What happened after Austrian lawmakers walked out on Zelenskyy's address?
A look back at the Freedom Party protest in Vienna and the nuclear announcement from Moscow that preceded it.
What did Ukraine's diplomacy look like on 31 March 2023? It was shaped by events of the preceding days, among them a protest in Austria's parliament and an announcement from Moscow.
On 30 March 2023, lawmakers from the right-wing Freedom Party of Austria walked out of the lower house of the Austrian parliament during a speech by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. They said they were protesting a violation of Austria's national principle of neutrality.
Five days earlier, on 25 March 2023, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that Russia would station tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus by July. Russian forces would operate the missiles. It would be the first time Russian nuclear weapons had been deployed abroad since 1996.
Together, the two developments showed how the war continued to shape politics well beyond Ukraine's borders, in parliamentary debate in Vienna and in security announcements involving Russia and Belarus.
