The latest on the Russia–Ukraine crisis, March 31. Click here for updates from March 30. Ukraine Expects Russian Assault in East Ukrainian forces are preparing for new Russian attacks in the southeast region where Moscow’s guns are now trained after its assault on the capital Kyiv was repelled, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Thursday. Moscow says it is now focusing on “liberating” the Donbas region—two southeastern provinces partly controlled by separatists Russia has backed since 2014. In an early morning video address, Zelenskyy claimed Russian troop movements away from Kyiv and the northern city of Chernihiv were not a withdrawal but rather “the consequence of our defenders’ work.” Ukraine was seeing “a build-up of Russian forces for new strikes on the Donbas and we are preparing for that,” he said. That includes Mariupol, once a city of 400,000 people, where most buildings have been damaged or destroyed in four weeks …