Ukraine Calls On Russia To Release Detained Fishermen
By RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service
The head of Ukraine’s border guard service, Serhiy Deyneko, says Russia should release four Ukrainian fishermen it detained for allegedly fishing illegally once their 10-day civil arrest term expires in occupied Crimea.
“We know all the citizens who were detained. The fishermen are being held in a detention facility in Kerch,” Deyneko told Interfax news agency on February 17.
He added there is no evidence so far that the Ukrainians were illegally fishing in the Sea of Azov.
"At the moment, we do not have information that clearly indicates that citizens detained by the Russian side were fishing illegally, so we can only evaluate the information we have available and to which we have access,” Deyneko said.
He said the Foreign Ministry and law enforcement agencies are cooperating and doing their “utmost to bring our citizens back to Ukraine as soon as possible.”
Ukraine's Foreign Ministry on February 17 summoned the Russian charge d'affaires and protested the fishermens' detention.
"We demand that the Russian side steadily adhere to the international and legal obligations and treaties which it is party to and immediately provide exhaustive information about the circumstances of the detention of the Ukrainian fishing vessel and its four crew members," the Foreign Ministry said on its website.
During the meeting, the Russian side was "presented with the demand to immediately release the Ukrainian fishermen and fishing vessel and return all fishing equipment."
On February 16, a Russian-administered court in Kerch on the Ukrainian peninsula ruled to arrest the four Ukrainian fishermen, who were detained along with their boat the previous day near the Crimean coast.
Deyneko said their boat was about 50 kilometers from the coast of Crimea.
Pavlo Melnyk, a Ukrainian lawmaker from the ruling Servant of the People party, named the fishermen as Serhiy Hoha, Oleksiy Ivanov, Vasyl Tyurkedzhi, and Maksym Tyeryekhov.
They all hail from the southeastern region of Zaporizhzhya.
The border guard force of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) said it apprehended the fishermen on February 15 and accused them of “violating rules of catching aquatic biological resources.”
The FSB also said the boat’s captain had admitted guilt during questioning.
The fishermen didn’t have documents on their person and the catch on board the vessel was illegal, said Larisa Opanasyuk, the human rights ombudswoman on the Russian-occupied peninsula.
A 2003 Russia-Ukraine treaty stipulates unimpeded access to the Kerch Strait and Sea of Azov, including the sharing of its aquatic resources.
On November 25, 2018, Russian border guards attacked, intercepted, and seized three Ukrainian Navy boats off Crimea, taking 24 crew members prisoner.
The sailors were freed as part of a prisoner exchange in September.
Russia invaded Crimea in early 2014 and has controlled the peninsula ever since, triggering Western sanctions that are still in place.
With reporting by Interfax
Ukraine Says It Disrupted Bot Network Supported By Russian Online Services
By RFE/RL
Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) on February 17 said it had disrupted a network of “bot farms” and seized computer and telecommunications equipment that were supported by Russian online services in five Ukrainian cities.
Telecommunication platforms were used to create and promote 8,000 fake social-media accounts and groups that were used to spread “fake information about the situation in Ukraine, incite protests, scare the public, send notices of bomb threats at critical infrastructure sites,” and troll the accounts of high-ranking officials, the SBU reported on its website on February 17.
The operation took place in the capital, Kyiv, and in Kharkiv, Dnipro, Dubno, and Irpin.
Firearms, explosive devices, and narcotics were also distributed using the social-media accounts.
These accounts were registered on the Internet through Russian online services that provided virtual mobile-number services.
Some of the equipment was used to illegally reroute mobile-phone traffic from two “illegally created” mobile carriers that operate in territories that Russia-backed forces control in the eastern part of the country, the SBU said.
While conducting searches in the five cities, the SBU found computer equipment, GSM modems, computer network gateways, and more than 22,000 SIM cards from Ukrainian mobile carriers.
The involvement of Russian special services and intelligence bodies in the bot farms is being checked, the SBU said.
Kyiv Airport Monument Unveiled In Memory Of Victims Of Iran Plane Shoot-Down
By the Crimea Desk of RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service
KYIV -- Ukrainian officials have unveiled a monument at Kyiv's international airport to commemorate the victims of a Ukrainian airliner that was shot down by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps in Tehran last month.
The Ukraine International Airlines (UIA) Boeing 737-800 was shot down on January 8 just hours after Iran had launched a missile attack on U.S. forces in Iraq in response to the January 3 assassination of the IRGC's Quds Force commander, Major General Qasem Soleimani, by a U.S. drone strike in Baghdad.
All 176 people aboard the civilian airliner were killed.
Tehran initially claimed the plane had crashed, but the IRGC admitted three days after the tragedy that Flight PS752 had been shot down "unintentionally" by the country’s air defenses.
A memorial stone with the inscription “PS 752, 08.01.2020” was unveiled on February 17 at Boryspil International Airport outside the Ukrainian capital.
The ceremony was attended by relatives of the victims, as well as by Ukraine's Foreign Minister Vadym Prystayko, the secretary of the Ukrainian Security Service, Oleksiy Danilov, and UIA President Yevhen Dyhne.
Representatives of other countries which lost their citizens in the crash -- Afghanistan, Britain, Canada, Germany, Iran, and Sweden -- were also present.
Addressing reporters, Prystayko said the investigation into the crash was still under way.
"The Prosecutor-General's Office addressed the Iranian side with a request to create a joint investigation group which will result in punishing all those guilty -- not only the person who pressed the button," he said.
Prystayko said several options are being looked at concerning the flight data recorders, which Iran has so far refused to hand over.
International agreements stipulate that Iran --without delay and in the shortest time period -- release the flight recorders for analysis, he added.
“We believe, and all five countries believe, this term has expired,” Prystayko said. “We need to move as fast as possible.”
France, he noted, has the technical capability to read the devices.
In an interview with NBC, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif admitted that Iran cannot analyze the flight recorder data alone.
That's all for the live blog today. See you tomorrow.
A monument to victims of Ukraine International Airlines flight PS752, which was shot down over Iran, was unveiled at Kyiv's Boryspil airport.
A rocket jointly developed by U.S. and Ukrainian specialists carrying nearly four tons of supplies, hardware, and science payloads is scheduled to arrive at the ISS tomorrow.
Here is today's map of the latest situation in the Donbas conflict zone according to the Ukrainian Defense Ministry. (CLICK TO ENLARGE.)
