Children in the eastern Ukrainian city of Slovyansk attended their first day of school on September 1. Students recited Ukrainian poetry and sang the national anthem at a back-to-school ceremony in the former stronghold of pro-Russian separatists, recaptured by the Ukrainian military in early July.
From our News Desk:
Prominent Polish intellectuals on September 1 marked the 75th anniversary of Nazi Germany’s 1939 invasion of Poland by comparing it to Russia’s interference in Ukraine.
Signatories to an open letter to the European Union include former Foreign Minister Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, who had been a Polish resistance fighter against the Nazis and a prisoner at the Auschwitz concentration camp.
The letter calls Russia an "aggressive state" that has taken over Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula Moscow annexed from Ukraine in April.
It says Russia’s Army and special forces now operate in eastern Ukraine, often covertly, to support separatists who “terrorize the local population.”
The appeal calls on France to cancel its planned sale of Mistral warships to Russia.
It says Berlin should restrict the activities of Russian energy firms in Germany to decrease German dependence on Russian natural gas.
This just in from RFE/RL's News Desk, citing Reuters and AFP:
Military officials say Ukrainian forces have pulled back from the airport in the eastern city of Luhansk following clashes with pro-Russian separatists.
Army spokesman Andriy Lysenko said the soldiers made an "organized retreat" from the airport on September 1.
The announcement comes as Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov expressed hope participants at a meeting in Minsk on September 1 would agree terms of an immediate, unconditional cease-fire.
Ukrainian and Russian officials as well as separatist rebels and OSCE representatives were expected to attend.
The rebels have been fighting Ukrainian government forces since April in a conflict the United Nations says has killed more than 2,600 people.
The provincial capitals of Luhansk and Donetsk are in rebel hands.
Ukraine and the West accuse Russia of sending troops into Ukraine and supporting the separatists, allegations denied by Moscow.
