Reportedly a refund deal on the Mistrals:
A top Kremlin aide says Russia and France have reached an agreement on reimbursement for two Mistral warships that Russia purchased but will not receive.
The delivery of the Mistral-class helicopter carriers was suspended in response to Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea and its support for pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine.
Vladimir Kozhin, an adviser to President Vladimir Putin, confirmed that a refund deal was reached but would not reveal the figure. He said the amount will be announced when the contract is cancelled.
The $1.3 billion contract that was signed in 2011 was meant to be the biggest arms sale ever to Russia by a NATO country.
Russia’s Kommersant newspaper reported earlier this week that France had offered to terminate the contract and pay back about $794 million provided France can re-export the warships.
The first ship was due for delivery in 2014 and the second was to be delivered in 2015.
Trump on Putin:
From our news desk:
Ukraine's Constitutional Court has ruled that draft constitutional amendments that would decentralize power do not violate the country's constitution.
The Deputy Chairman of the Constitutional Court, Vasyl Bryntsev, said on July 31 that the draft law on constitutional amendments "conforms with the requirements of Articles 157 and 158 of the Ukrainian Constitution" and are "not directed against the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine."
Bryntsev also said "the peculiarities of the local self-government in some areas of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions will be defined by a separate law."
On July 16, Ukrainian lawmakers voted to send President Petro Poroshenko’s proposed constitutional amendments to the Constitutional Court for review.
According to the draft amendments, "a special law will regulate peculiarities of local self-government” in the districts which are being held by Russian-backed separatists in Donetsk and Luhansk regions in eastern Ukraine.
Poroshenko submitted the bill to parliament on July 15 after pressure from Western leaders to grant thsoe areas some self-rule powers as promised in February's cease-fire deal that was agreed in Minsk.
The separatists insist that special status of the districts they control should be mentioned in the constitution.
A cartoon from our Ukrainian Service:
Here's the latest map of the military situation in the Donbas region -- issued by the Ukrainian Defense Ministry (click image to enlarge):
