Kyiv imposes a curfew until Monday morning, EU poised for SWIFT sanctions and Germany to send weapons to Kyiv. Follow the latest updates from Russia's war in Ukraine on our live blog.
Russia Attacks Ukraine: As It's Happening
Updated:
Russian President Vladimir Putin has launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, forcing residents to flee for their lives and leaving dozens dead.
Follow the latest news as it happens (follow the news in Russian here):
Russia's invasion of Ukraine ramped up Saturday as Moscow announced a major escalation "in all directions" as it seeks to topple Volodymyr Zelensky's regime in Kyiv.
Here's the key developments as of 21:30 in Moscow:
- The Russian armed forces ordered its troops to "advance in all directions," a defense ministry spokesman said in a briefing.
- Kyiv imposed a curfew until Monday morning and said anybody on the streets would be considered part of a Russian "sabotage group."
- The Ukrainian capital is braced for another night of heavy Russian attacks, after shelling Friday morning damaged at least one residential building.
- The U.S. Pentagon and independent military analysts have said Russia's military campaign is not going to plan, having failed to oust Zelensky and with Ukrainians putting up a more staunch resistance than Moscow expected.
- The EU stood poised to restrict Russia's access to the SWIFT financial communications network, as Germany said it was working on "targeted" sanctions on specific Russian banks' access to the system.
- More than 150,000 Ukrainians have left the country since Russia invaded Thursday morning, the UN said.
- Nine European countries have closed their airspace to Russian airlines and planes.
- Germany announced it will send weapons to Ukraine in a major policy U-turn.
Military analysts and observers are increasingly saying that Russia's invasion of Ukraine is not going to plan, with the armed forces having failed to capture key cities or to oust President Volodymyr Zelensky from office, three days into the campaign.
Russian police arrest demonstrators at an anti-war rally in St. Petersburg on Saturday evening
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Germany said Saturday it was working on excluding Russia from the SWIFT interbank system in a "targeted and functional" way that would limit any collateral damage.
"We are working at the same time urgently on limiting the collateral damage from an exclusion from SWIFT so that [the measure] hits the right people," Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock and Economy Minister Robert Habeck said in a joint statement.
"What we need is a targeted and functional limitation of SWIFT," they added.
Germany's army will transfer 1,000 anti-tank weapons and 500 "Stinger" class surface-to-air missiles to Ukraine to help it in its battle against Russia's invasion, the government said Saturday.
The weapons, which will come from the Bundeswehr's own stocks, "will be delivered as quickly as possible to Ukraine," said a government statement.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Saturday that Russia's invasion of Ukraine marks a turning point in history as he announced the major U-turn in Germany policy.
"In this situation, it is our duty to support Ukraine to the best of our ability in its defence against (Russian President) Vladimir Putin's invading army," said Scholz, stressing that Germany "stands closely by Ukraine's side".
Russia's invasion force is being slowed and frustrated by unexpectedly stiff resistance from Ukrainian troops, keeping them well outside Kyiv, a senior U.S. defense official told AFP Saturday.
The United States and Western allies are still able to deliver arms into the country to bolster the Ukraine military, and Washington plans to send more in the coming days to help them fight both Russian armor on the ground and assaults from the air, the official said.
"We have indications that the Russians are increasingly frustrated by their lack of momentum over the last 24 hours, particularly in the north parts of Ukraine," the official said.
Slovenia became the ninth European country to have banned Russian airlines from their airspace. Russia has responded to previous closures in tit-for-tat moves.
Germany has authorized the Netherlands to send Ukraine 400 rocket-propelled grenade launchers, Politico Europe cited two unnamed EU officials as saying.
The move marks a major shift in Berlin's military policy of not permitting lethal weapons that it controlled to be transferred into a conflict zone.
Sergei Aksyonov, head of the Moscow-led administration in Crimea, tells the state-run RIA Novosti news agency that the Russian military destroyed a dam that had cut off water supplies from Ukraine after Russia annexed the peninsula in 2014.
Russia now has at least 50% of its massive invasion force inside Ukraine but is making slow progress due to unexpectedly stiff resistance, a senior US defense official told AFP on Saturday.
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