Got to check out more convoy trucks this morning. A lot of them mostly empty like this one pic.twitter.com/9qM7bYliv9
— Courtney Weaver (@courtneymoscow) August 15, 2014
Here is another mostly empty one. Rus emergency services said they wanted reserve trucks if some break down 1/2 pic.twitter.com/4tO1gGOcrN
— Courtney Weaver (@courtneymoscow) August 15, 2014
Seems more like the trucks were hastily packed/ not enough time for all to be filled completely 2/2
— Courtney Weaver (@courtneymoscow) August 15, 2014
The Verkhovna Rada is fast becoming a more prolific boxing venue than Madison Square Garden. The latest bout of fisticuffs involved populist Radical Party deputy Oleh Lyashko, who took a "standing count" after walking into a sweet hook punch from independent deputy Oleksandr Shevchenko. Lyashko had been berating his parliamentary colleague for ignoring the plight of soldiers fighting in the Ukraine's east. ""Look at this pot-bellied fatty," he shouted. "You need to go to Donbas." (Reuters video)
#Russia'n humanitary #convoy stopped at #Finland's border at "Raatteen tie" in year 1940. Convoy's goal was Oulu. pic.twitter.com/rXj2qEHAoM
— Juhani Kaukoranta (@jukaukor) August 14, 2014
A huge Lenin toppled in Mariupol. http://t.co/XZNCiIT4QN
— Leonid Ragozin (@leonidragozin) August 15, 2014
Separatists's tactic of inviting the Ukrainian army to shoot at residential areas - reportage from Luhansk http://t.co/cbEz5R5QFq
— Leonid Ragozin (@leonidragozin) August 15, 2014
They've been keeping journalists away from the aid convoy this morning. But now there'll be an official press tour. pic.twitter.com/c8yCpvA3DW
— Steve Rosenberg (@BBCSteveR) August 15, 2014
Putin, apparently, is willing to let bygones be bygones w/ Crimean Tatars: http://t.co/yLqql4IAy2
— Robert Coalson (@CoalsonR) August 15, 2014
Last night, two British reporters said they saw Russian military vehicles crossing the border with Ukraine ahead of an aid convoy, which is currently parked near the frontier. Our news desk has this update on the situation:
Dozens of Russian armored personnel carriers (APCs) have massed near the border with Ukraine, where a huge Russian convoy of reported humanitarian aid is camped out.
Moscow says the convoy of more than 250 trucks is carrying 2,000 tons of water, food, and other aid for people in eastern Ukraine lacking basic supplies due to fighting between pro-Russia separatists and Ukrainian forces.
Ukrainian and Western officials have said the convoy could be a cover for a Russian military incursion, something the Kremlin has rejected.
The Ukrainian military says its border guards have begun inspecting the convoy after crossing the border into Russia.
The convoy stopped yesterday in open fields near the Russian town of Kamensk-Shakhtinsky, about 20 kilometers from the border with Ukraine.
It was then joined this morning by the APCs.
Meanwhile, reporters for "The Guardian" and "The Telegraph" reported seeing about 23 Russian APCs supported by logistics vehicles cross into Ukraine from Russia's Rostov Oblast yesterday evening.
(Reuters, dpa, AP)
Reuters: #Russia, #Ukraine, #EU leaders to hold talks on gas, trade disputes http://t.co/UKXMEtURyB
— Kyiv Post (@KyivPost) August 15, 2014
"The Kyiv Post" has published an interesting sketch of life in Crimea for people who still hold pro-Ukrainian views:
Expressing pro-Ukrainian views in Sevastopol does, indeed, come with a price.
Larisa Moskalets, 42, knows that well. She almost lost her job in a ticket sales office for telling a client that her president was Poroshenko, Ukraine’s leader, not Putin. Her employer first asked Moskalets to leave, but ended up just transferring her to a different office.
An ethnic Russian, Moskalets has lived in both Russia and Ukraine. She doesn’t speak Ukrainian perfectly, but nevertheless prefers to live in Ukraine, not Russia. She “follows political news and understands what is going on in Russia,” Moskalets says. “Morally it’s now extremely difficult for me here.”
Networking with other pro-Ukrainians helps, she said, so do brave gestures.
During the EuroMaidan Revolution that toppled Viktor Yanukovych as president on Feb. 22, she wrote “Sevastopol - Ukraine - Europe” in big black letters on a fence. She did it late at night to be on the safe side. After the annexation, she once told a vendor she wouldn’t buy a Russian flag because it is the banner of the occupiers.
While Moskalets’ husband and children share her views, her parents are heavily pro-Russian and call her a traitor. They almost stopped speaking to her. “This is the worst thing about this situation - how the ties between people are breaking down,” Moskalets says.
Serhiy Gogol, a 33-year old sailor from Sevastopol, agrees. His family comes from western Ukraine but has been living in Sevastopol since the late 1980s. He grew up going to Russian-speaking school but still prefers to speak Ukrainian to friends.
However, Gogol’s best friend in Sevastopol welcomed Russia, but worried about losing Gogol’s friendship.
Gogol ended up deciding to sever his ties to Crimea. He worked as a navigator on a foreign ship in Brazil during Russia’s military invasion. When he returned to Sevastopol in late March, he found conditions intolerable and packed his things and took the train to Ivano-Frankivsk in western Ukraine.
Gogol senses new danger on Sevastopol streets.
“I grew up here and always felt safe in this city. Now I don’t. Now there are many drunk and weird people on the streets, like never before,” Gogol says.
As he talks to Kyiv Post sitting on a bench in a park in Sevastopol, three police officers pass by and turn heads curiously to him, attracted by his Ukrainian speech.
Gogol is not alone in wanting to leave.
Read the entire article here