Ukraine

KIEV (Reuters) - Ukraine will press Iran to hand over the black boxes from the crash of a Ukrainian passenger plane at a meeting with a visiting Iranian delegation on Monday, Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko told reporters.

Ukraine would convey the message to visiting Minister of Roads and Urban Development Mohammad Eslami, that returning the black boxes would show that Iran wanted an unbiased investigation of the crash, Prystaiko said.

KIEV, Jan. 19 (Xinhua) -- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky bid farewell to 11 Ukrainians killed in a plane mistakenly shot down by Iran earlier this month, the presidential office said Sunday.

The president, along with Parliament speaker Dmutro Razumkov, Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk and some other members of the government, arrived at Boryspil International Airport in Kiev to receive the bodies of nine crew members and two passengers.

The head of state expressed his sincere condolences to the families and relatives of the victims.

KIEV, January 17. /TASS/: Ukraine’s new National Security Strategy, which was presented at the Friday session of the National Security and Defense Council, stipulates measures to curb tensions with Russia, the Ukrainian presidential press office said in a statement.

"There were proposals to take measures aimed at easing a possibility of escalation with Russia and tensions in bilateral relations," the statement says.

KIEV, Jan 18, (NNN-CGTN) – Ukraine President, Volodymyr Zelensky said, he wanted to give his Prime Minister, Oleksiy Honcharuk, a “second chance” and refused to accept his resignation, after a recording emerged of the premier questioning the head of state’s grasp of economics.

“I have decided to give you and your government a second chance,” Zelensky said, during a meeting with Honcharuk in a video, released by the presidency.

KIEV (Reuters) - Ukraine’s prime minister Oleksiy Honcharuk submitted his resignation on Friday after an audio recording suggested he had criticized the president, but then appeared to suggest in comments to Reuters that he might stay in his job.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy will consider the resignation letter later on Friday, the president’s office said.

KIEV (Reuters) - An Iranian representative will travel to Ukraine next week following the shooting down of a Ukrainian passenger plane near Tehran last week, Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko told parliament on Friday.

He said Iran was willing to pass on to Ukraine the data and voice recorders from the flight after they had been examined by a joint investigation team comprising experts from Iran, Canada and Ukraine.

The airliner was struck by a missile on Jan. 8 shortly after leaving Tehran en route to Kiev. Iran admitted on Saturday it had shot down the plane in error.

KIEV, Jan 17 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Ukraine’s Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk has submitted a letter of resignation and President Volodymur Zelenskiy will consider it, the presidential office said on Friday.

“I came to the position of fulfilling the program of the President. He is for me a model of openness and decency,” Honcharuk said on Facebook.

“However, in order to take away any doubts about our respect and trust in the President, I wrote a letter of resignation and handed it to the President with the right to submit it to Parliament,” he added.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Police in Ukraine are investigating whether the U.S. ambassador came under illegal surveillance by an unknown party before the Trump administration recalled her from Kyiv, Ukrainian authorities said Thursday.

The announcement came two days after Democratic lawmakers in the United States released documents and text messages that showed an associate of President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer communicating with Rudy Giuliani about Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch’s r emoval.

KIEV (Reuters) - Ukraine has asked the FBI in the United States for help in investigating a suspected cyberattack by Russian military hackers on the energy company Burisma, a Ukrainian interior ministry official said on Thursday.

At the same briefing, the interior ministry also announced an investigation into the possible illegal surveillance of the then American ambassador to Kiev, Marie Yovanovitch, following messages contained in documents released by the U.S. Congress this week.

KIEV (Reuters) - Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Wednesday asked Chancellor Angela Merkel for Germany’s support in bringing the perpetrators of last week’s plane crash in Iran to justice, according to a statement issued by Zelenskiy’s office.

After initially denying blame, Iran acknowledged on Saturday that it had mistakenly shot down a Ukrainian passenger plane, killing all 176 people on board shortly after it took off from Tehran for Kiev.