Here is today's map of the latest situation in the Donbas conflict zone according to the Ukrainian Defense Ministry. (CLICK TO ENLARGE.)
Russia challenges arbitration ruling in favor of Ukraine's Oschadbank:
By RFE/RL
Russia is appealing an international arbitration court's ruling that has awarded Ukrainian state-owned Oschadbank $1.3 billion in damages for assets it lost after Moscow annexed Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in 2014, Russian media report.
Interfax news agency quoted a statement by Russia's Justice Ministry as saying on August 22 it had filed the appeal with the Paris-based International Court of Arbitration earlier this week.
It argued that the court's decision in the first instance was based on an agreement between Russia and Ukraine to mutually protect each other's investments made after January 1, 1992.
The statement said the deal should not apply to Oschadbank's Crimean branch, which it said "existed since the Soviet times and was part of Oschadbank even before 1992."
After the initial ruling in November 2018, Moscow stated that the Paris arbitration court had no jurisdiction over the case and refused to recognize it.
Russia has faced a number of lawsuits brought on by Ukrainian billionaires and companies for their lost Crimean assets.
Moscow seized control of Crimea in March 2014 after sending in troops and staging a referendum dismissed as illegal by at least 100 countries. Russia is also backing separatists in a war in eastern Ukraine that has killed more than 13,000 people since April 2014.
Naftogaz Group, Ukraine's state-run oil and gas conglomerate, on July 31 filed a lawsuit for $5.2 billion in damages over assets that Russia seized on the Black Sea peninsula.
The Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague will hear the case and Naftogaz said in a statement that it expected a ruling "no sooner than the end of 2020." (w/Interfax)
Head of president's office sues RFE/RL for libel:
By RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service
KYIV -- The head of Ukraine's presidential office is suing an investigative journalism program of RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service for libel, the government says.
A news release on the government's judicial web portal says the lawsuit was filed on August 20 in a Kyiv court to defend Andriy Bohdan's "honor, dignity, and business reputation."
It names Ukraine's state-run public broadcaster UA:PBC and three members of Skhemy (Schemes) as co-defendants: chief editor Natalka Sedletska, and journalists Maksym Savchuk and Valeria Yehoshyna.
Skhemy is a joint project by RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service and the UA:Pershy television channel, which belongs to UA:PBC.
There is no information on the essence of the claims, but the plaintiff is seeking to "refute false information," according to the judicial web portal.
"At present, neither journalists nor the Radio Liberty editorial office have received the text of the lawsuit," said Inna Kuznetsova, chief editor of RFE/RL's Kyiv bureau. "Once it arrives, we will analyze it with lawyers and voice our position on Andriy Bohdan's claims."
A preliminary hearing in the case is scheduled for September 19 at Kyiv's Shevchenko district court.
Bohdan was formerly billionaire Ihor Kolomoyskiy's personal lawyer.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is linked to Kolomoyskiy through the oligarch's ownership of Ukrainian TV station 1+1, which hosts the former comic and actor's comedy programs and hit sitcom, Servant Of The People, as well as through advisers and other resources.
Bohdan has been the subject of Skhemy investigations in the past.
In April, the program reported that before his appointment as head of the presidential office, Bohdan had secretly visited the Constitutional Court the previous month, according to the court's visitor logbook.
At that time, there was legal debate whether Bohdan could head the presidential office because he was a senior official in former President Viktor Yanukovych's administration. A lustration law in effect bars senior Yanukovych-era officials from posts in future Ukrainian governments.
Another Skhemy investigation found that Bohdan and Zelenskiy flew at least five times together starting in January from Kyiv to Tel Aviv, where Kolomoyskiy was residing at that time in self-imposed exile.