Ukraine: 836 new cases of COVID-19
The total number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Ukraine reached 55,607 as of July 15, including 836 new cases that were reported over the course of the past day, according to data provided by the coronavirus spread monitoring system of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine. The city of Kyiv confirmed 147 new cases of COVID-19 during the past 24 hours, which is the highest single-day increase in coronavirus cases in the city since the beginning of the pandemic, according to Mayor Vitali Klitschko. (Ukrinform)
Ukrainian soldiers killed in Donbas
Russian occupation forces fired at Ukrainian positions in the Donbas on July 13 near the settlement of Slavne, as a result of which one soldier was killed, the press center of the Joint Forces Operation (JFO) headquarters reported. “Today, on July 13, the armed groups of the Russian Federation once again violated the ceasefire regime. The enemy opened fire from grenade launchers of various systems and small arms at positions of the JFO near Slavne. Unfortunately, as a result of shelling attacks by the enemy, Ukraine lost one courageous defender,” the JFO said on its Facebook page. In addition, near the village of Zaitseve, as a result of an unknown explosive device, another member of the JFO was seriously wounded while on a combat mission. A few days earlier, the JFO headquarters had reported: “On July 10, the armed groups of the Russian Federation violated the ceasefire 17 times, using 120mm and 82mm mortars prohibited by the Minsk agreements, as well as grenade launchers of various systems, heavy machine guns, anti-tank missile systems and small arms… one Ukrainian defender unfortunately was killed and three others were injured.” Population centers such as Prychepylivka, Orikhove, Khutir Vilny, Novotoshkivske, Novoluhanske, Katerynivka, Vodiane, Avdiyivka and Nevelske Lebedynske came under attack. (Interfax Ukraine, Ukrainian Canadian Congress Daily Briefing)
Netherlands takes Russia to court
The Dutch government is taking Russia to the European Court of Human Rights for its alleged role in the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over eastern Ukraine in 2014. Dutch Foreign Minister Stef Blok said July 10 that the move is designed to support individual cases filed by relatives of some of the victims at the Strasbourg-based court. “By taking this course of action the government is offering maximum support to these individual cases,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. MH17 was shot down on its way from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur by a Russian-made Buk surface-to-air missile fired from territory controlled by Moscow-backed separatists in the east of Ukraine. Nearly two-thirds of the 298 victims were Dutch nationals. By launching an inter-state case against Russia, the Dutch government will share “all available and relevant information about the downing of Flight MH17” with the European court to support individual cases filed against Russia, the Foreign Ministry said. “As a government, we have information, evidence, that leads us to the conclusion of the involvement of the Russian Federation,” Mr. Blok told the Associated Press. “Of course, the relatives themselves do not have all this information so we can help them by starting this procedure.” (RFE/RL, with reporting by AFP, AP and Reuters)
Rally held in support of Ukrainian language
Dozens of activists, opposition politicians and lawmakers rallied near the building of Ukraine’s Constitutional Court as it debated a language law that has been criticized for restricting access to minority languages. Demonstrators on July 9 held posters supporting the law with slogans such as “Does the Constitutional Court want to kill the state language?’ and “Ukrainian – the only state language!” The Constitutional Court began debating the legislation’s constitutionality on July 8 at the request of 51 lawmakers, mainly from the pro-Russia Opposition Bloc who claim that the law’s provisions “discriminate against Russian-speaking citizens.” The legislation, signed by former President Petro Poroshenko just days before he left office following his electoral defeat to rival Volodymyr Zelenskyy last year, declares that Ukrainian is “the only official state language” in the country. Mykola Kniazhytsky, a member of the European Solidarity party, joined the picketers saying he was ashamed that the Ukrainian language has come under fire for being entrenched as the state’s official language. “Imagine that in Poland, Hungary, Israel, France, the Constitutional Court would initiate proceedings on whether the state language should be used or not used in some regions. Obviously, it’s hard to imagine,” he said. (RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service)
EU extends sanctions against Russia
European Union member states have formally extended a six-month extension of economic sanctions imposed against Russia over its role in the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. The European Council decided on June 29 to roll over the restrictive measures until January 31 next year because the “full implementation” of the Minsk agreements that sought to put an end to fighting in eastern Ukraine “has not yet been achieved,” the council said in a statement. European leaders had agreed to extend the sanctions beyond their current July 31 expiry date at their summit on June 19. The sanctions were first adopted in July 2014 over Russia’s support for militants in the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Luhansk in a conflict that has killed more than 13,000 people. Since then, the measures mainly targeting Russia’s financial, energy, and defense industries have been extended every six months. The EU has also imposed sanctions on Russia over its forcible seizure of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in March 2014. (RFE/RL)
Hungarian foreign minister visits Kyiv
The Ukrainian and Hungarian foreign affairs ministers have met for the second time in less than a month as the two neighboring states seek to overcome an impasse over the language law in Ukraine. Ukrainian Foreign Affairs Minister Dmytro Kuleba and his Hungarian counterpart, Peter Szijjarto, met in Kyiv on June 25 as they chaired a session of the Ukrainian-Hungarian Economic Cooperation Commission. After the talks, Mr. Kuleba said that officials from both countries will meet to discuss Ukraine’s controversial language law before a summit between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban can take place in Kyiv in July as scheduled. The minister said the sides planned to sign a memorandum during the summit that will “cover the whole range of issues concerning our bilateral cooperation.” On May 29, Mr. Kuleba had travelled to Budapest where he and Mr. Szijjarto discussed, among other things, the Ukrainian language law, which Hungary says restricts the right of Ukraine’s ethnic Hungarian minority of approximately 125,000 people to be educated in their native language. Budapest has been blocking NATO initiatives aimed at building closer ties with Ukraine since the country in September 2017 adopted the law that emphasizes the instruction of Ukrainian in publicly funded schools and curtails the teaching of minority languages such as Romanian, Russian and Hungarian. (RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service)
Hundreds protest acting education minister
Hundreds of demonstrators rallied in the Ukrainian capital to protest against the appointment of Serhii Shkarlet as acting minister of education and science. Scholars, students, teachers and civil rights activists took part in the rally on June 30, accusing the rector of the Chernihiv National University of Technology of plagiarism and expressing outrage over his past association with the Russia-friendly Party of Regions. The protesters held placards and put a toilet with a sign reading, “For Diplomas from Shkarlet,” next to a government building. One man wore a mask depicting Mr. Shkarlet and pretended to auction off diplomas. From the government building, the protesters marched to the Presidential Office, where they staged a sit-in. The government appointed Mr. Shkarlet as acting minister of education and science on June 25, several days after a parliamentary committee refused to approve him to the ministerial post. (RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service)
Iran blames misaligned radar, human error
Iranian authorities say a misaligned missile battery and miscommunication between soldiers and superior officers were to blame for the January downing of a Ukrainian jetliner that killed 176 people. The conclusions by Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization were detailed in a new report released late on July 11. Ukrainian International Airlines Flight 752 was struck by two missiles and crashed shortly after taking off from Tehran’s main airport on January 8. The disaster happened the same night that Iran launched a ballistic-missile attack that targeted U.S. soldiers in Iraq. That attack was in response to an American drone strike that had killed the powerful commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps, Major General Qassem Soleimani, in Baghdad five days earlier. “A failure occurred due to a human error in following the procedure” for aligning the radar, causing a “107-degree error” in the system, the Civil Aviation Authority said in its report. The authority said the document was a “factual report” and not the final report for the accident. (RFE/RL, based on reporting by AP and AFP)