Foreigners in Ukraine’s army
KYIV – Lawmakers in Kyiv have legalized the service of foreigners in the Ukrainian armed forces. The draft law was approved in its second reading by the Verkhovna Rada on October 6. Lawmakers had earlier approved in first reading a draft law that simplifies the process for foreigners serving in the Ukrainian army to receive citizenship. The second draft law must be voted on again before being sent to President Petro Poroshenko for his signature, which is necessary to become law. According to the bill, foreign nationals who serve or have served in Ukraine’s army will be eligible to obtain citizenship after living in the country for three years, instead of the current five years. The bill also says foreign nationals who were decorated with a Ukrainian national medal for outstanding actions during their military service can become citizens without being required to speak fluent Ukrainian, provide documents confirming they can support themselves, or have residence permits. Many volunteers from other countries have joined Ukrainian armed forces and volunteer brigades in the wake of the military conflict between Ukraine and Russia-backed separatists in the east that began last year and has left at least 8,900 people dead. (RFE/RL)
Obama sends radars to Ukraine
NEW YORK – “A day after U.S. President Barack Obama met with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the United States announced that it will ship long-range counter-battery radars to Ukraine. Obama authorized $20 million to provide the country with radars, bringing U.S. security assistance to Ukraine up to $265 million. Obama’s message is clear: the United States will not sacrifice Ukraine in exchange for Russian cooperation against Islamic State in Syria,” Adrian Karatnycky wrote on the Atlantic Council’s “New Atlanticist” blog. “The announcement also shows that the United States views the current ceasefire in eastern Ukraine – in place since September 1 – as an opportunity to help Ukraine upgrade its deterrent military capability. While Ukraine’s request for 1,240 Javelin anti-tank missiles has gone unmet, Washington’s willingness to move forward with radars sends a clear signal that the U.S. may consider sending lethal weapons should the Minsk II process fail,” Mr. Karatnycky commented. “In short, the Obama administration now accepts that deterrence is the best way to maintain the stalemate in eastern Ukraine.” Mr. Karatnycky is a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Dinu Patriciu Eurasia Center and Managing Partner of Myrmidon Group LLC, a New York-based consultancy that works with investors and corporations in Ukraine and Eastern Europe. (Atlantic Council)
Rebels agree to postpone elections
DONETSK – Pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine say they have decided to postpone disputed local elections in territory they control until next year. Denis Pushilin and Vladislav Deinego, the representatives of the self-proclaimed “people’s republics” in parts of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk regions, said in a joint statement that local elections scheduled for October 18 and November 1 would be postponed until next year. The statement, published on the rebels’ Donetsk News Agency website, said the separatists decided to delay holding the elections after studying the results of the Paris summit on October 2 involving the leaders of Germany, France, Russia and Ukraine. Messrs. Pushilin and Deinego, who represent the rebels in talks moderated by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), said they would not hold the elections as scheduled as long as Ukraine fully implemented the “political points” of the Minsk peace deal that was signed in February. Ukrainian officials and several Western governments had condemned the rebel plans to hold the elections and said the balloting would be a gross violation of the Minsk protocol. The EU’s foreign affairs arm welcomed the decision to postpone the elections, saying that, if implemented, it “will represent a fundamental step towards full implementation of the Minsk agreements.” The United States also applauded the decision. ”People living in separatist-controlled areas deserve to pick their local officials in elections that meet international standards, are compliant with Ukrainian law and monitored by the OSCE,” U.S. State Department spokesman Mark Toner said in Washington. Ukrainian officials said on October 5 that French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel had put strong pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin to get the rebels to delay the elections. The rebels did not say when exactly their polls will take place now. They said, however, that their elections will be held only after Kyiv grants the territories they control “special status” within Ukraine that would give them the right to develop closer ties with Russia. The statement also sought full amnesty for everyone who has taken part in the conflict. The rebels also demanded a new vote in the Ukrainian Parliament on constitutional amendments regarding elections that would first be agreed with the rebels themselves. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the rebels’ decision “one more example of a flexible and constructive approach in the interests of the implementation of the Minsk agreements.” (RFE/RL, with reporting by Agence France-Presse, UNIAN, Interfax, TASS and RIA Novosti)
Smaller-caliber weapons being withdrawn
KYYIV – Ukrainian government forces and Russian-backed separatists have started withdrawing small-caliber weapons from the front line. Military spokesman Ruslan Tkachuk said the “synchronized withdrawal from the frontline” began on October 5 in the eastern Luhansk region, involving tanks, antitank cannons, and mortars. The rebels in Luhansk confirmed that the weapons were being withdrawn. The separatist forces in the Donetsk region are also scheduled to withdraw weapons from the frontline. Arms with a caliber of less than 100 millimeters are to be pulled back a distance of 15 kilometers within 41 days. A spokesman for international monitors in the area, Michael Bociurkiw of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), told the BBC there was “encouraging” movement of heavy weapons. The pullback is part of the ceasefire agreement signed in Minsk in February. (RFE/RL, based on reporting by the BBC, TASS, and Interfax)
Russia plans base near Ukraine border
MOSCOW – Russia is reportedly planning a second major military base near the Ukrainian border. Citing public documents, the Reuters news agency reported on September 23 that the Defense Ministry intends to turn an old military depot in the town of Boguchar, 45 kilometers from the border with Ukraine, into a base. The new base in Voronezh Oblast is to house dozens of buildings and special facilities for more than 5,000 troops and 1,300 armored vehicles. The agency said the ministry planned to transfer a motorized rifle brigade to Boguchar along with troops trained in how to respond to nuclear, biological, and chemical attacks. Early that month, Reuters reported that Moscow had started building a major military base near the town of Valuiki, in Belgorod Oblast, close to the Ukrainian border. (RFE/RL, based on reporting by Reuters)
Russia to ban Ukrainian air traffic
MOSCOW – Russia is closing its airspace to Ukrainian airlines starting on October 25 in reprisal for a ban that Ukraine imposed last week on Russian carriers. The Russian transport agency said on September 28 that it is imposing the ban on instructions from Russian Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev. The measure is in response to a decision by Ukrainian authorities on September 25 to ban Aeroflot, Transaero and other Russian air companies from flying into Ukraine, also starting on October 25. Kyiv, whose ban is aimed at punishing Russia for its annexation of Crimea and its support for Ukrainian separatists in the east, is also barring Russian transit flights if the aircraft carries military personnel or dual-use goods. Moscow branded Kyiv’s move at the time as an “act of madness.” Also in September, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko expanded a list of sanctions against Russian companies and individuals, targeting 400 officials and 90 companies. (RFE/RL, based on reporting by the Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and TASS)
Ukraine sanctions cargo operator
KYIV – Ukraine’s state-run railway company has suspended cooperation with a cargo branch of Russian Railways as part of a wave of sanctions against Russia over its support for separatists in the country’s east. Ukrzaliznytsya said on September 29 that it “is not handling cargo and [rail] cars operated by Russia’s freight railway operator Freight One or its daughter company.” On September 25, Ukraine banned Russian airlines, including Aeroflot, from flying to Ukraine from October 25, prompting Russia to impose similar restrictions on Ukrainian airlines flying in Russian airspace. Earlier in September, Kyiv expanded a list of sanctions against Russian companies and individuals, targeting 400 officials and 90 firms. (RFE/RL, based on reporting by Reuters and Interfax)
U.S. official visits border guards
KYIV – Kenneth Myers, director of the U.S. Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), visited the Ukrainian State Border Guard Service (SBGS) in Kyiv on September 23 to oversee the transfer of 8 hydraulic telescopic excavators worth $1.9 million and to inspect other equipment that DTRA has transferred to the border guards. The excavators will be used to build defensive security earthworks on Ukraine’s borders. Since April 2014, DTRA has provided nearly $40 million worth of operations equipment and training to help the Border Guard Service respond quickly to emerging border threats and to secure Ukraine’s borders, including in areas where little or no border security or infrastructure previously existed. This has been critical in the face of Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea and its ongoing destabilizing activities in eastern Ukraine. The equipment DTRA has given to the SBGS has also allowed it to respond to WMD (weapons of mass destruction) threats in eastern Ukraine, as well as incidents of trafficking of chemical and explosive materials at the Crimean Administrative Boundary. (U.S. Embassy Kyiv)
Fitch: Ukraine in partial default
LONDON – The Fitch ratings agency has declared Ukraine in partial default and downgraded the cash-strapped country after it failed to make payment on bonds it has been trying to renegotiate with creditors. Fitch declared the partial default on $500 million in Eurobond obligations on October 6 after Ukraine did not make payment following a grace period. It then downgraded the country’s main credit rating to “restricted default.” Ukraine has been struggling with its debts since entering a deep economic recession after war broke out with pro-Russian insurgents in its eastern industrial heartland early last year. Ukraine struck a deal in August to restructure much of its debt, but a small group of private lenders torpedoed the agreement, leading Kyiv to launch an exchange offer. Fitch said the “distressed debt exchange” for $18 billion in Eurobonds is designed to avoid default and will harm creditors. Rival ratings agency Standard & Poor’s similarly declared Ukraine in selective default last month, saying Kyiv’s offer to creditors would include a 20 percent “haircut” in the money they are owed. Fitch said it expects the debt exchange to be successful and it will upgrade Ukraine’s credit rating shortly afterward. (RFE/RL, based on reporting by Agence France-Presse and International Business Times)
Soldiers wounded in Ukraine’s east
KYIV – Kyiv says Russian-backed separatists have “cynically” violated a ceasefire in eastern Ukraine by firing an anti-tank missile. The Ukrainian military said the October 7 attack wounded four soldiers. The attack undermines earlier comments by President Petro Poroshenko, who said a “real truce” had begun in the country’s east, but warned that peace was still a long way off. Addressing students undergoing military training in Kyiv, Mr. Poroshenko said the end of war will come “when the last piece of the Ukrainian land is liberated from the enemy, the occupant, the invader,” he said. A ceasefire agreed in Minsk in February was often broken, but has been widely upheld in the past month. The conflict between Ukrainian government forces and rebels has killed more than 7,900 people since April 2014. (RFE/RL, based on reporting by Agence France-Presse, Reuters, Interfax and TASS)
Chornobyl teems with wildlife
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – Some 30 years after the world’s worst nuclear accident, Chornobyl has evolved from a disaster zone into a nature reserve teeming with elk, deer and wolves, a scientific study has found. The remarkable turnaround in the area, which was declared off-limits for people after the accident in 1986, suggests radiation contamination is not hindering wildlife from breeding and thriving. The study, which was published October 5 in the Current Biology journal, also shows how wild mammals are drawn to areas left untouched by humans despite such contamination. “When humans are removed, nature flourishes – even in the wake of the world’s worst nuclear accident,” said Jim Smith, a specialist in earth and environmental sciences at Britain’s University of Portsmouth. “This doesn’t mean radiation is good for wildlife, just that the effects of human habitation, including hunting, farming, and forestry, are a lot worse,” he said. “It’s very likely that wildlife numbers at Chornobyl are now much higher than they were before the accident.” Dr. Smith and co-researchers took the opportunity to see what happens to wildlife in an area where contamination is heavy but people are largely absent. Earlier studies in the 4,200-square-kilometer Chornobyl Exclusion Zone showed major radiation effects and pronounced reductions in wildlife populations. But new evidence, based on long-term census data, shows that mammal populations have bounced back. The study found a relative abundance of elk, roe deer, red deer, and wild boar – with population rates similar to those found in four designated, uncontaminated nature reserves in the region. The number of wolves living in and around the Chornobyl site is more than seven times greater than can be found in comparable nature reserves. And helicopter survey data also reveals rising trends in the abundance of elk, roe deer and wild boar from one to 10 years after the accident. The findings “illustrate the resilience of wildlife populations when freed from the pressures of human habitation,” said Jim Beasley of the University of Georgia in the United States, who co-led the work. (RFE/RL, with reporting by Reuters and Agence France-Presse)