An excerpt:
Most photojournalists covering the pro-Russian separatists in Eastern Ukraine work in the Donetsk area, where a small industry of fixers and drivers has developed. Images of the same people in similar scenes are frequently the result.
The Belgian photographer Thomas de Wouters took a less-traveled route last April, traveling through multiple checkpoints on damaged roads to Luhansk — a forlorn city that now bears scars of the continuing war.
Many of its buildings were destroyed, and the streets often empty of residents. Every day, Mr. de Wouters, 45, heard bombs exploding near the villages north of the city, but none of its inhabitants seemed to notice.
From Newsweek magazine:
Petro Poroshenko: Why Ukraine Needs to Give Power to Its Regions
Ukraine's parliamentary vote on August 31 in favor of the law on amendments to the constitution on decentralization of powers showed the world that our country has many responsible politicians with a strategic and democratic vision.
However, the events outside Parliament that followed the vote were supremely painful – three servicemen fell victims to a failed attempt to destabilize the state. I feel truly disgusted that someone could use the deepest sorrows of my fellow citizens to their political advantage. And I will personally make sure that anyone involved directly in the events near the Ukrainian parliament as well as those who orchestrated their actions will be brought to justice.
For more than twenty years decentralization has been discussed in Ukraine, although no government before dared to take real action on this topic. Decentralization of powers in Ukraine is crucial for building a European state, full stop. I said it in my inauguration speech, I say it now.
The existing model of governance is excessively centralized, and has nothing to do with democracy. It is a Soviet atavism that has largely contributed to endemic corruption and widespread economic and political mismanagement in Ukraine. We are now doing what should have been done a long time ago.
An excerpt:
Experts from the left and right alike warn that cooperation with Russia on Syria can have potentially disastrous consequences for the U.S., but too many Americans still don’t understand how closely linked these two headline conflicts are, and American policy has yet to confront the reality that Syria and Ukraine are part of the same mission for Russia—the destruction of the post-WWII architecture of the West. To achieve this goal, Russia has pursued a clear policy of disruption, chaos and destabilization --in Ukraine and in the Middle East -- in order to force the West to have to partner with Russia to “resolve” the crises it has created.
Here is today's map of the security situation in eastern Ukraine, according to the National Security and Defense Council (CLICK TO ENLARGE):
