EU to close airspace to Russian airlines and fund weapons for Ukraine

Measures mark the first time the bloc has financed arms for a country under attack

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announces EU assistance for Ukraine in Brussels on February 27. AP

The EU plans to close its airspace to Russian airlines, fund weapons purchases to Ukraine and ban some pro-Kremlin media outlets in its latest response to the Ukraine crisis, European Commission officials said.

The measures, which commission president Ursula von der Leyen said she expected to be endorsed, would be the first time the 27-nation bloc paid for the purchase and delivery of weapons and equipment to a country under attack.

“Another taboo has fallen. The taboo that the European Union was not providing arms in a war,” said the EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell.

The commission’s plans followed the announcement earlier in the day that Germany was committing €100 billion ($113bn) to a special armed forces fund and would keep its defence spending above 2 per cent of GDP from now on.

The shift underscored how Russia’s war in Ukraine was rewriting Europe’s post-Second World War security and defence policy in ways that were unthinkable only a few weeks ago.

Also on Sunday, leaders of the G7 group of wealthy nations threatened to impose new sanctions on Russia if it continued its military operations in Ukraine. They pledged not to recognise Moscow's military gains.

Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Britain and the US warned that they would "take further steps" to add to the sanctions already announced if Russia did not cease its operation.

Meanwhile, anti-war protesters took to the streets in Berlin, Rome, Prague, Istanbul and even Russian cities including Moscow and St Petersburg, and a dozen Belarusian cities, to demand an end to the war.

Human rights advocates reported that more than 170 people had been arrested in the Belarusian protests, as the country’s authoritarian leader offered its territory to his ally Russia.

In Minsk, a large pile of flowers continued to grow at Ukraine’s embassy.

Tens of thousands of people massed on Sunday in front of Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate, with some carrying posters with slogans such as “Hands off Ukraine,” “Tanks to Windmills” and “Putin, go to therapy and leave Ukraine and the world in peace".

The EU plans to use millions of euros to help to provide air defence systems, anti-tank weapons, ammunition and other military equipment for Ukraine’s armed forces.

It would also supply fuel, protective gear, helmets and first aid kits.

The system might also use EU money to reimburse members that have already sent lethal and non-lethal aid to Ukraine this year, giving an incentive for those countries to invest more in assistance.

To bolster its military training and support missions around the world, the EU has set up a European Peace Facility, a fund with a ceiling of about €5.7bn.

Some of the money can be used to train and equip partner countries, including with lethal weapons.

Ukrainian fighters test an automatic grenade launcher taken from a destroyed Russian infantry vehicle in Kharkiv. AFP

Refugees from Ukraine rest after arriving at a railway station in Przemysl, Poland. AP

People walk down 17th June Street in Berlin before a rally against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. AP

Vitali Klitschko, Mayor of Kiev and former heavyweight boxing champion, right, and his brother, Wladimir. AP

Khreshchatyk, Kiev’s main street, lies empty as a curfew comes into effect. AP

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy speaks to the nation from Kiev. AP

On February 27, the seventh anniversary of the assassination of opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, a note stating ‘No to war!’ is placed among flowers on the central Moscow bridge on which he was shot. AFP

A member of the Ukrainian forces, wearing the Guy Fawkes mask popularised by Anonymous, patrols central Kiev. AFP

Sviatoslav Yurash, 26, a politician from President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s Servant of the People party, poses with his assault rifle as he patrols Kiev. AFP

A Ukrainian serviceman and his dog look at smoke from a burning fuel storage depot after a Russian missile attack near Kiev. EPA

A refugee who fled conflict in Ukraine rests at a railway station after arriving in Zahony, Hungary. AP

A refugee boy who fled Ukraine cries at the railway station in Zahony, Hungary. AP

Civil defence members eat during a break at City Hall in Kiev. AP

An Indian student is embraced by his family at Chennai Airport after returning from Ukraine. EPA

Smoke is seen rising from behind buildings following bombings in Kiev. Getty

An armed civil defence woman holds a Kalashnikov assault rifle while patrolling an empty street in Kiev. AP

A woman fleeing from Ukraine cries as she waits to be taken to a shelter in Zahony, Hungary. Reuters

Ukrainian refugees cross the Romanian border at Siret, northern Romania. EPA

A residential building damaged by shelling in Kharkiv, north-eastern Ukraine. AFP

Apartments damaged by shelling in Kharkiv. AFP

A girl protests against Russia's military operation in Ukraine, in front of the Russian embassy in Tel Aviv. AFP

Young women protest in Tbilisi, Georgia with their hands painted in the colors of the Ukrainian flag. Getty

Supplies for Ukrainian refugees at one of three camps set up at the MoldExpo exhibition center, in Chisinau, Moldova. EPA

Police detain a demonstrator during a protest against Russia's incursion into Ukraine in St Petersburg. AP

A man waits at a bus stop in St Petersburg, which has been with a painted in the colours of Ukraine's national flag. EPA

Russian ground forces approaching Nova Kakhovka, southern Ukraine. AP

A woman holds her daughter's hand as they arrive by bus from the Polish-Ukrainian border. Getty

A man drives his car full of food supplies to deliver to the Ukrainian side of the border, where thousands wait to enter Poland. Getty

Refugees arrive with buses from the Medyka pedestrian border crossing, in Przemsyl, eastern Poland. AFP

People gather to catch a train and leave Ukraine for neighboring countries at the railway station in Lviv, western Ukraine. AP

Cars form a line that stretches 35 kilometres from the Shehyni border crossing to Poland as people try to flee Russia's military operation against Ukraine. Reuters

Helena, right, and her brother Bodia, left, from Lviv, wait at the Medyka border crossing in eastern Poland. AFP

A Ukrainian soldier walks past debris of a burning military truck, on a street in Kiev. AP

People run for cover during the shelling on the city of Kiev. AP

A child refugee who fled the conflict in Ukraine covers her face in the event hall of a hotel offering shelter in Siret, Romania. AP

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy holding a briefing in Kyiv. He said that Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev and Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan have suggested talks with Russia, which 'can only be welcomed'. AFP

Ukraine's ambassador to the US, Oksana Markarova, at a news conference in the embassy of Ukraine, Washington. AP

Manchester City footballers wear t-shirts in support of Ukraine before a match. Reuters

Ukrainian refugees arrive in Warsaw by train from Kiev. EPA

A woman waves a Ukrainian flag during a rally in Times Square, New York City. AFP

A man sits next to his dogs in an underground car park turned into a bomb shelter during an air raid alert in Kiev. AP

A woman sleeps on chairs in a Kiev bomb shelter. AP

A satellite image with overlaid graphics shows military vehicles alongside the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. Reuters

A satellite image shows the effects of shelling in open fields along Soborna Street in the north-east suburbs of Kharkiv. Reuters

A big fire at a petroleum storage depot after a Russian missile attack, in Vasylkiv, near Kiev. EPA

Ukrainian servicemen take positions at a military airbase in the Kyiv region. Reuters

Ms von der Leyen said that beyond the weapons purchases, EU nations would shut down airspace to Russians – a decision that more than a dozen EU members had already announced.

“We are proposing a prohibition on all Russian-owned, Russian-registered or Russian-controlled aircraft," she said. "These aircraft will no more be able to land in, take off or overfly the territory of the EU."

She said the EU would also ban “the Kremlin’s media machine. The state-owned Russia Today and Sputnik, as well as their subsidiaries, will no longer be able to spread their lies to justify Putin’s war and to sow division in our union”.

Ms von der Leyen said the EU would also take aim at Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko for supporting Russia’s widespread military campaign in Ukraine.

“We will hit Lukashenko’s regime with a new package of sanctions,” she said.

Meanwhile, Japan joined the US and European nations in cutting key Russian banks from the Swift international financial banking system.

Japan will also freeze assets of Russian President Vladimir Putin and other top Russian officials, while sending $100 million in emergency humanitarian aid to Ukraine, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said.