Russia Ukraine War Updates: Moscow warns of diplomatic breakdown with US

Russia has refused to negotiate a peace treaty with Japan, according to the Russian Foreign Ministry.

"The Russian side under the current conditions does not intend to continue negotiations with Japan on a peace treaty," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

It noted that this decision was made due to the impossibility of discussing the fundamental document on bilateral relations with a state that takes an unfriendly position, RT reported.

Earlier, the Japanese government imposed personal sanctions against 17 individuals from Russia.

Russia, in response to Japanese sanctions, is halting visa-free travel for Japanese citizens to the southern Kuril Islands.

"A decision was made to stop visa-free travel for Japanese citizens on the basis of agreements on visa-free exchanges between the South Kuril Islands of the Russian Federation and Japan of 1991 and on the most facilitated visits by former Japanese residents of the South Kurils to their places of former residence from 1999," the ministry noted.

Earlier, US Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel announced Washington's support for Tokyo on the issue of territorial ownership of the southern Kuril Islands.

The Russian side is withdrawing from the dialogue with Japan on establishing joint economic activities in the South Kurils.

It is noted that the decision was made as a response to the actions of the Japanese government.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki says he is encouraging Switzerland to take bolder steps in cutting off Russian oligarchs who support Russian leaders from the billions of US dollars they have in Swiss banks or in business there.

Morawiecki spoke Monday at a joint news conference with visiting Swiss President Ignazio Cassis. They held talks about the situation in Ukraine, which was invaded by Russian troops February 24.

Morawiecki noted that Russia's richest businessmen have deposited billions of US dollars in Swiss banks, were doing business there and had other assets.

He said the assets could be used to help Ukraine rebuild from the war's destruction.

Cassis noted that Switzerland has joined the European Union's sanctions on Russia and has also has frozen the bank accounts and business of Russian oligarchs who are on the EU sanctions lists and also of some others.

Poland's government is working on amendments to the constitution that would allow for the seizure of Russia's assets in Poland.

The Russian military says it will continue using its state-of-the-art hypersonic missile to hit particularly important targets in Ukraine.

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said Monday that the Kinzhal hypersonic missile “has proven its efficiency in destroying heavily fortified special facilities.”

He said that a Kinzhal missile was used Friday to hit a Soviet-era arsenal for storing missiles near the western town of Deliatyn in the Carpathian Mountains, the first time the new weapon was used in combat.

It also was used in a strike on the fuel depot in Kostiantynivka near the Black Sea port of Mykolaiv over the weekend. Konashenkov noted that Kinzhal was used for these strikes due to its high kinetic energy and its ability to penetrate defenses.

Konashenkov said that Kinzhal missiles were fired at a distance of more than 1,000 kilometers (over 620 miles).

Kinzhal, one of an array of hypersonic weapons developed by Russian in recent years, has a range of 2,000 kilometers(1,250 miles) and flies at a speed 10 times the speed of sound. It's carried by specially redesigned MiG-31 fighter jets.

The Russians were hunting us down. They had a list of names, including ours, and they were closing in.

We were the only international journalists left in the Ukrainian city, and we had been documenting its siege by Russian troops for more than two weeks. We were reporting inside the hospital when gunmen began stalking the corridors. Surgeons gave us white scrubs to wear as camouflage.

Suddenly at dawn, a dozen soldiers burst in: “Where are the journalists, for fuck's sake?”

I looked at their armbands, blue for Ukraine, and tried to calculate the odds that they were Russians in disguise. I stepped forward to identify myself. “We're here to get you out,” they said.

The walls of the surgery shook from artillery and machine gun fire outside, and it seemed safer to stay inside. But the Ukrainian soldiers were under orders to take us with them.

The Russian military says it has hit a shopping mall on the outskirts of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv because it has been used to store rockets.

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov charged Monday that the Ukrainian forces were using the shopping mall to reload multiple rocket launchers and store rockets used for shelling Russian troops. He said that a battery of multiple rocket launchers and ammunition for them were destroyed in the strike. The defense ministry spokesman’s claims could not independently verified.

The shopping center in the densely populated Podil district was reduced to a smoldering ruin after being hit late Sunday by shelling that killed eight people, according to Ukrainian emergency officials. The attack shattered every window in a neighboring high-rise.

Russia has warned that relations with the U.S. are “on the verge of a breach” and summoned the U.S. ambassador for an official protest against President Joe Biden’s criticism of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

A Russian Foreign Ministry statement Monday referred to “recent unacceptable statements” by Biden about Putin. Biden referred to Putin last week as a “war criminal” in relation to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The Foreign Ministry says that at the meeting with U.S. ambassador to Moscow John Sullivan “it was emphasized that remarks such as these by the American President, which are unworthy of a state figure of such a high rank, put Russian-American relations on the verge of a breach.”

India buying more volumes of crude oil from Russia is still less than 1 per cent of the total oil imports while the volumes from the US will rise significantly, Petroleum Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said on Monday.

Replying to supplementaries during the Question Hour in the Rajya Sabha, he said India bought 419,000 tonnes of crude oil from Russia during the first 10 months of the current fiscal year that began in April 2020, which was 0.2 per cent of the total import of 175.9 million tonnes.

In 2020-21, India imported 633,000 tonnes of 0.3 per cent while in 2019-20 the purchases were 2.93 million tonnes or 1.3 per cent of total imports, he said.

The statement comes against the backdrop of Indian firms picking up distressed Russian cargoes being offered at deep discounts. While Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) has bought 3 million barrels through a trader, Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL) has picked up 2 million barrels.

"We require a total of 5 million barrels per day. That is our (crude oil) consumption. 60 per cent of it comes from the Gulf," he said. "Even if we were to scale these up considerably, it would still be a drop, literally a drop, in a larger bucket."

Stating that oil imports from Russia are "minuscule", he said, "even now, the total amount contracted will be less than three days' supply from Russia to India and that also spread over the next three to four months."

On the US, Puri said India has a robust bilateral energy relationship with Washington.

Countries scrambling to replace Russian oil, gas and coal supplies with any available alternative may fuel the world's “mutually assured destruction” through climate change, the head of the United Nations warned Monday.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the all-of-the-above' strategy now being pursued by major economies to end fossil fuel imports from Russia because of its invasion of Ukraine could kill hopes of keeping global warming below dangerous levels.

“Countries could become so consumed by the immediate fossil fuel supply gap that they neglect or knee-cap policies to cut fossil fuel use,” he said by video at an event organized by the Economist weekly.

“This is madness. Addiction to fossil fuels is mutually assured destruction.”

Germany, one of Russia's biggest energy customers, wants to increase its supply of oil from the Gulf and speed up the building of terminals to receive liquefied natural gas.

In the United States, White House spokesperson Jen Psaki earlier this month said the war in Ukraine was a reason for American oil and gas producers to "go get more supply out of the ground in our own country.” Guterres said that “instead of hitting the brakes on the decarbonization of the global economy, now is the time to put the pedal to the metal towards a renewable energy future.”

His comments came as scientists on the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change began a two-week meeting to finalize their latest report about the world's efforts to curb emissions of planet-heating greenhouse gases.

A separate report, released last month, found half of humanity is already at serious risk from climate change and this will increase with each tenth of a degree of warming.

Guterres said the Paris climate accord's goal of capping global warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit) was “on life support” because countries aren't doing enough to drive down emissions.

With temperatures already about 1.2C higher now than before industrialization, keeping the Paris target alive requires a 45% cut in global emissions by 2030, he said.

But after a pandemic-related dip in 2020, emissions rose again sharply last year.

“If we continue with more of the same, we can kiss 1.5 goodbye,” he said. “Even 2 degrees may be out of reach. And that would be catastrophe.” Guterres urged the world's biggest developed and emerging economies to make meaningful emissions cuts, including by swiftly ending their dependence on coal — the most polluting fossil fuel — and holding private companies that continue to support its use to account.
Hundreds of scientist in Britain and the United States published an open letter Monday calling on academic institutions to stop accepting funding from fossil fuel companies for research into climate change.
Speaking at the opening of the IPCC meeting Monday, the head of the UN climate office urged governments to take immediate action so that targets for 2030 — such as the European Union's goal to reduce emissions by 55% compared with 1990 levels — can be met.
“Long-term plans are important and they are needed,” said Patricia Espinosa.
"But if global leaders, public and private, do not make progress and establish clear plans for climate action in the next two years, plans for 2050 may well be irrelevant.”
The IPCC report due to be published on April 4 isn't expected to include direct references to the impacts of the war in Ukraine, said Jim Skea, who co-chairs the expert panel that wrote it.
“Our strength lies in incrementally building up scientific information over a period of time and getting it bought into by governments as well as scientists,” he said.
“And you can't do that at the same time as turning on a sixpence to address current affairs.”
However, it will outline how various energy policies would affect emissions trends in future. These include plans for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere again.
“That's a much bigger emphasis from previously,” said Skea. (

Britain is accusing the Russian state of being behind hoax calls to two government ministers by an imposter posing as the prime minister of Ukraine.

Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said the hoaxer was able to speak to him on a video call Thursday. Home Secretary Priti Patel said she had received a similar call, and Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries said an unsuccessful attempt was made to speak to her.

Wallace said he became suspicious and hung up after the caller “posed several misleading questions.”

He accused Russia of “dirty tricks.”

Prime Minister Boris Johnson's spokesman, Max Blain, said Monday that “the Russian state was responsible for the hoax calls made to government ministers last week.”

British officials are concerned that Russia might release doctored clips from the calls as part of a disinformation campaign and to embarrass Britain.

Blain warned that “it won't be the last attempt,” and accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of staging distractions “to hide the scale of the conflict and Russia's failings on the battlefield.” 

Authorities in Odesa have accused Russian forces of damaging civilian houses in a strike on the Black Sea port city on Monday.

The city council said no one was killed in the strike and that emergency services quickly extinguished a fire. Mayor Hennady Trukhanov visited the site and said “we will not leave Odessa and we will fight for our city.”

Odesa is in southwestern Ukraine and has largely avoided the fighting so far, though Russia has ships operating off the Black Sea coast.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Monday called on European nations to halt all trade relations with Russia, in a bid to put pressure on Moscow to halt its attack on Ukraine. 

Russian spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv had yet to yield any major breakthroughs and called on countries that can exert influence over Ukraine to use their clout to make Kyiv more constructive at the negotiations. Speaking to reporters, Peskov said significant progress in the talks still had to be made for there to be a basis for a possible meeting between President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy. (Reuters)

Russian spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv had yet to yield any major breakthroughs and called on countries that can exert influence over Ukraine to use their clout to make Kyiv more constructive at the negotiations. Speaking to reporters, Peskov said significant progress in the talks still had to be made for there to be a basis for a possible meeting between President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy. (Reuters)

Russian spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv had yet to yield any major breakthroughs and called on countries that can exert influence over Ukraine to use their clout to make Kyiv more constructive at the negotiations. Speaking to reporters, Peskov said significant progress in the talks still had to be made for there to be a basis for a possible meeting between President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy. (Reuters)

Russian spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv had yet to yield any major breakthroughs and called on countries that can exert influence over Ukraine to use their clout to make Kyiv more constructive at the negotiations. Speaking to reporters, Peskov said significant progress in the talks still had to be made for there to be a basis for a possible meeting between President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy. (Reuters)

Ukrainian officials defiantly rejected a Russian demand that their forces in Mariupol lay down arms and raise white flags Monday in exchange for safe passage out of the besieged strategic port city.

Even as Russia intensified its attempt to bombard Mariupol into surrender, its offensive in other parts of Ukraine has floundered.

Western governments and analysts see the broader conflict grinding into a war of attrition, with Russia continuing to barrage cities.

In the capital Kyiv, Russian shelling devastated a shopping center near the city center killing at least eight people.

The encircled southern city of Mariupol on the Sea of Azov has seen some of the worst horrors of the war, under Russian pounding for more than three weeks.

Strikes hit an art school sheltering some 400 people only hours before Russia's offer to open two corridors out of the city in return for the capitulation of its defenders, according to Ukrainian officials.

Ukrainian officials rejected the Russian proposal for safe passage out of Mariupol even before Russia's deadline of 5 am Moscow time (0200GMT) for a response came and went.

“There can be no talk of any surrender, laying down of arms," Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Irina Vereshchuk told the news outlet Ukrainian Pravda. "We have already informed the Russian side about this.”

Mariupol Mayor Piotr Andryushchenko also dismissed the offer shortly after it was made, saying in a Facebook post he didn't need to wait until the morning deadline to respond and cursing at the Russians, according to the news agency Interfax Ukraine.

Russian Col. Gen. Mikhail Mizintsev had offered two corridors — one heading east toward Russia and the other west to other parts of Ukraine. He did not say what Russia planned if the offer was rejected.

The Russian Ministry of Defense said authorities in Mariupol could face a military tribunal if they sided with what it described as “bandits,” the Russian state news agency RIA Novosti reported.

Multiple attempts to evacuate residents from Mariupol and other Ukrainian cities have failed or only partly succeeded, with bombardments continuing as civilians tried to flee. City officials said at least 2,300 people have died in the siege, with some buried in mass graves.

Tearful evacuees from devastated Mariupol have described how “battles took place over every street.”

Ahead of the latest offer, a Russian airstrike hit the school where some 400 civilians had been taking shelter and it was not clear how many casualties there were, Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a video address early Monday.

“They are under the rubble, and we don't know how many of them have survived,” he said.

The fall of Mariupol would allow Russian forces in southern and eastern Ukraine to unite.

But Western military analysts say that even if the surrounded city is taken, the troops battling a block at a time for control there may be too depleted to help secure Russian breakthroughs on other fronts.

Ukrainians “have not greeted Russian soldiers with a bunch of flowers,” Zelenskyy told CNN, but with “weapons in their hands.”

US President Joe Biden was expected to talk later Monday with the leaders of France, Germany, Italy and Britain to discuss the war, before heading later in the week to Brussels and then Poland for in-person talks.

Zelenskyy has been pleading with the US for more aircraft and advanced air-defense systems, while NATO members on the alliance's eastern flank have also been looking for missile defense systems from the US and Britain.

More than three weeks into the invasion, the two sides now seem to be trying to wear down the other, experts say, with bogged-down Russian forces launching long-range missiles at cities and military bases as Ukrainian forces carry out hit-and-run attacks and seek to sever Russian supply lines.

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Ukrainian resistance means Russian President Vladimir Putin's “forces on the ground are essentially stalled.”

“It's had the effect of him moving his forces into a woodchipper,” Austin told CBS on Sunday.

Israel's prime minister says that while there have been advances in cease-fire talks between Russia and Ukraine, “very large” gaps remain between the two sides.

Naftali Bennett, who has acted as intermediary between the two warring countries in recent weeks, said at a conference on Monday that Israel “will continue — together with other friends in the world — to try and bridge the gap and bring an end to the war.”

Israel has good relations with both Ukraine and Russia and has acted as a broker between the two sides since Russia invaded Ukraine in late February. Bennett has held multiple phone calls with both leaders in recent weeks and flew to Moscow earlier this month to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Bennett has offered to host a summit in Jerusalem.

“There's still a long way to go, because as I stated, there are a number of controversial issues, some of them fundamental,” the prime minister said at the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper's conference.

The Central government on Monday told the Supreme Court that the Government of India has evacuated 22,500 students from conflict-ridden Ukraine and it is also looking into the educational concerns of the evacuated students. A bench headed by Chief Justice of India NV Ramana was informed by the Attorney General of India KK Venugopal, appearing for the Centre that students have given representation to the government on the issue of continuation of their studies and the government is looking into it and will make a decision.

Russia needs to be held accountable for the tragic loss of lives in Ukraine following its "terrible" invasion of that country, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Monday at a virtual summit with his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi. In his opening remarks, Morrison also referred to the recent meeting of the leaders of the Quad countries on the Ukraine crisis and said it provided an opportunity to discuss the "implications and consequences" of the developments for the Indo-Pacific region.

Two Haryana girls are still stuck in war-torn Ukraine’s Kherson city, according to a Bundi social activist, who said they are left with little food and spending their nights in the cold. Charmesh Sharma said he had on March 10 informed the Indian authorities about five students stranded in that country, after which three of them were brought back.

Rivne Oblast Governor Vitaliy Koval said on March 20 that Russian forces hit the city’s military training grounds with two missiles. There is no information on casualties yet. The city of Rivne is located 300 km west of Kyiv.

Russian forces advancing on Kiev from northeast have stalled and bulk of its forces remain more than 25 kilometres from centre of city, said British military intelligence.

The Russians have stolen five grain carriers from the Berdyansk port. Oleksandr Starukh, governor of Zaporizhzhia Oblast, said on March 21 that the stolen ships were carrying tens of thousands of tons of grain. Eyewitnesses say the ships were stolen by Russian tugboats.

At least six people were killed in an overnight bombing on a shopping centre in Ukraine's capital Kyiv. Six bodies were laid out in front of the Retroville shopping mall in northwest Kyiv, according to AFP.

Russian occupiers killed over 900 Ukrainian civilians. About 1.5 thousand people were wounded. These figures were reported by @UNHumanRights as of March 19.

A senior naval commander from Russia's Black Sea Fleet had been killed in Ukraine, said governor of Sevastopol, a port city on the Crimea Peninsula, on Sunday.

Patriotic messages in the form of tattoos and billboards have become popular in war-torn Ukraine. The Ukrainian flag and other symbols are favored additions for customers at a tattoo parlor in Lviv. Olena Barlevych, 18, recently got a tattoo of the Ukrainian coat of arms with a military aircraft, symbolizing the fight to defend her country.

China's Vice Foreign Minister Le Yucheng has drawn a comparison between the ongoing Ukraine crisis and geopolitical theatre of the Indo-Pacific which it calls as Asia-Pacific region. At the Fourth International Forum on Security and Strategy, Yucheng said the Ukraine crisis provides a mirror for us to observe the situation in the Asia-Pacific.

An ammonia leak has been reported at a chemicals plant in the northeastern Ukrainian city of Sumy besieged by Russian troops, said news agency Reuters.

Swiss President Ignazio Cassis said that he hopes the “guns would soon fall silent” and that Switzerland was prepared to mediate or host negotiations. Cassis will visit the Polish-Ukrainian border today.

France has frozen 22 billion euros ($24 billion) worth of assets belonging to the Russian Central Bank, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said on Sunday. "We have frozen the assets of the Central Bank of Russia in the amount of 22 billion euros. In addition, we have frozen assets in private individuals' accounts in French financial institutions in the amount of 150 million euros," Le Maire told the RTL radio.

Thirteen warships from several NATO countries are heading to Stockholm after military drills, the Swedish Aftonbladet newspaper reports.
The warships include nine German vessels and four ships from the Baltics that are on their way to Frihamnen Port following the exercise, the newspaper said on Sunday citing the Swedish military.

The United States could impose more sanctions on Russia and the White House is "nowhere near" lifting any of the restrictions, Daleep Singh, the deputy national security adviser for international economics, said. "We can broaden our sanctions. So - take the measures, take the sanctions we've already applied, apply them in more targets. Apply them to more sectors," Singh said on Sunday on CBS News.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed a bill extending martial law in Ukraine, the press service of Ukraine's parliament said Sunday.

The Russian military had offered the Ukrainian troops defending the strategic port of Mariupol to lay down arms and exit the city via humanitarian corridors, but that proposal was quickly rejected by the Ukrainian authorities.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) on Sunday said that 10 million Ukrainian refugees have fled abroad or been displaced inside the country in the wake of Russia's invasion. UN Refugee Agency chief Filippo Grandi said that millions of Ukrainians have been forced to flee their homes due to escalating fights between Russia and Ukraine, reported NHK World.