The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has extended Russia’s deadline to December 31 to provide an official explanation on claims that deal with Crimea’s annexation in 2014 and ongoing aggression in Donbas, according to a government delegate to the ECHR, Borys Babin, in an interview with the Ukrainian News agency.
"We think that it may not be Russia's last request to postpone this matter, because they have a sole and very simple interest -- Russia will try to drag these cases out for as long as it can. Because they know they can't win," Babin said.
He said that as of July, the ECHR had received more than 500 individual claims.
"The majority of these cases are related to the events in Donbas, the minority, in Crimea. Most of the cases are filed against two countries simultaneously, Russia and Ukraine," Babin said.
He explained that cases are filed against Ukraine too, due to its reluctance to help its citizens in filing complaints to the ECHR.
Babin said he didn't know when the ECHR will eventually make decisions.
"As for individual cases, the terms are reasonable -- two-three years, five years maximum, meaning, not decades," he said.
The Donetsk, Russia, court where Nadia Savchenko is being tried has refused her request to be questioned using a "lie detector."
"I want to testify using a polygraph. The investigation is probably afraid that the case would fall apart when a polygraph shows that I am not lying," Savchenko said in court.
The judge, however, stated that interrogation with a polygraph specialist is not statutory.
The Ukrainian pilot, who is now jailed in Russia, is facing 25 years in prison for alleged participation in the killing of two Russian journalists in Donbas last year.
Today Savchenko is being questioned in court as part of the proceedings.
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Ukraine's state-run railway company has suspended cooperation with a cargo branch of Russian Railways as part of a wave of sanctions against Russia over its support for separatists in the country’s east.
Ukrzaliznytsya said on September 29 that it "is not handling cargo and (rail) cars operated by Russia's freight railway operator Freight One or its daughter company."
On September 25, Ukraine banned Russian airlines, including Aeroflot, from flying to Ukraine from October 25, prompting Russia to impose similar restrictions on Ukrainian airlines flying in Russian airspace.
Kyiv-Moscow relations are extremely poor due to Russia's annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in March last year and support for pro-Russian separatists in the ongoing crisis in Ukraine's eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk.
Earlier this month, Kyiv expanded a list of sanctions against Russian companies and individuals, targeting 400 officials and 90 firms.