Maidan Community Sector, Lviv: Dear friends!
December 11 – Ukraine’s Justice Minister Pavlo Petrenko, MP representing “People’s Front” Leonid Yemets, MP representing “Samopomich” Yegor Sobolev and lawyer Tetyana Kozachenko who is also a member of the workgroup on screening corrupt officials, have urgently left for a meeting of the Venice Commission in order to defend Ukrainian law on screening corrupt officials.
December 11 – 40 KAMAZ heavy duty trucks filled with ammunition and 2 carrying terrorists have entered Ukraine from Russia on Thursday, – stated the representative of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Oleksandr Razmaznin.
December 11 – Denis Pushylin – one of the leaders of the militants – has said that they have started the withdrawal of heavy artillery in the conflict zone. It has been reported that ceasefire was declared in Donbas on Tuesday. It was previously planned that another meeting of the tripartite contact group could be held in Minsk on this day, however it was postponed indefinitely.
December 11 – 3 Ukrainian soldiers were killed and 8 injured during the last 24 hours, – informed NSDC spokesman Andriy Lysenko.
December 11 – Economic situation in Ukraine is very challenging, but the country is not facing a default, – said Ukraine’s Finance Minister Natalia Jaresko – “We are not facing a default and it is not even a pre-default state, which we are currently experiencing.”
December 11 – On Wednesday during combat in eastern Ukraine a Russian military intelligence unit was destroyed, – stated the representative of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Oleksandr Razmaznin.
December 11 – Chairman of Verkhovna Rada Volodymyr Groisman is convinced that the Parliament will support the abolition of non-aligned status of Ukraine next week.
December 11 – Pro-Russian terrorists stated that a four-party meeting for a peaceful resolution of the situation in the Donbas, will not be held in Minsk on Friday – one of terrorist leaders Denis Pushylin.
December 11 – Russia’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich has said that Russia will not withdraw its troops from Ukraine, because they are supposedly not there anyway and that they will not close down Ukrainian-Russian border, which is controlled by the militants.
December 11 – The possibility that Russia will try to create a corridor from Donbas to Crimea is becoming more likely. This was stated by the Polish Eurodeputy Jatsek Sariush-Volskyj in an interview for Polish radio. Also, according to him, it is also possible that the RF will try to “cut off” Ukraine from the Black Sea and create a corridor to Prydnistrovia, but this is less likely.
“During its time, research of specialists pointed out that the likelihood of the Crimea-Prydnistrovia
Corridor was 30%, whereas the Crimea-Donbas Corridor possibility was considered as 50%,” he noted. “I think that with the flow of time and real facts – the gathering of Russian armies on the territory of Ukraine, the movement of the Black Sea Flotilla, the mobilization of Russian armies in Crimea, the likelihood of this increases,” commented Sariush-Volskyj. “I hesitate to express the risk in percentages, but the logic of the facts says that this will be the next step – perhaps, not inevitable, but very likely. Very. The RF is denying this but this is the traditional strategy of Moscow – to do one thing, but to speak something else,” emphasized the Eurodeputy.
He believes that such actions would “make sense” in view of the problems RF has with purchasing gas and food products for Crimea. “In such a manner the problems with delivery in Crimea demand a transit route. There exist automobile and railroad, but during a time of war, one can only consider a scenario either of a total exit of Russia from Crimea, which is hardly likely, or a military occupation of the corridor, noted Sariush-Volskyj. According to the Europarliamentarian, he is very pessimistic about the possibilities of Ukraine defending itself. “Russia has such a military advantage that Ukraine will not be able to defend itself,” he stated.
Mykola Riabchuk
Mykola Riabchuk
SEEKING FOR PEACE, MAKING A WAR: FIRST MONTHS OF PETRO POROSHENKO’S PRESIDENCY
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