Destabilizing factor: Why Russia needs the separatist-held territories of eastern Ukraine
Author: Dmytro Snegiryov, Head of Prava Sprava public initiative.
Moscow has the return of the separatists controlled territories of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions back to the jurisdiction of Ukraine on its agenda, but only under Russian conditions. Right now Russia does not need a large-scale attack by the separatist troops in the Donbas or the escalation of hostilities.
The intention of the Russian Federation is to create a zone of a permanent social and military tension within Ukraine by …
The Kremlin says it did not receive an official letter from Yanukovych on the deployment of Russian troops
The presidential administration of the Russian Federation never received an official letter from former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych with a request for Russian troops to enter Ukraine. TASS reports that this was stated by Dmitry Peskov, Press-Secretary for the President of Russia.
"No letter was officially received by the presidential administration; no such letter was registered in the administration," Peskov said.
At the same time, the Kremlin spokesman declined to comment on the …
European Parliament urges Russia to free Ukrainian political prisoners detained in the Crimea
The European Parliament adopted a resolution regarding Ukrainian political prisoners that are being illegally detained by Russia in the annexed Crimea.
The MEPs urged Russia to immediately release these Ukrainians and appealed to the EU with a call for new sanctions against those responsible for this harassment of Ukrainian citizens.
451 Eurodeputies voted for the resolution and 73 opposed it. 86 European parliamentarians abstained from the vote.
In a resolution called "Ukrainian prisoners …
Ukraine confiscated a foreign ship for entering the Crimea
The Malinovsky District Court of Odessa convicted the captain of the vessel Sky Moon, which sailed under the flag of Tanzania, for illegally entering a port in the Russian-annexed Crimea, as reported on the website of the military prosecutor's office of the Southern region.
The court decided to confiscate the goods that were being smuggled, namely, soda worth almost 18.5 million UAH (or 687 thousand USD), and the ship itself, as the vehicle that was used to commit the offense. The worth of the …
US battalion was deployed to Lithuania on a permanent basis
The presence of American troops in Lithuania is virtually permanent, said Curtis Scaparrotti, Supreme Allied Commander Europe of NATO.
“We have forces here here 365 days a year. I want some flexibility on that, so it may not be [permanent deployment] but it will be nearly that if not that because of the forces we have,” Scaparrotti told reporters on Thursday.
He noted that the rotation of the US battalion in Lithuania would take place in June and July, and the division would take part in the “ …