rocket launcher sat burning. And shelling from tanks hit another apartment building half a mile away.
March 1, 2022, 8:17 p.m. ET
Japan's foreign ministry said on Wednesday that it was temporarily closing its embassy in Kyiv because the situation in the city has become more "extreme." Diplomats have been relocated to Lviv, near the border with Poland, where they are working to evacuate Japanese nationals seeking to leave Ukraine.
March 1, 2022, 7:57 p.m. ET
Google said it would no longer permit articles from Russian state-funded media to appear in Google News and its other news-related features such as Top News and the News tab.
March 1, 2022, 7:53 p.m. ET
Russian aircraft will be banned from American airspace, U.S. officials say.
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WASHINGTON — President Biden will announce Tuesday that the United States will ban Russian aircraft from flying through American airspace, following moves by the European Union and Canada to shut airspace to passenger flights from Russia and to planes used by Russian oligarchs, two administration officials said Tuesday.
Mr. Biden will announce the ban during his State of the Union address Tuesday evening. It would prohibit planes that are owned or registered by Russians from flying over the United States, hampering their ability to travel. It was the latest coordinated effort by Mr. Biden's administration and the NATO allies to inflict pain on President Vladimir V. Putin and his closest supporters.
It was not clear how quickly the ban, which was reported earlier by The Wall Street Journal, will be put in place. Mr. Putin has already retaliated against the European ban by canceling flights from European airlines over Russian territory.
The ban would prevent Aeroflot, Russia's national airline, from making flights to the United States, or from traveling over the United States on its way to other destinations.
But the effect of the ban could be limited. Aeroflot is the only Russian airline that flies between that country and the United States, according to flight information from Cirium, an aviation data provider. Last year, Aeroflot operated 761 flights from Moscow into the United States, to airports in New York, Los Angeles, Miami and the Washington, D.C., region. The airline had 55 flights scheduled into the United States for March.
Russian airlines also have little need to traverse the skies over the United States to get to other destinations.
Russia is widely expected to retaliate with a reciprocal ban, as it has with flight bans imposed by dozens of other countries, according to experts. That, too, will have limited effect, experts say.
American Airlines, which had used Russian airspace en route to India, started rerouting flights before the war began. United Airlines, which was similarly exposed, said on Tuesday that it had temporarily stopped flights to India and will avoid Russian airspace. Cargo carriers UPS and FedEx had already stopped deliveries to Russia, though a ban on flying over the country could slow some shipments as flights are rerouted.
The move is the latest in a series of steps Mr. Biden has taken to punish Mr. Putin after similar actions by his counterparts in Europe and Canada. The president issued sanctions on a Russian-owned natural gas line last week, days after Germany took a similar action.
March 1, 2022, 7:49 p.m. ET
Figure skating, tennis, track and cycling add to sports penalties against Russians.
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The fallout for Russian and Belarusian teams and athletes continued on Tuesday as more international sports federations barred them from competition.
The International Skating Union, figure skating's world governing body, said it would bar all Russian and Belarusian skaters from international events, a ban that apparently will include the world championships later this month in France. That would prevent Anna Shcherbakova, the Olympic women's singles champion, from defending her 2021 world title.
Russia ran into trouble at the Winter Games when the star skater Kamila Valieva tested positive for a banned substance, but the skating body has now dropped Russia not because of doping but in response to the country's invasion of Ukraine.
The top tennis organizations will bar Russia and Belarus from team events but will continue to allow their players to compete as individuals, though without national identification. Similarly, the Russian F1 driver Nikita Mazepin will be allowed to race for Haas under rules announced Tuesday by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile, motorsport's world governing body.
The world governing body for track and field barred Russian and Belarusian athletes and officials from events "for the foreseeable future," including this summer's World Athletics Championships, which will take place in Oregon, as well as the World Athletics Indoor Championships in Belgrade, Serbia, and other competitions.
And the International Cycling Union, as part of a broad range of measures announced on Tuesday, banned teams from Russia and Belarus from international competition. The measure will effectively shut down a professional team co-sponsored by Gazprom, the Russian state-controlled energy company, which normally makes appearances in top-level events including the Giro d'Italia.
March 1, 2022, 7:16 p.m. ET
Our photographers capture Ukraine under attack.
For weeks, a Russian invasion had been feared, but once the attacks began on Thursday, hitting the country from the north, east and south, the war became unavoidably tangible for Ukraine's people, a full-scale military conflict that once seemed unimaginable in Europe in the post-Cold War era. These images are a visual documentation of a populace coping with the initial stages of an invasion, struggling with newfound uncertainty and fear.
March 1, 2022, 6:48 p.m. ET
Iran's supreme leader blames the U.S. for the conflict in Ukraine.
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Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, blamed the United States for the current crisis in Ukraine in a live speech broadcast to his nation on Tuesday.
Mr. Khamenei, who considers Russia an Iranian ally, did not condemn President Vladimir V. Putin for invading Ukraine. In fact, he did not mention Russia at all in his speech. He said Iran had a general policy of opposing wars and invasions of sovereign states, and called for an end to the conflict in Ukraine.
He then veered into an anti-American tirade. He compared the U.S. government to a collective mafia of weapons, economics and politics, and said the United States created, thrived and fed on crises around the globe.
"In my opinion, Ukraine is a victim of this policy today," said Mr. Khamenei. "A victim of American policies. It's America that brought Ukraine to this point."
Mr. Khamenei said that the United States had interfered with Ukraine's domestic politics, fueling covert coups and so-called "color revolutions" against pro-Russian leaders, and sending its senators to participate in Ukrainian protests.
The Islamic Republic has long been paranoid about foreign interference and has cracked down on dissent and anti-government protesters by labeling them agents of foreign coups and color revolutions.
The majority of the Iranian public, however, is deeply suspicious of Russia's motives in cozying up to Iran and is decidedly against the invasion of Ukraine.
In recent days, some Iranians have taken to social media and to the streets to protest Russia's actions. On Saturday night, demonstrators chanted "Death to Putin" and "Death to supporters of Putin" at a rally in front of the Ukrainian Embassy in Tehran, in defiance of the government.
On Monday, the families of victims of Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 — which was shot down by Iran's Revolutionary Guards in January 2020, killing all 176 on board — also held a protest outside the embassy.
The families held photos of the loved ones they lost and chanted, "Death to warmongers," "Death to criminals" and "Death to Putin and supporters of Putin," according to videos posted on the social media accounts of the Association of Families of the flight.
The association said in a tweet that security forces had attacked the families and injured some of the parents of the victims.
"The regime's forces did not tolerate slogans against Russia and Putin," the tweet said. "They violently attacked the mothers and fathers and dragged them to the police station."
March 1, 2022, 5:56 p.m. ET
A protest organized by Ukrainian and American activists has formed outside the White House before President Biden's State of the Union address.
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March 1, 2022, 5:54 p.m. ET
Jewish groups condemn a strike near the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial.
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Jewish groups and institutions around the world condemned a strike in Ukraine's capital, Kyiv, in the area of the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center, where tens of thousands of Jews were killed by the Nazis in a two-day massacre during World War II.
It was not clear to what extent the memorial was damaged by the strike. The memorial is close to Kyiv's main radio and television tower in Kyiv, which was hit by a projectile. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said at least five people were killed in the area.
Mr. Zelensky, who is Jewish, also alluded to the site's history, saying on Twitter, "What is the point of saying 'never again' for 80 years, if the world stays silent when a bomb drops on the same site of Babyn Yar?"
On Facebook, the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center said that Russian forces had struck the site but did not describe whether there was damage.
Natan Sharansky, the chair of the memorial's advisory board and a former Soviet dissident, said in the statement that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had sought "to distort and manipulate the Holocaust to justify an illegal invasion of a sovereign democratic country" and called the move "utterly abhorrent."
Mr. Sharansky added: "It is symbolic that he starts attacking Kyiv by bombing the site of the Babyn Yar, the biggest of Nazi massacre."
In remarks last week, Mr. Putin said the Russian military operation would aim for the "demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine," and called Ukraine's leaders "neo-Nazis."
More than 33,000 Jews were killed at the site over a two-day period according to historians. In addition, mass shootings, including of Roma people and Soviet prisoners of war, took place there throughout the war.
Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial museum in Israel, called for the site to be preserved, saying it had "irreplaceable value for research, education and commemoration of the Holocaust."
"Rather than being subjected to blatant violence, sacred sites like Babi Yar must be protected," it said in a statement.
Yair Lapid, Israel's foreign minister, said on Twitter that the country would help with repairing damage to the memorial.
The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum said it was outraged at "the damage inflicted on the Babyn Yar memorial by Russia's attack today." The Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, a British charity, said it was "horrified" to learn of the strike.
"I'm beyond devastated," said Karyn Grossman Gershon, the chief executive of Project Kesher, a nonprofit that aims to build Jewish community by empowering women leaders.
The massacre at Babyn Yar, also known as Babi Yar, took place in late September 1941. Soon after the German army entered Kyiv, the city's Jews were told to gather near a train station in order to be resettled. Crowds were forced to undress and gather in a ravine, where they were shot. The Nazis wiped out nearly the entire Jewish population of Kyiv over the course of the war.
Last year, on the 80th anniversary, Mr. Zelensky unveiled a modern art installation at the site. Peter Hayes, a professor emeritus of Holocaust studies at Northwestern University, said that it only started to become a more formally recognized landmark since Ukrainian independence in 1991.
"The Soviets for a long time did not want to acknowledge that the victims were almost exclusively Jewish, and rather kept referring to it as a place where Soviet citizens had been massacred and so forth," he said.
March 1, 2022, 5:50 p.m. ET
In a Senate hearing, lawmakers debate whether U.S. intelligence forces should be sent into Ukraine.
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Lawmakers at a congressional hearing Tuesday discussed the possibilities of having American intelligence provide more direct assistance to the Ukrainian military, including potentially on the ground operatives to help stop a Russian military column moving toward Kyiv.
Using American covert intelligence operations to assist Ukraine was first raised at a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee by Roger Zakheim, the Washington director of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute. Mr. Zakheim, a former general counsel for the House Armed Services Committee, said that the United States should use intelligence agency assets to covertly advise the Ukrainian military and help them destroy the troops moving on Kyiv.
"The United States, our intelligence agencies have an opportunity to thwart or to at least arrest the advance of that column," Mr. Zakheim said, in response to a question from Senator Roger Wicker, Republican of Mississippi. "And it would strike me as an important operational action that could have strategic implications."
An American president can authorize the C.I.A. to operate covertly in a conflict, though American officials have, unsurprisingly, declined to comment on whether such options are under consideration.
Mr. Zakheim also said that intelligence forces could continue advising Ukrainian forces as they had previously been doing before being ordered to leave the country in mid February.
The training American Special Operation Forces had provided for the Ukrainian military before the invasion was effective, Mr. Zakheim said, and "explains why the Ukrainians have been able to thwart Russian advances today."
The idea caught the interest of several lawmakers, including Senator Joe Manchin III, Democrat of West Virginia.
"You said we must stop that convoy from getting to Kyiv," Mr. Manchin said. "OK, there's only certain ways we can stop that convoy. Can you be a little bit more explicit on how we should be doing it?"
Mr. Zakheim responded that the United States should use intelligence forces to "sabotage the roads" using either people on the ground or unmanned drones.
Mr. Manchin said he agreed with unmanned operations. But other senators seemed at least intrigued by putting operatives closer to the front lines.
Senator Tom Cotton, Republican of Arkansas, said that the United States should provide intelligence to help Ukraine strike at Russian forces, but suggested it should be American operatives working near or alongside the Ukrainian military rather than officials in Washington.
"One lesson of Iraq and Afghanistan is that you don't want to have what we call the 5,000 mile screwdriver operating from the White House," Mr. Cotton said.
Later in the hearing, lawmakers discussed ways of increasing support for the Ukrainians without making the United States a direct party to the conflict.
Elsewhere on Capitol Hill, Senator Ben Sasse, Republican of Nebraska and a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told reporters that the United States should provide more intelligence to the Ukrainian military.
"This is a matter of life and death for Ukrainians and information about where an invading Russian tank was 12 hours ago does squat to prevent civilian bloodshed," Mr. Sasse said.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/03/01/world/ukraine-russia-war
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