Three weeks ago, separatists kidnapped the Judge of the Luhansk Court of Appeals, Vitaliy Rudenko, who was coming to his father’s funeral in Krasnodon, a territory uncontrolled by Ukrainian authorities. The incident was disclosed by the chairman of the “Patriot” volunteer organization and member of the hostage exchange negotiating group, Oleg Kotenko, during his commentary on Hromadske Radio.

"The judge had an agreement with a man he knew from the LPR (Luhansk People's Republic) that he would …

In the occupied Luhansk region, near the Izvarino checkpoint, engineering barriers were installed and Russian Armed Forces were deployed along the Russian side of the border, as announced on Tuesday at a briefing by the press secretary of the Ministry of Defense on ATO issues, Colonel Olexandr Motuzyanyk, Ukrinform reports.

"Near the Izvarino border crossing, in the occupied territory, engineering obstacles are being built on the Russian side of the border. Also, along this stretch of the …

Russian Minister of Economic Development Alexey Ulyukayev stated that Russia is determined to lift the mutual sanctions with the European Union. However, the European partners themselves have not yet demonstrated good will regarding this issue.

“The best proposal would be a mutual refusal from these restrictions. We would welcome it but unfortunately, our partners, including European partners, have not demonstrated the proper good will,” Ulyukayev said at the meeting with Italian entrepreneurs, …

The Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, said that Moscow rejects the accusations that Russia seeks to maintain the conflict in Ukraine.

"Russia is interested in resolving the conflict near its borders, more than anyone else, despite the fact that periodically you hear the assertions that we want to artificially drag out the conflict, keeping it in a frozen state forever. This is an attempt to shift the blame on others," the Minister said, speaking at the Potsdam meetings at the Alexander …

A number of official documents relating to cooperation objectives have been signed by Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and Slovenian President Borut Pahor in the city of Ljubljana. This was announced by the press secretary of the Ukrainian President, Svyatoslav Tsegolko, on Twitter.

“Ukraine and Slovenia have signed a memorandum of understanding on energy efficiency and alternative fuels,” Tsegolko noted.

A memorandum of cooperation in the field of consumer rights protection and an …

The European Union agreed on the introduction of new personal sanctions against Crimean officials, Reuters reports, indicating that this decision was based on the accession of the Crimea to Russia.

According to the newspaper Delfi, the decision was made at the request of Lithuania and was formally approved at a meeting of the Economic and Financial Affairs Council of the Council of the European Union.

It was noted that the sanctions will affect the six deputies of the State Duma who were …

Ukraine has insisted that the OSCE Mission and the Red Cross work near the gate checkpoints for 24 hours a day.

This was posted on Facebook by a member of the humanitarian subgroup at the Minsk negotiations, Iryna Herashchenko, after a meeting of the subgroup on Tuesday.

“Generally speaking, Ukraine supports the idea that the ICRC [International Committe of the Red Cross] and the OSCE have permanent posts when working close to all the checkpoints. Also, they should not just go there for only 1 …

The head of the EU Delegation to Ukraine, Hugues Mingarelli, stated that the European Union offered Ukraine expert assistance in the development and implementation of laws on the seizure of illegally acquired assets, the minister of justice of Ukraine, Pavlo Petrenko, reported on his Facebook page.

“The development and adoption of legislation that will enable the state to return illegally acquired assets became a separate paragraph of the dialogue. In particular, Mr. Ambassador proposed to …