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"It's such a high-stakes, high-risk situation, and here they are right in the middle of it."
• For Obama, the U.S. response to the chaos in Ukraine has become more than a test of his ability to stop Russia's advances. It's also being viewed through the prism of his decision last summer to back away from his threat to launch a military strike when Syria crossed his chemical weapons "red line" -- a decision that has fed into a narrative pushed by Obama's critics that the president talks tough, but doesn't follow through.
• While there has been no talk of "red lines" when dealing with Putin, Obama has said repeatedly that the Kremlin's advances into eastern Ukraine would be a "serious escalation" of the conflict that would warrant broad international sanctions on the Russian economy. But perhaps trying to avoid another Syria scenario, White House officials have carefully avoided defining what exactly would meet Obama's definition of a "serious escalation," even as they make clear that they believe Russia is fomenting the violence in cities throughout Ukraine's vital industrial east.
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• HORLIVKA, Ukraine (AP) -- Pro-Russian insurgents who have seized government buildings across eastern Ukraine dug in on Tuesday, fortifying their positions and erecting fresh barricades, despite another government announcement that it was acting to restore order in the restive region.
• In Kiev, Ukraine's acting president, Oleksandr Turchynov, announced an "anti-terrorist operation" to root out the "separatists," but it was unclear how that measure differed from the one announced Monday, which resulted in no visible action.
• The insurgents, many of them armed, continued occupying government, police and other administrative buildings in nearly 10 cities in the country's Russian-speaking east of the country, demanding broader autonomy and closer ties with Russia. The central government has so far been unable to rein in the insurgents, as many of the local security forces have switched to their side.
• The unrest comes weeks after Russia annexed Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula, after a pro-Russian president was ousted after three months of pro-Western protests.
• The city of Horlivka, not far from the Russian border, where the local police station has been seized by unidentified gunmen, has been turned into the latest of a wave of sit-ins across eastern Ukraine, where at least nine cities appeared in control

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