Ukraine crisis. News in brief. Tuesday 17 May [Ukrainian sources]

TUESDAY

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LOCAL VIEW:
Seems the local sentiment's more focused on its government than in the conflict in the eastern part of the country, from what I've picked up from locals.


WEATHER:
In Odesa, there was light rain, then heading south, clear skies with a feel like temperature of 57f to drop 48f tonight.
54 in Kyiv, with a low of 42f.

I sent my Editor, Nelson on a long deserved vacation to Cyprus, and I'm in the second half of my month in Ukraine, so the new will be light soon. I'll be back to normal at end of month, as nothing in Ukraine I do is normal.

Ukraine Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin believes he has made a strong case for deploying OSCE police force to Donbas, a source in the foreign ministry says, Liga.net reports May 16.

The force can have small arms and armored vehicles, and Germany’s foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier approves, the diplomatic source says. 
 
 “Without the police force the German foreign minister believes there won’t be any progress,” the source says.

The OSCE police force may number 5,000. It has to be very mobile to speedily react to any incidents during the likely elections and after, Ukraine proposed.

Russia’s foreign minister Lavrov is opposed to such mobility – for very clear reasons, the source says.

Ukrainian proposals are aimed at neutralizing Russia’s threat, while Moscow is eager to leave as much room as it can for staging military provocations.

That is why the recent talks came to a dead end, the source explained.

zik.ua

On Tuesday, May 17, Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland will travel from Vienna, Austria, to Moscow, Russia. She will meet with senior Russian government officials to discuss the peaceful settlement process in the Donbas.

As noted by U.S. Department of State press office, the parties will meet to talk the situation in eastern Ukraine and next steps to implement the Minsk agreements, Censor.NET reports.

Nuland will also discuss a range of bilateral and regional issues with Russian officials.

censor.net.ua  In Ukrainian/український

Odesa human rights activist Oleksandr Pohorelyi, who was reported murdered May 16, is alive.

The information on the lawyer's death was intentionally spread in the press as part of the special operation to arrest all those involved in the crime plotting. The "murder scene" was also faked, Censor.NET reports citing Dumskaia.

See more: Human rights activist murdered in Odesa as his car assaulted by unknown individuals, - police. PHOTOS
The sources in the law enforcement agencies informed that the officers of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) had detained the assassins and found firearms on them. The perpetrators used a car with Crimean license plates.



The middleman was also apprehended. The information about the person who ordered the hit will be released in the near future.

It is known that the assassins' paymaster has close ties to the law enforcement agencies of the Odesa region, which is why their representatives have not only been involved in the operation but had not even a clue about it. The SBU officers were forced to literally fend off the investigators and experts from the "crime scene" due to this fact.

The security agency learned about the plotted attempt on Oleksandr Pohorelyi in connection with his activities in the resort town of Zatoka back in early March and started to plan the operation to apprehend assassins and their hirer.

According to updated information, the operation was carried out by members of the central office of the National Police of Ukraine under the personal supervision of its head Khatia Dekanoidze.

Pohorelyi has publicly accused officials and criminals close to them of embezzlement of land plots in the town, electoral fraud, and blackmailing Estonian investor Marcel Vichmann. The members of the Privilegija law firm headed by Pohorelyi were conducting their own investigations of criminal activities and shared this information with both law enforcement agencies and journalists.

censor.net.ua   In Ukrainian/український

The last remaining monument of Vladimir Lenin is being demounted in Odesa.

As reported by Censor.NET citing Pervyi Horodskoi, the 10-meter monument is being demounted under the decommunization law.

Three equipment units are operating at the scene - two cranes and a truck. A pillar crane is disassembling the monument into seven parts.

The monument was moved to Savytskyi park from Kulykove Pole in 2006.





censor.net.ua  In Ukrainian/український

Putin tries to present himself as the best bet against ISIS. In reality, he’s helped it thrive.

Photo: Protesters wearing masks of Bashar Assad and Vladimir Putin demonstrate in front of the U.N. Security Council building on Jan. 24, 2012. Photo: TIMOTHY A. CLARY VIA GETTY IMAGES


By Akbar Shahid Ahmed, Foreign Affairs Reporter, The Huffington Post

WASHINGTON — The last time he visited the U.S., in September of 2015, Russian President Vladimir Putin brought the ideal message for war-weary observers of U.S. foreign policy.

At the United Nations’ annual General Assembly, he indicated he wanted to address international players involved in the Middle East — the most prominent of which, of course, is the U.S. In the region now, Putin said, “nobody cares a bit about human rights, including the right to life.”

“I cannot help asking those who have caused the situation. Do you realize now what you have done?”

[…]

Putin’s particular style of disinformation relies heavily on that assumption to sow international distrust of American actions. Now a fascinating report from Reuters challenges it. It turns Putin’s question back at him: Do you realize what you have done?.

The news agency revealed on Friday that the Russian government has had a deliberate policy of sending radicalized Islamists out of Russia — which means they inevitably end up in the central hub of militant extremism, Syria. In one case, officials allowed a militant placed under house arrest to make it to Moscow’s international airport and start a journey that would end in his joining ISIS’s ranks. In five of the instances Reuters tracked, “Russian authorities had reason to deny [radicals] travel documents and prevent them from leaving the country. But according to relatives and local officials, in each case the authorities made their passage possible.”........................

To read further go to this link:  ukrainebusiness.com.ua