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Ukraine's acting Foreign Minister Andriy Deshchytsya speaks to the UN General Assembly on March 27.
Ukraine's acting Foreign Minister Andriy Deshchytsya speaks to the UN General Assembly on March 27.

Live Blog: UN Backs Ukraine Integrity

Final Summary For March 27

-- 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 Muzychko earlier 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
13:39 15.3.2014
13:38 15.3.2014
Former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili writes in "The Guardian" that the August 2008 Russia-Georgia war provides lessons for current crisis in Crimea:

The invasions of Ukraine and Georgia bear striking similarities, not only because the pattern of the invader stays the same, but also because the two countries share deep historic parallels.
13:37 15.3.2014
RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service has some more details on the Verkhovna Rada's decision to dissolve the Crimean parliament:

The Ukrainian parliament in Kyiv has voted to dissolve the Crimean Supreme Council, the Ukrainian region's parliament.

An overwhelming majority of 278 lawmakers voted in favor of the measure, with one abstention.

Seventeen legislators did not take part in the vote. Kyiv's Verkhovna Rada debated the issue on March 15 in a special session presided over by acting President and parliament speaker Oleksandr Turchynov.

Legislators in Kyiv are upset with the Crimean parliament's holding of a referendum on the peninsula on whether to leave Ukraine and join Russia, scheduled for tomorrow.

The Ukrainian government has declared the referendum illegal.

One Ukrainian nationalist leader in Kyiv said the Crimean assembly had to be dissolved in order to discourage a similar separatist movement in eastern Ukrainian cities that are predominantly Russian-speaking. (With reporting by Reuters and Interfax)
13:33 15.3.2014
13:30 15.3.2014
Tweet from Pavel Sheramet: "On the eve of the Crimean referendum":
13:13 15.3.2014
RFE/RL's Russian Service Live Feed of Peace Rally in Moscow:

13:10 15.3.2014
From "The Globe And Mail":

"As Ukrainians brace for Sunday's referendum on Crimea, the country's Acting Minister of Foreign Affairs said the government is preparing for a potential invasion by Russia but he is hoping a diplomatic solution to the crisis can still be found."
13:08 15.3.2014
13:06 15.3.2014
13:03 15.3.2014
"For Your Freedom and Ours" Russian opposition figure Boris Nemtsov at Peace March in Moscow

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