Accessibility links

Breaking News
Moscow Court Upholds Extending Pretrial Detention Of Ukrainian Sailors
please wait

No media source currently available

0:00 0:00:56 0:00

WATCH: Moscow Court Upholds Extending Pretrial Detention Of Ukrainian Sailors

Live Blog: A New Government In Ukraine (Archive Sept. 3, 2018-Aug. 16, 2019)

-- EDITOR'S NOTE: We have started a new Ukraine Live Blog as of August 17, 2019. You can find it here.

-- A court in Moscow has upheld a lower court's decision to extend pretrial detention for six of the 24 Ukrainian sailors detained by Russian forces along with their three naval vessels in November near the Kerch Strait, which links the Black Sea and Sea of Azov.

-- The U.S. special peace envoy to Ukraine, Kurt Volker, says Russian propaganda is making it a challenge to solve the conflict in the east of the country.

-- Two more executives of DTEK, Ukraine's largest private power and coal producer, have been charged in a criminal case on August 14 involving an alleged conspiracy to fix electricity prices with the state energy regulator, Interfax reported.

-- A Ukrainian deputy minister and his aide have been detained after allegedly taking a bribe worth $480,000, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau said on Facebook.

*Time stamps on the blog refer to local time in Ukraine

16:33 18.6.2019

Here is today's map of the latest situation in the Donbas conflict zone according to the Ukrainian Defense Ministry. (CLICK TO ENLARGE.)

16:29 18.6.2019

16:26 18.6.2019

16:18 18.6.2019

16:16 18.6.2019

16:15 18.6.2019

15:08 18.6.2019

Update from the Crimea Desk of RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service:

Russian Court Jails Five Crimean Tatars On Extremism Charges

The five defendants (seen here in a courtroom in April) were arrested in October 2016 after Russia-controlled authorities in Ukraine's Crimea searched their homes.
The five defendants (seen here in a courtroom in April) were arrested in October 2016 after Russia-controlled authorities in Ukraine's Crimea searched their homes.

ROSTOV-ON-DON, Russia -- A court in Russia has sentenced five Crimean Tatars to lengthy prison terms on extremism charges that they say are politically motivated.

The North Caucasus Regional Military court in the city of Rostov-on-Don on June 18 found the five men guilty of organizing and/or participating in the activities of the Hizb ut-Tahrir Islamic group that is banned in Russia but legal in Ukraine.

Teymur Abdullayev was sentenced to 17 years, Rustem Ismaiylov received 14 years, and Uzeiyr Abdullayev 13 years, while Ayder Saledinov and Emil Dzhemadenov were sentenced to 12 years in prison each.

The men were arrested in October 2016 after Russia-controlled authorities in Ukraine's Crimea searched their homes.

Two months later, they were transferred to a detention center in the Russian city of Rostov-on Don.

Last week, eight other Crimean Tatars were arrested in Crimea and charged with belonging to Hizb ut-Tahrir.

Since Russia seized the peninsula in 2014, Russian authorities have prosecuted dozens of Crimean Tatars for allegedly belonging to Hizb ut-Tahrir.

Earlier, in March-April, Russia's Federal Security Service detained 24 Crimean Tatars, also on suspicion of being members of the group, following house-to-house searches in Crimea.

Rights groups and Western governments have denounced what they describe as a campaign of repression by the Russian-imposed authorities in Crimea who are targeting members of the Turkic-speaking Crimean Tatar community and others who have spoken out against Moscow's takeover of the peninsula.

In its annual report on religious freedom worldwide, released on April 29, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) said that "[in] Russian-occupied Crimea, the Russian authorities continued to kidnap, torture, and imprison Crimean Tatar Muslims at will."

Russia took control of Crimea from Ukraine in March 2014 after sending in troops, seizing key facilities, and staging a referendum dismissed as illegal by at least 100 countries. Moscow also backs separatists in a war against government forces that has killed some 13,000 people in eastern Ukraine since April 2014.

14:45 18.6.2019

14:44 18.6.2019

14:41 18.6.2019

Load more

XS
SM
MD
LG