LGBT activists were attacked in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv on May 17 at a rally to mark the International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia. (RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service)
No video link with Yanukovych as treason trial resumes in Kyiv:
By RFE/RL
KYIV -- A Ukrainian court has resumed hearings in the treason trial of ex-President Viktor Yanukovych, but an expected video link with the fugitive former leader failed to materialize.
At the start of the May 18 preliminary hearing in the Obolon ditsrict court in Kyiv, Yanukovych's lawyer Vitaliy Serdyuk asked Judge Vladyslav Devyatko to provide details on how a video link could be established.
After a break, Devyatko said that the court had never intended to set up a video link for the preliminary stage of the trial.
Yanukovych abandoned office in late February 2014 and fled to Russia in the face of protests triggered by his decision to scrap plans for a landmark deal with the European Union and improve trade ties with Moscow instead.
Dozens of people were killed when his government attempted to clamp down on the Euromaidan demonstrations.
Yanukovych is accused of treason, violating Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity, and abetting Russian aggression, and is being tried in absentia.
After he fled, Russia seized Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula and fomented separatism in eastern Ukraine, where war between the government and Russia-backed forces has killed more than 9,900 people.
In another development at the May 18 hearing, the judge agreed to register a defense claim that a statement by Prosecutor-General Yuriy Lutsenko ahead of the initial May 4 hearing influenced preparations for the trial. (w/RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service)
Assailants Attack Ukrainian LGBT Activists, Police In Kharkiv, Burn Rainbow Flag
By RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service
Assailants attacked gay and transgender rights activists and torched a rainbow flag at a small rally in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv.
Law enforcement officials said on May 18 that two police officers were hospitalized after police tried to disperse a group of about 30 assailants in the center of the eastern city.
Video footage from the May 17 violence showed young men dressed in black attacking activists and fighting with police officers, one of whom holds his hand to his bloodied head and says he was hit with a rock or a brick.
At one point, an assailant uses a cigarette lighter to torch a rainbow flag -- a symbol of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) rights -- and holds it as it burns.
Kharkiv police said on Facebook that four of the assailants were detained and could be charged with violence against law enforcement authorities.
They could face five years in prison if tried and convicted.
Organizers of the rally said they were attempting to draw attention to homophobia in society.
Several gay-pride parades have been banned in Ukraine in recent years, but authorities have sought to display more tolerance by permitting various LGBT events to take place and providing better protection.
The violence in Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-biggest city, came after Kyiv hosted the Eurovision Song Contest on May 9-13 -- an event whose slogan this year was "Celebrate Diversity."
Tanya Cooper, a Kyiv-based Ukraine researcher for Human Rights Watch (HRW), told RFE/RL ahead of the pop competition that the slogan "sounds hollow in a country where LGBT people still do not enjoy equal protection under law and in employment."