going on. it s a difficult venue for ukraine because belarus is very much part of this war as we happen reporting in the weeks running up to this invasion, there were military exercises, marshalling of forces on the belarusian ukraine border and then of course there had been reports in the last 2a hours that belarusian troops could actually cross the border to join the russian offensive. is there any indication where you are how likely that is? no, not really, i m afraid. the kremlin is very keen to perpetuate the narrative that this is not an invasion of ukraine, this is not a war, the russian media are not even allowed to use those words, the narrative here is this is a necessary defence of the russian speaking populations in eastern
the united nations refugee agency says more than half a million people from ukraine have now fled into neighbouring countries. poland alone is handling 250,000 refugees the european union says it s preparing for millions more to arrive. shops have reopened in kyiv after the lifting of a curfew which has been in force since saturday evening, allowing residents of the city to emerge from their underground shelters. in other developments, the russian currency, the rouble, has tumbled almost 30% to record lows against the dollar. russia s stock and derivative markets have stayed shut, and the central bank announced it was more than doubling its key interest rate to 20%. the kremlin has blamed comments by the british foreign secretary, liz truss, for its decision to place russia s nuclear forces on special alert . and in an hour s time, the united nations general assembly will hold a special emergency
ukraine against the aggression coming from kyiv. the state media here is very keen to keep that narrative going. you do not hear a lot about what is going on in the rest of the country, you hear what is going on in the east and the south of ukraine and we have had various upbeat assessments from the ministry of defence here over the last few days including today when they talk about the fact they ve taken some towns in the south and that they are managing to control those cities with the cooperation of local people. they don t mention casualties on the russian side although they have acknowledged just yesterday there have been some casualties but no more detail than that. they want people here to think this is going very well. we have to see if we hear more but today that is not something the kremlin is talking about. jenny hill, thank you forjoining us
been imposed in the last few days and how quickly the escalation from pretty targeted measures, to now fairly sweeping measures against the swift payment system and access to that system of russian banks, the russian central bank has been, so far this is a big restriction of western resolve, the question will be what the effects will be on the decision making of putin and the kremlin. decision-making of putin and the kremlin. . , , , ., kremlin. that s the big question. toda we kremlin. that s the big question. today we are kremlin. that s the big question. today we are seeing kremlin. that s the big question. today we are seeing the - kremlin. that s the big question. today we are seeing the rouble l kremlin. that s the big question. i today we are seeing the rouble has fallen to an all time low against the dollar, the everyday lives of russians could be impacted quite quickly. whether all this is enough to make him change course. yes. quickly. whether all this is enough to make