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A Ukrainian serviceman stands guard in the city of Schastye in the Luhansk region late last month.
A Ukrainian serviceman stands guard in the city of Schastye in the Luhansk region late last month.

Live Blog: Ukraine In Crisis (Archive)

Final News Summary For September 1, 2017

-- EDITOR'S NOTE: We have started a new Ukraine Live Blog as of September 2, 2017. Find it here.

-- Ukraine says it will introduce new border-crossing rules from next year, affecting citizens of “countries that pose risks for Ukraine.”

-- The Association Agreement strengthening ties between Ukraine and the European Union entered into force on September 1, marking an end to four years of political drama surrounding the accord.

-- The trial of Crimean journalist Mykola Semena will resume later this month after the first hearing in weeks produced little progress toward a resolution of the politically charged case.

*NOTE: Times are stated according to local time in Kyiv (GMT +3)

13:41 27.11.2016

13:46 27.11.2016

13:48 27.11.2016

Here's a live stream of the Mikheil Saakashvili rally in Kyiv today (natural sound):

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RFE/RL's Christopher Miller has sent us some details of Saakashvili's rally in Kyiv today:

Saakashvili Holds Rally In Support Of New Political Movement In Ukraine

Former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili addresses a crowd in Kyiv on November 27 at a rally in support of his new political movement in Ukraine.
Former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili addresses a crowd in Kyiv on November 27 at a rally in support of his new political movement in Ukraine.

KYIV -- A diverse crowd of about 1,000 people turned out in central Kyiv for a rally in support of a new political movement headed by Mikheil Saakashvili, the reformist former Georgian president who has launched a second political career in Ukraine.

Saakashvili launched the New Forces movement and called for early parliamentary elections, days after he quit his job of governor of the Odesa region on November 7 and accused President Petro Poroshenko of coddling a corrupt elite.

Poroshenko had brought Saakashvili in to govern Odesa as part of an effort to conduct reforms in Ukraine, where entrenched graft and a costly conflict with Russia-backed separatists who hold part of the eastern Donbas region is hobbling progress following the pro-European protests that pushed Moscow-friendly President Viktor Yanukovych from power in 2014.

The rally on November 27 brought a mix of young and older people, many waving Ukrainian flags and some holding flags of the European Union -- one of the symbols of the Euromaidan protests.

Saakashvili repeated his call for early elections and promised, ""We will win, we will return Ukraine's wealth to its people and will recover its potential."

He told supporters he knows how to "make Ukraine great...and we will do it together."

Saakashvili vaulted to power in Georgia's peaceful 2003 Rose Revolution and led the country for almost a decade, but his party was defeated by an opposition coalition in 2012 parliamentary vote.

He is now sought in Georgia on criminal charges related to his 2004-2013 presidency that he says are politically motivated.

With reporting by Christopher Miller in Kyiv
17:44 27.11.2016

Am item on the controversial Ukrainian oligarch Dmytro Firtash:

17:48 27.11.2016

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