-- The UN General Assembly has passed a resolution that affirms Ukraine's territorial integrity.
-- The IMF has announced "a staff-level agreement" with Kyiv on assistance of $14 billion-$18 billion in conjunction with a reform program that will "unlock" up to $27 billion over the next two years, pending final approval next month. Tthe U.S. Congress has also passed an aid bill for Ukraine.
-- Ex-PM Yulia Tymoshenko has announced plans to run for president.
-- Members of the Right Sector have been holding a demonstration outside the Ukrainian parliament building to vent their anger at the killing of prominent member Oleksander Muzychkoearlier in the week.
-- Six Ukrainian military officers detained by pro-Russian troops in Crimea have been released, including Colonel Yuliy Mamchur, but five others are still being held captive.
-- Anonymous sources quoted by CNN say U.S. intelligence "concludes it is more likely than previously thought that Russian forces will enter eastern Ukraine."
-- U.S. President Barack Obama, in the keynote speech of his visit to Europe, chided Russia for its use of "brute force" in Ukraine and vowed that a determined alliance of the United States and Europe will prevail over time.
*NOTE: Times are stated according to local time in Kyiv
From the wires. Ukraine is further mobilizing its reserves:
Ukraine's acting President Oleksandr Turchynov has called for the formation of a national guard and for the mobilization of reserves and volunteers into the country's armed forces.
Turchynov asked parliament to approve a decision to turn the country's Interior Ministry troops into a National Guard "to defend the country and citizens against any criminals, against external and internal aggression."
Turchynov said that the mobilization will include those who have previously served in the military, as well as volunteers.
Turchynov said Ukraine had as few as 6,000 combat-ready infantry out of a nominal force of 41,000. Prime Minister Arseny Yatsenyuk, meanwhile, said a 1994 agreement under which Ukraine agreed to give up its Soviet nuclear weapons obliges Western powers to defend Ukraine's sovereignty.
14:2511.3.2014
In the Czech Republic, creative anti-Russia dissent continues in the city of Liberec, where Dekomunizace, an anticommunist watchdog group, today unfurled a giant banner from atop the town hall that features a portrait of Russian President Vladimir Putin sporting a Hitler mustache and wearing a Stalin-style overcoat. "Everyone can choose to see who they want," said Martin Fryc, one of the activists behind the project.
City officials are permitting the banner to remain in place through the day, as a sign of support for Ukraine.
Dekomunizace raised a similar portrait of Putin in Prague in October 2013, to protest the political aspirations of the Czech Communist Party ahead of parliamentary polls.
14:2311.3.2014
A series of tweets from Ukrainian singer and Maidan stalwart Ruslana Lyzhychko:
Ruslana: #Putin has not change anything in KGB propaganda. It is still about fascists.#Ukraine
Fascinating "Daily Beast" piece from Kyiv, where Jamie Dettmer profiles Euromaidan's so-called inner Circle of Trust, which includes doctor Olha Bohomolets, Right Sector head Dmytro Yarosh, Oleh Mikhnyuk from the Afghan War Veterans, and Serhiy Poyarkov, an artist and Automaidan head who is increasingly worried that the current conflagration in Ukraine could derail Maidan's achievements and goals:
"Poyarkov has ventured into the hotel to meet with some foreign businessmen to deliver the message that there could be a 'new Maidan' if Ukraine’s embattled interim government doesn't start 'changing the system' in earnest. He and the others in the Circle of Trust want crooked judges ditched and the notoriously corrupt police reformed. They also want the speedy introduction of a lustration law, blocking officials from the kleptocracy of ousted President Viktor Yanukovych from occupying government posts and public office. Such a law would offer also a process to deal with past human-rights abuses and injustices."
13:2411.3.2014
Peter Eltsov and Klaus Larres write in "New Republic" that Russia's de facto annexation of Crimea may naturally lead to Moscow biting off chunks of north Kazakhstan, with its large Russian-speaking population.
They write: "Nazarbaev is cautiously silent, but spontaneous protests in front of the Russian Consulate in Almaty... have not been disbanded by the police." They go on to note that Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, as the Soviet Union was falling, himself called for the creating of a new Russian state combining Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and parts of Kazakhstan. "It is quite possible that President Putin wants his legacy to be the implementation of Solzhenitsyn's ideas... Putin is a great admirer and was a friend of Solzhenitsyn's."
12:5211.3.2014
My interview with Radio Ekho Moskvy:"..it’s a huge mistake to view #Ukraine through the lens of the 19th century.": http://t.co/WegCRqskI3
Nursultan Nazarbaev and U.S. President Barack Obama have discussed the situation in Ukraine in a telephone conversation.
A statement from the U.S. Embassy in Russia said the two leaders "reaffirmed their common interest in defining a peaceful settlement" that will nonetheless help "maintain the territorial integrity" of the country.
Nazarbaev has also held conversations with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Russian President Vladimir Putin. As an energy superpower and a key member of Putin's much-desired Eurasian Union, is Nazarbaev looking like the West's inside man?
12:3011.3.2014
Members of a pro-Russian "self-defense" unit in Crimea check a passenger's documents at the train station in Simferopol on March 11. Armbands, random stops, nationalism (albeit to a foreign power), thugs. Where have we seen this before?
12:2511.3.2014
Kharkiv Mayor Hennadiy Kernes has been summoned to Ukraine's Prosecutor-General's Office for questioning as a supsect in unspecified criminal proceedings.
Kernes announced the summons himself, via Instagram. Ukraine's UNIAN news agency suggests that Kernes may face charges of attempted overthrow of constitutional order (Article 109 of the Ukrainian criminal code) and encroachment on Ukraine's territorial integrity (Article 110).
Mykhaylo Dobkin, the former Kharkiv governor, was detained March 10 on suspicion of violating Article 110. Kernes and Dobkin, both members of the Party of Regions, were earlier reported as attempting to flee Ukraine to seek shelter in Russia.
