Russia-Ukraine updates: US sanctions Russian military shipbuilder, diamond miner

Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla on Monday defended the company’s decision to continue supplying medicine to Russia, saying “patients first.”

The pharmaceutical company announced Monday that it would donate all profits from sales in Russia to Ukraine. Despite the hefty sanctions placed on Russia by countries around the world, Bourla said at the South by Southwest film festival in Austin that a humanitarian exemption to continue operations in Russia applies.

“Always with sanctions, medicines are excluded,” he said, citing other previous instances, including Iran. “We debated a lot what needs to be done, and we felt it’s so foundational in our principles that patients should come first that we cannot stop the flow of our medicines to Russia.”

Bourla emphasized that medicine is not comparable to goods such as the latest smartphone, saying that treatments for conditions such as lung and metastatic breast cancer “can’t stop.”

However, Pfizer is not "continuing business as usual" in Russia, Bourla said.

“Though we will maintain the flow of the medicines, we will not make money out of it -- all the profits of the Russian subsidiary going forward effective immediately will be donated to causes to alleviate the pain that the invasion is causing to Ukrainians.”

-ABC News' Sasha Pezenik

Fox News State Department correspondent Benjamin Hall was injured while newsgathering near Kyiv on Monday, according to Suzanne Scott, CEO of Fox News Media.

The circumstances were not immediately clear but Scott said Hall was hospitalized.

"Please keep Ben and his family in your prayers," Scott said in a statement.

Shaun Tandon, president of the State Department Correspondents’ Association, said in a statement, "We know Ben for his warmth, good humor and utmost professionalism. We wish Ben a quick recovery and call for utmost efforts to protect journalists who are providing an invaluable service through their coverage in Ukraine.”

While the State Department has declined to confirm reports that Russia has reached out to China for aid, State Department spokesman Ned Price is warning China that the U.S. is watching for any country that may come to Russia's defense.

The U.S. delegation "raised directly and very clearly our concerns about the PRC's [People's Republic of China's] support for Russia in the wake of the invasion and the implications that any such support would have for the PRC's relationship not only with us, but for its relationships around the world," Price said.

The U.S. is "watching very closely the extent to which the PRC or any other country for that matter provides any form of support -- whether that's material support, whether that's economic support, whether that's financial support for Russia," he added.

He declined to say whether the U.S. and its allies are drawing up sanctions in case China provides strong support to Russia in violation of Western sanctions.

But he said, "Any country that would seek to, attempt to bail Russia out of this economic, financial morass will be met with consequences. We will ensure that no country is able to get away with such a thing."

During a United Nations Security Council briefing Monday, China appeared to align itself more closely with the Kremlin.

“The final solution to the crisis in Ukraine is to take seriously and respect the reasonable security concerns of all states,” said Zhang Jun, China's U.N. representative, repeating China’s assertion that Russia is reacting to legitimate threats to national security posed by Ukraine.

He continued, “The Cold War was over long ago. Cold War mentality based on bloc confrontation should be completely rejected. Sticking to hegemony mentality and provoking bloc confrontation will only bring the world disasters and exacerbate turmoil and division."

He also slammed the use of sanctions by the U.S. and it allies, arguing that these economic punishments would not solve the conflict, but create more international strife.

-ABC News' Conor Finnegan and Shannon Crawford

There was a lull in attacks by Russian forces on the coastal Ukrainian city of Mariupol on Monday, allowing the first mass civilian evacuation from the city, according to Petro Andrushenko, an adviser to the mayor.

About 160 cars fled the city Monday, carrying what's estimated to be hundreds of civilians, he said.

Heavy shelling and air bombardments impeded previous efforts to get civilians out and to allow for humanitarian supplies to be brought in.

The Mariupol City Council reported Sunday that 2,187 residents had been killed since the start of the invasion. Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereschuk said last week that the city was "beyond a humanitarian disaster," with most roads destroyed, little communication with the outside and no power, gas or heat.

-ABC News' Patrick Reevell