Ukraine

LUGANSK, May 18. /TASS/: The Ukrainian army has shelled the positions of people’s militia in the self-proclaimed Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR) six times over the past 24 hours, the LPR defense ministry said on Saturday.

"The shelling targeted the areas of Pervomaisk, the urban-type settlement of Frunze, the villages of Zhelobok and Smeloye," the LuganskInformCenter news agency quoted a spokesman for the LPR people’s militia as saying.

According to the spokesman, the fire was conducted from mortars.

17 May 2019; DW: A group of lawmakers has quit Ukraine's ruling coalition allied with the outgoing President Petro Poroshenko. This could pose an obstacle to incoming leader Volodymyr Zelenskiy and his efforts to call for new elections.

The People's Front party in Ukraine announced it was exiting the ruling coalition on Friday and looking to form "a new coalition with a new agenda."

KIEV, May 15. /TASS/: Ukraine has imposed new economic sanctions against Russia banning supplies of certain groups of goods and introducing special duties, Prime Minister Vladimir Groisman said at a cabinet meeting on Wednesday.

"Those are tit-for-tat measures - embargo and special duties on Russian goods," he said, adding that the restrictions will be applied to those goods that "are fully produced" in Ukraine or may be replaced with alternative supplies.

KIEV, May 7. /TASS/: Ukrainians are laying flowers at the Russian embassy in Kiev in memory of the victims of Sunday’s Sukhoi Superjet 100 plane crash at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport, an embassy official told TASS on Tuesday.

"People are bringing flowers, icon lamps and notes of condolences," the official said.

KIEV, May 4. /TASS/: Ukraine’s president-elect, Vladimir Zelensky has said his team is looking at how to respond to Russia’s issuing its passports to people living in Donbass.

"We have several approaches, so to say. We must be creative, quick and smart on that matter, the way we are as a matter of fact. So, we will think of that and announce everything later. I will come out and announce - I have no secrets," Zelensky said on Monday before a meeting with the Verkhovna Rada (national parliament) speaker, leaders of parliamentary factions and lawmakers’ groups.

KIEV, May 4. /TASS/: Ukraine’s president-elect Vladimir Zelensky has said he will offer the country’s Verkhovna Rada (parliament) to hold his inauguration ceremony on May 19. He was talking to reporters on Saturday ahead of his meeting with the Verkhovna Rada speaker, leaders of parliamentary factions and lawmakers’ groups.

"At the meeting, we will suggest [holding the inauguration] on May 19, and then we’ll see," Zelensky said.

DONETSK, May 2. /TASS/: Over 1,000 Ukrainian army's servicemen have been killed or injured since the start of the military operation in Donbass under Sergey Nayev's command, head of the people's militia of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) Eduard Basurin said on Thursday.

KIEV, May 2. /TASS/: Ukraine’s military has occupied 24 square kilometers of Donbass territory, including in three villages, Joint Forces Commander Sergey Nayev told a briefing on Thursday, stressing that there were no violations of the Minsk peace deal.

KIEV, May 1. /TASS/: Ukraine’s authorities are not seeking to carry out a fair investigation into the tragedy that occurred in the southern city of Odessa five years ago, the political council chief of Ukraine’s Opposition Platform - For Life party, Viktor Medvedchuk, said on Wednesday.

Kiev, Apr 28 (AFP) President-elect Volodymyr Zelensky dismissed an offer by Vladimir Putin to provide passports to Ukrainians, and pledged instead to grant citizenship to Russians who "suffer" under the Kremlin's rule.

The Russian president on Saturday said Moscow was considering plans to make it easier for all Ukrainians to obtain Russian citizenship, after it earlier moved to grant passports in the country's separatist east.

Kiev has been fighting Moscow-backed rebels in eastern Ukraine since 2014 in a war that has killed 13,000.