The Moscow stock market fell by 10 percent and the central bank spent $10 billion of its reserves to prop up the rouble as investors took fright at escalating tensions with the West over the former Soviet republic.
Ukraine said Russia was building up armoured vehicles on its side of a narrow stretch of water closest to Crimea after Putin declared at the weekend he had the right to invade his neighbor to protect Russian interests and citizens.
On the ground in Perevalnoye, half way between the Crimean capital of Simferopol and the Black Sea, hundreds of Russian troops in trucks and armoured vehicles - without national insignia on their uniforms - surrounded two military compounds, confining Ukrainian soldiers as virtual prisoners.
Ukraine called up reservists on Sunday and the United States threatened to isolate Russia economically after Putin's action provoked what Britain's foreign minister called "the biggest crisis in Europe in the twenty-first century". » | Lidia Kelly and Alissa de Carbonnel | Moscow/Perevalnoye, Ukrain | Monday, March 03, 2014
