Ukraine Update: Wednesday, March 5 20:46 GMT: Protests will be held in several Russian cities on Thursday in support of people in Ukraine. Demonstrations are planned in Nizhny Novgorod, Saratov, Salekhard, Yekaterinburg, and Pyatigorsk. 20:41 GMT: United Nations special envoy Robert Serry is leaving the Crimean capital of Simferopol for Kiev, according to the United Nations press service. Serry took a plane from Simferopol and will soon arrive in Kiev to continue his mission which was interrupted by the incident, said the statement. According to the prime minister of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, Sergey Aksyonov, the UN representatives visit wasn’t coordinated with Crimean authorities and they were not aware of his arrival. 20:31 GMT: The Prosecutor Generals Office in Kiev has issued an arrest warrant for the head of the Black Sea Fleet, Vice Admiral Aleksandr Vitko, according to acting Prosecutor General Oleg Makhnitsky, who was appointed by the coup-imposed Kiev government. Vitko, a Russian citizen, is accused of “coup-provocation” and “organization of sabotage,” according to Makhnitsky. 20:09 GMT: Ukraine will not hand over the leader of far-right group Right Sector if Russia makes such a request because that would violate Ukrainian laws, the Prosecutor Generals Office said in a statement. 19:39 GMT: Arrest warrants have been issued for the speaker of Crimean parliament, Vladimir Konstantinov, and Crimean Prime Minister Sergey Aksyonov, according to the Prosecutor Generals Office in Kiev. 19:31 GMT: “NATO has put the entire range of NATO-Russia cooperation under review. NATO foreign ministers will take decisions on this in early April,” NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said at a press conference following the meeting of the NATO-Russia Council in Brussels. Rasmussen also stated that “no staff-level civilian or military meetings with Russia will take place for now.” “I have just chaired a frank and important meeting of the NATO-Russia Council to discuss the situation in Ukraine...I asked the Russian ambassador to convey NATO’s firm message to Moscow,” Rasmussen said. The NATO chief admitted that NATO still wants “to keep the door open for political dialogue” with Russia. “We are ready to maintain meetings of ambassadors in the NATO-Russia Council, as we have done today,” he stated. 18:43 GMT: Russian FM Sergey Lavrov is to meet shortly with the Foreign Ministers of France, Germany and Poland who signed the February-21 agreement between the Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich and the opposition. Earlier Lavrov held a meeting with the US secretary of State John Kerry on the situation in Ukraine. 18:25 GMT: Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and US Secretary of State John Kerry have expressed assurances that both sides in the Ukrainian conflict should be helped to fulfill obligations under the February-21 agreement.“We have agreed that Ukrainians should be helped to fulfill obligations under the February-21 agreement,” Lavrov said. We had a meeting with John Kerry on the situation in Ukraine, regarding all actions that our partners are trying to take with the OSCE and Council Russia, NATO and other international organizations, activities that do not help creating an atmosphere of dialogue,” he said. “John Kerry acknowledged that a constructive environment should be created.” The US has agreed that ultimatums and threats complicate the work aimed at the process of constructive dialogue and cooperation, Lavrov stressed. 18:25 GMT: Nearly 100 people waving Russian flags and chanting Russia! Russia! marched towards the building used by international observers in the autonomous Republic of Crimea, according to a Reuters photographer in the vicinity. 17:30 GMT: Special UN representative Robert Serry wasn’t kidnapped in Crimea, the United Nations Deputy Secretary General Jan Eliasson said. Earlier Ukraines Foreign Ministry claimed that “armed men seized Serry in Ukraines Crimea on Wednesday, according to Reuters. “When Serry left the headquarters of the navy in Simferopol, his vehicle was blocked by unknown men, who said they had an order to take him to the airport,” Eliasson added. According to the UN Deputy Secretary General, Serry got out of his car and called him, saying that he was neither threatened nor kidnapped. Speaking to journalists, Eliasson said, “Serry even didn’t know which language the men were speaking.” “It was a group of 10-15 people,” he added. Serry then went into a local coffee shop, according to ITV News correspondent James Mates, who accompanied him.
Posted on: Wed, 05 Mar 2014 21:14:52 +0000
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