An item from our news desk that's peripheral but still pertinent to Ukraine:
Foreign Investors Reportedly Buy $1.3 Billion Of Russian Eurobond Offering
Foreign investors on May 23 and 24 bought around $1.3 billion of a Eurobond offering by Russia – its first since sanctions were imposed against it for forcibly annexing Crimea and Moscow’s support for separatists in eastern Ukraine.
Reuters quotes financial market sources as saying that Russia sold $1.75 billion of the 10-year Eurobonds at a yield of 4.75 percent.
The sources said $1.3 billion of those sales involved foreign investors from Europe, the United States, and Asia.
Russia launched the Eurobond offering on May 23 and extended the sales by a day in the hope of attracting Asian investors.
Some Western banks said they were not taking part amid concerns about the sanctions risk.
Based on reporting by Reuters, AP, AFP, and TASS
Here's a Ukraine-related item from RFE/RL's Brussels correspondent Rikard Jozwiak:
NATO General Says Eastern Buildup Is Response To Russian 'Aggression'
WATCH: Top NATO General Says Russia Sees 'Compromise As Weakness'
The chairman of NATO's Military Committee, General Petr Pavel, told RFE/RL on May 24 that the alliance's planned buildup on its eastern flank is a direct response to Russian military actions in Georgia, Ukraine, and Syria.
Pavel, a Czech general, told RFE/RL that "if there were no increases in Russian assertiveness demonstrated in actions in Georgia, in Ukraine, in Crimea, and in Syria, there would not have to be a reaction from the NATO side."
He said NATO, and especially the alliance's easternmost member states, "feel threatened by Russian assertiveness, Russian aggression, in several areas."
Pavel said countries that directly border Russia "wanted to be more assured about the NATO presence and NATO willingness and preparedness to act."
NATO's Military Committee is the senior military authority in the alliance and the primary source of military advice to NATO's civilian decision-making bodies.
It's safe to say a lot of people have been wondering about this:
A tweet linking to an intriguing article by Timothy Snyder from the New York Review of Books:
Some good news for a city in western Ukraine:
Seven Ukrainian Soldiers Reported Killed In Eastern Conflict
Ukraine says seven of its servicemen have been killed and nine others wounded in the country’s east over the past 24 hours.
National Security Council head Oleksandr Turchynov said on May 24 that it is the largest number of casualties in the region in a single day so far this year.
The announcement came as the leaders of Russia, France, Germany, and Ukraine spoke by telephone on May 24 about ways to settle the conflict.
Fighting between Ukrainian government forces and Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine has killed more than 9,300 people since April 2014.
A February 2015 agreement brokered by France and Germany has helped reduce the violence, but sporadic clashes have continued.