• Canada says that sanctions against Russia must be maintained

    Canada strongly condemns the “illegal annexation” of Crimea by Russia and stresses the importance of maintaining international pressure on Moscow and keeping sanctions in place “until Russian respects international law and Ukraine’s sovereignty.” This was stated by Chrystia Freeland, Canada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs.

    “Today is the three year anniversary of the illegal annexation of Crimea. We strongly condemn the violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine…Canada …

  • 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 …

  • Russia will form a new army at the southeastern border of Ukraine

    A new integrated 8th army will be formed in the Russian Southern military district, as reported by Izvestia daily citing representatives of the Russian military forces.

    “The General Staff headquarters are planned to be established in Novocherkassk with the units stationed in Rostov and Volgograd regions,” Izvestia reports.

    Izvestia’s source said that the formation of the new Army has already begun. It is expected that the first stage of the formation of the army will be completed by June 2017. …