Contents tagged with Verkhovna Rada

  • Media: Kyiv negotiates establishment of US military base in Ukraine

    The Russian newspaper Izvestia claims, citing its sources, that Kyiv is in talks with the United States on the possibility of the construction of a US military base in Ukraine. According to Izvestia, the information was also confirmed by a member of the Verkhovna Rada from the Petro Poroshenko Bloc, Ivan Vinnyk. Vinnyk said the new American military base will protect the country from Moscow’s threats.

    However, Izvestia states that despite US support, Washington would not give Ukraine official …

  • Ukrainian Parliament supports the bill on the course of Ukraine to NATO and EU

    Based on data from the Ukrainian parliament the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine approved in the first reading the draft law on amending the country’s constitution.

    The changes, in support of which 311 deputies voted, concern Ukraine’s strategic course on Ukraine’s membership to the European Union and NATO. Twenty-one deputies voted against, three abstained, and 16 did not vote. In total, 351 people participated in the meeting; the rest were not registered in time for the meeting.

    The document …

  • Naftogaz files $236 million lawsuit against Ukraine’s government

    The gas company Naftogaz of Ukraine asked Kyiv Economic Court to recover compensation of more than 6.63 billion hryvnias ($ 236 million) from the Ukrainian government due to the losses the company allegedly suffered because of supplying the gas below the market prices, reports Ukrainski Novyny news agency citing.

    According to the news agency, the company filed a lawsuit in October this year. Naftogaz accused the Ukrainian government of inaction, which “consists of the uncertainty in …

  • Ukraine’s Prosecutor General announces his resignation

    The Prosecutor General of Ukraine, Yuriy Lutsenko, has submitted his resignation to the President Petro Poroshenko, the spokesperson of the Prosecutor General Larysa Sarhan, told Ukrainski Novyny (Ukrainian News) news agency.

    “Yes, he submitted the resignation,” she said, noting that the document was sent on Wednesday, November 7.

    On the eve of November 6, Lutsenko announced that he is retiring. He explained that he made this decision due to a “propaganda campaign” that began after the death …

  • Russia introduces sanctions against Ukraine

    The Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev signed a government decree introducing sanctions against Ukraine.

    Based on the document published on the Russian government’s website, the list includes more than 300 Ukrainian citizens and 68 companies.

    Starting November 1st, their funds, property and bonds will be blocked in the Russian Federation, and transferring capital out of Russia will be restricted.

    The imposition of sanctions is “aimed at countering unfriendly actions against Russian …

  • Nadiya Savchenko prepares lawsuit against Ukraine to European Court of Human Rights

    People’s Deputy of Ukraine Nadiya Savchenko, who is currently in custody, is preparing a lawsuit to the European Court of Human Rights against Ukraine.

    Savchenko asked the former First Deputy Prosecutor General Renat Kuzmin to consult her regarding this lawsuit in an open letter to Kuzmin published on Savchenko’s Facebook page.

    "Your cooperation with my lawyers will significantly increase Ukraine’s chances to defeat the arbitrariness and lawlessness of every political “elite” that comes to …

  • Journalist: Ukraine lost 40% of its ammunition during recent depo explosions

    Ukraine has lost about forty percent of its entire arsenal of ammunition because of warehouse explosions over the past year and a half. In his article for Dzerkalo Tyzhnia, Ukrainian journalist Yury Butusov writes that more than 210,000 tons of ammunition were destroyed, from pistol ammo to the OTR-21 Tochka ballistic missiles during recent explosions at the storage facilities in Ichnia.

    For comparison, Butusov notes that during the five years of war in the Donbas, the Armed Forces of Ukraine …

  • Chairman of Ukrainian Parliament: raising gas prices unavoidable

    Verkhovna Rada Chairman Andriy Parubiy said in a statement on the Ukrainian parliament’s official website that raising the gas prices is an “unavoidable decision” which is “necessary to prevent an economic crisis in Ukraine”.

    Parubiy said that the decision “is not and cannot be popular”, but that statist government leaders knowingly accept losses to their own popularity when this is necessary.

    “One of our country’s great problems is that the populists of the past led Ukraine into extremely …

  • Law protecting Ukrainian political prisoners comes into force in Ukraine

    On Saturday, October 13, amendments to addendum No. 3 of the law “On the State Budget of Ukraine for 2018” came into force which improve the protection of Ukrainians held illegally in Russia and the Russia-occupied territories of the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces, as well as on the Crimean peninsula. The text of the document was published by the parliamentary news outlet Voice of Ukraine.

    The law stipulates a change to the name of the budget program envisaged for the Ministry of Temporarily …

  • Ukraine considers imposing criminal penalties for promoting ‘Russian World’ ideology

    A group of deputies from the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine headed by Oleksandr Shevchenko registered a Parliament bill proposing criminal prosecution for promoting the idealogy of “Russian World”.

    As stated in an explanatory note attached to the draft bill, “current Ukrainian legislation prohibits only communist and national socialist ideologies, not taking into account the promotion of the ideas of “Russian World,” which aim at destruction of Ukrainian independence.”

    In connection with this, the …