FINANCIAL TIMES: …Investors fled Russian assets, with stocks in Moscow falling by 10.8 per cent, their biggest daily fall since the 2008 financial crisis. The prospect of a full-blown conflict hit global stocks and prompted a jump in the price of commodities that are heavily dependent on Russia and Ukraine for supplies, such as wheat, oil and European natural gas…
Amid new signs that the situation in Crimea is getting even more tense, Ukraine’s defence ministry said its forces in Crimea had received an ultimatum from Russian forces to surrender to them by 5am local time on Tuesday or face military attack…
President Barack Obama said on Monday that the US would take a series of diplomatic and economic steps to “isolate Russia” if it did not withdraw its military from Crimea. He warned that the intervention would be a “costly proposition for Russia” in the long term, but held open the prospect of Mr Putin defusing the crisis by accepting international monitors to ensure the security of Russians in Ukraine. “Really there are two paths Russia can take at this point,” he said… (more)
