Ukraine on 30 March 2020: emergency rules and closing borders
A look back at a day when Ukraine was living under a nationwide emergency regime as neighbouring Russia closed its borders.
What did a country under a nationwide emergency look like on 30 March 2020? For Ukraine, it was a day within a 30-day regime that the Cabinet of Ministers had introduced on 25 March across the whole territory, in response to the spread of coronavirus disease.
The emergency status was the framework for the days around that date. The Cabinet's decision applied everywhere in the country, with no region excluded, and was set for a fixed period of 30 days.
Beyond Ukraine's own measures, the wider region was tightening its movement rules. On 28 March, Russia announced that all its borders would be closed from 30 March to counter the spread of COVID-19. The measure was not to apply to Russian diplomats or to drivers of freight trucks, among others. The closure therefore took effect on the very day covered here.
The period was not only about the pandemic. On 25 March, the same day the emergency regime was introduced, security forces arrested Leonid Kozhara, a former Ukrainian foreign minister, on charges of murdering advertising mogul Sergiy Starytsky. The arrest was reported alongside the emergency announcement.
Taken together, the reports from 25 to 28 March show a country and its neighbourhood adjusting to new restrictions, with a government acting on a nationwide scale and a neighbouring state sealing its frontiers on 30 March 2020.
