Natalia Zinets, Pavel Polityuk

LVIV (Ukraine) – After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2014, the United States warned China not to provide financial or military assistance to Moscow. This was as a result of increasing sanctions against Russian business and political leaders and civils fleeing intense fighting.

After talks on Monday by video, which ended without any progress being made, further negotiations between Russian and Ukrainian negotiators were scheduled for Tuesday.

Since Russian President Vladimir Putin’s order to invade Ukraine on February 24, 2018, thousands have died in fighting and bombings.

Russia claims that its actions are a “specially military operation” meant to “denazify” Russia and stop genocide. This claim is rejected by the United States as well as its allies, and used instead of a justification for an illegal and unjustified attack.

Officials in the United States claim that Russia requested economic and military support from Beijing. This indicates that Russia is open to receiving assistance.

Moscow denied that and said it had sufficient resources to fulfill all its purposes. China’s foreign minister has called the information on assistance “disinformation”.

After U.S. national security advisor Jake Sullivan had met with Yang Jiechi, China’s top diplomat in Rome, Ned Price from the State Department stated that “We have clearly communicated to Beijing that we will not stand by.” “We won’t allow any country compensate Russia for its loss.”

A U.S. official said that the meeting lasted seven hours and was very intense.

‘NO WAR’

Russia witnessed a very rare demonstration against war in the studio of the Channel One news channel. It is Russia’s most important source of news and closely follows Kremlin guidelines.

One woman raised a sign that read in Russian and English: “NO WAR.” Stop fighting. Don’t believe propaganda. You are being lied to here.”

Without citing any evidence, Britain’s defense ministry suggested that Russia may be planning to use chemical and biological weapons in Ukraine to counter a fake attack on Russian troops. Similar statements were made by U.S. officers.

Russia accuses Ukraine of planning to develop biological weapons. According to the United Nations, there was no evidence that Kyiv has such a program.

Moscow allowed Monday’s first escape convoy from Mariupol to be freed. This was the site of the most severe humanitarian crisis in the conflict.

Andrei Rempel from Mariupol’s city council stated to Reuters that 160 vehicles left within the first hour.

According to local authorities, as high as 2,500 civilians died in the conflict so far. This figure cannot be independently verified.

According to the United Nations, more than 2 million Ukrainians have fled Ukraine since the outbreak of war.

Tanya, a Ukrainian woman who claimed she fled with her child from Mykolaiv, in south Ukraine to Romania across the Danube River to Romania said that she had traveled there along with her child. “Because they are Russians and Russian soldiers, which are killing children.”

Russia insists that it is not targeting civilians.

FURTHER STATIONS

France reports that the EU members agreed Monday to implement a fourth set of sanctions against Russia.

Although details were not disclosed by diplomatic sources, they included an import ban for Russian steel and iron as well as an export ban for luxury goods. They also prohibited investment in the energy industry. Sources said Roman Abramovich, owner of Chelsea’s soccer team, and 14 other people would be included on the EU blacklist.

Japan announced Tuesday that it would freeze assets for 17 Russians, which includes 11 Russian Duma members, the Russian parliament and five relatives of banker Yuri Kovalchuk as well as Viktor Vekselberg, a billionaire.

The West-led sanctions against Russia have cut Russia off of key global financial markets. They have also frozen almost half the $640 billion worth of gold and foreign currency reserves. This has triggered the most severe economic crisis since 1991.

Russia’s finance minister said Wednesday that the ministry is ready to service some foreign currency loans. But, these payments will be in Russian rubles in case sanctions stop banks from honoring their debts in the issue currency.