Belarusian who fought with Right Sector jailed:
By RFE/RL's Belarus Service
A Belarusian national accused of fighting alongside Ukraine's extremist Right Sector has been sentenced by a district court in Minsk to five years in prison.
Taras Avatarau, a resident of the eastern Belarusian city of Navapolatsk, was found guilty on charges of trafficking weapons and explosive devices.
Avatarau, whose trial began on April 18, was detained in November when he arrived in Minsk on a train from Ukraine.
Authorities said they seized a pistol and an explosive device from him at the time of his arrest.
According to the investigators, Avatarau fought as a volunteer alongside Right Sector in battles against Russia-backed separatists in Ukraine's eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk.
Right Sector was one of many groups across Ukraine's political spectrum that took part in the Kyiv street protests that toppled former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych in February 2014.
The Right Sector has been banned in Russia as a terrorist organization.
IMF to visit Kyiv next week to review reform program:
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) says it will send a mission to Kyiv from May 10 to May 18 to review whether the new Ukrainian government's reform program is sufficient to restore disbursements from a $17.5 billion bailout loan.
Before Prime Minister Volodymyr Hrosyman took office on April 14, IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde had warned that the bailout program could be halted unless Kyiv launched "a substantial new effort" to improve governance and fight corruption.
Lagarde said that unless Kyiv acted to put the country on a "promising path of reform," Ukraine would risk "a return to the pattern of failed economic policies that has plagued its recent history."
IMF bailout programs involve the disbursement of loans in stages and have always been contingent upon economic and political reforms.
A third tranche of assistance to Ukraine has been held up since October due to concerns that funds might be squandered or stolen by corrupt officials. (Reuters, Bloomberg, Kyiv Post)