Ukraine: chronicle of events on March 17 – Rosbalt

Rosbalt continues to talk about the events that followed after statements by Russian President Vladimir Putin about the start of a special operation in the Donbass and in Ukraine in response to the appeal of the leaders of the LPR and DPR. On demand Roskomnadzor media should use data on its progress only from official Russian sources. With information about events that took place March 16can be found here.

00:16 The UK will hand over Starstreak man-portable air defense systems to Ukraine, Reuters reports citing British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace.

00:27 Britain, the United States, France and a number of other countries requested a meeting of the UN Security Council on Ukraine, the British permanent mission to the organization said. The exact date of the meeting is not known.

00:46 The European Federation of Energy Traders said that many energy companies may be unable to cope with the volatility in the energy market due to a lack of liquidity, which could cause a “domino effect” with “serious consequences for all European energy markets and their consumers,” according to The Times.

01:20. American processor manufacturer Qualcomm has stopped selling its products to Russian companies, Nate Tibbits, senior vice president for government relations at the company, said on Twitter.

01:33. King and Queen of Belgium Philip and Matilda will settle in the premises belonging to the royal charitable foundation, three families of Ukrainian refugees, the Belgian TV channel RTBF reports.

02:10. The UNESCO Director-General spoke about the deaths of journalists Alexandra Kuvshinova and Pierre Zakrzewski in Ukraine, stressing that journalists “play a crucial role in providing information during a conflict and should not be a target,” the UN press service reports.

03:12. President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky called the ongoing negotiations with Russia “very difficult” and added that the two countries are now going through “the most difficult period in relations,” RBC reports citing NBC News.

03:38. The Pentagon believes that the transfer of MiG-29 fighters to Ukraine “may be mistakenly perceived as an escalation,” said White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki. In addition, according to her, “this will not significantly change the effectiveness of the Ukrainian air force.”

04:02. The leaders of the United States, Great Britain, Germany, France and other EU countries should come to Ukraine, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, who recently visited Kyiv, said in an interview with the German newspaper Bild.

05:12. The package of military assistance provided to Kiev by Washington included the Switchblade guided missiles of the American company AeroVironment, CNN reports, citing sources.

05:48. Twitter has removed about 50,000 materials about events in Ukraine with inaccurate or unreliable information, said Sinead McSweeney, vice president of public policy at the company.

06:34. The United States “will not hold back” on the issue of sanctions against Russia in connection with the situation in Ukraine, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said. At the same time, she noted that Washington has already imposed more economic sanctions against Moscow than against any other country.

07:11. 13 buses with 300 refugees from Mariupol arrived at the border with Russia. This is reported by the Russian Ministry of Defense. Three buses have already passed to the territory of the Rostov region. At the same time, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, more than 6,000 people were evacuated from Mariupol in a day.

07:23. The Ministry of Emergency Situations of the Russian Federation informs that 2 thousand tons of cargo have been sent to the residents of the DPR, LPR and Ukraine since the beginning of the humanitarian operation.

07:41. On Thursday, March 17, the G7 will hold regular online talks on the Ukrainian crisis. The discussions will be held by the foreign ministers of the seven countries, the Japanese diplomatic department said in a statement.

07:55. The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), Karim Khan, sent an official request to Moscow, TASS reports. The representative of justice in The Hague invites the Russian side to meet and discuss the situation in Ukraine.

08:01. According to El Pais, the Spanish authorities detained the Crescent megayacht, which may belong to the head of Rosneft, Igor Sechin, in the port of Tarragona near Barcelona. The Russian state oil company is under sanctions.

08:07. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov reminded US President Joseph Biden, who called Vladimir Putin a war criminal, about the bombs dropped on the former Yugoslavia. According to the press secretary of the President of the Russian Federation, the rhetoric of the head of the White House is unacceptable.

08:19. The head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov Kadyrov, announced President Vladimir Putin’s request to “take care of the guys involved in the military operation in Ukraine.” According to Kadyrov, these words of the head of state were heard in a telephone conversation with him. The leader of the republic also said that the Russian special forces broke through the ring, which they got into a few days ago. According to him, the encircled fighters rejected the offer of the Ukrainian military to surrender.

08:22. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky held talks with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan.

08:23. The Russian Embassy in the United States called on the American media to cover the special military operation in Ukraine objectively. “We urge you to stop lying and engage in objective coverage of events in Ukraine,” his Telegram message says. The diplomatic mission stated that “another example was the fake circulated in the local press about the alleged involvement of the Russian Armed Forces in the attack on the Mariupol Drama Theater.”

08:31. The official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, called “special cynicism” the publication of the Italian La Stampa in the March 16 issue of a photograph with the consequences of shelling in Donetsk. According to the official, the newspaper committed a “forgery”, passing off “victims of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and volunteers in Donetsk as people of Kiev.”

08:38. If the conflict in Ukraine continues in the next three months, almost a third of its population may fall below the poverty line, and 62% of Ukrainians will become impoverished. This is stated in the new report of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP).

08:46. A superyacht, presumably an influential Russian, is stuck abroad, RBC reports, citing the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation. According to her, the Ragnar vessel, owned by the Russian manager and official, ex-general director of Norilsk Nickel Vladimir Strzhalkovsky, cannot leave Narvik due to a refusal to supply fuel.

08:57. Security forces in the DPR check men leaving Mariupol for signs of participation in hostilities. At the exit from the Ukrainian city along the directions of humanitarian corridors, along which civilians are now being evacuated, units of the people’s republic are looking for traces of weapons in men, wearing ammunition for a long time and checking them for tattoos that determine belonging to the Armed Forces of Ukraine or nationalist battalions, writes RIA Novosti . Meanwhile, the LPR reports that the Ukrainian military opened fire six times in a day on four settlements controlled by Luhansk.

09:10. In Crimea, they promise a “solid reward” to those who can detain the organizers of the blockade of the peninsula – transport, food, energy and water. This was reported to RIA Novosti by the head of the regional national-cultural autonomy of the Crimean Tatars Eyvaz Umerov. “Those servicemen who can detain and deliver Mustafa Dzhemilev and Lenur Islyamov to the tribunal of the Crimean Tatar people in Crimea will receive a substantial reward,” Umerov said.

09:18. A significant part of Donetsk lost water. According to DAN, citing the DPR representative office in the JCCC, the pumping station of the Verkhnekalmiussky reservoir was de-energized by night shelling, and therefore the water supply to the city was suspended. It is noted that in some areas of the city it is still going on.

09:29. Squares, avenues, streets and other geographical features in settlements that came under the control of the DPR will bear the names that existed before the referendum on the independence of the republic in 2014. The decree was signed by the head of the Donetsk People’s Republic Denis Pushilin.