Here's another update from our news desk:
Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko says he will present a broad plan of reforms later today that would allow Kyiv to apply for membership of the European Union in six years.
Speaking to the country's judiciary, Poroshenko said the plan, "Strategy-2020," included some 60 social and economic reforms and programs.
Poroshenko signed a key trade and economic relations portion of an Association Agreement with the EU in Brussels on June 27. It provides for the creation of a Deep and Comprehensive Free-Trade Area (DCFTA) and closer economic integration.
Ukraine's parliament ratified the agreement on September 16.
However, the implementation of the trade part of the agreement has been delayed until January 2016 to appease Russia, which says the pact will hurt its markets.
(Reuters, ITAR-TASS)
Anthony Faiola has written a nice piece for "The Washington Post" on the "Orwellian nightmare" that pro-Ukrainians are now living through in Donetsk:
Khutor and Nika move briskly on the sidewalk, but not fast enough to draw attention. They have tried to memorize the “wrong streets” — the ones where they know the pro-Russian rebels who seized this city now regularly stand guard in camouflage, AK-47s poised. But sometimes the two of them get it wrong. Like now.
A muscular dirty-blond bearing a studied look of intimidation and an arm patch with the banner of the so-called New Russia clutches his weapon firmly as they pass. Khutor, 42, and Nika, 33, lower their heads. They cease talking. In a place where even a trip to the supermarket has become a ritual of stress, the couple tighten their grips on their bags of groceries, as if pointing them out. See? Just ran out for some milk and bread. Thanks now. Got to go.
In this metropolis that had a prewar population of almost a million, but where the city center now feels like an Orwellian ghost town of propaganda posters and armed patrols, perhaps no one feels more alone than those who still harbor pro-Ukrainian sentiments. Since the separatists took total control here, human rights and Ukrainian activists say, an untold number of loyalists have been extorted, abducted, tortured and, allegedly, executed. Many have left in search of sanctuaries farther west. But a small number of them — like Khutor and Nika — are riding out the storm.
Read the entire article here
RFE/RL's multimedia unit has issued this video of Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk addressing the UN General Assembly yesterday:
Here is the latest map of the situation in east Ukraine issued by Kyiv's National Security and Defense Council:
Don't miss this FT piece on the dramatic rise of Russian military provocations in the Baltic countries: http://t.co/Nxr4RE2jZB
— Annabelle Chapman (@AB_Chapman) September 25, 2014
Very subtle. MT: @BBCSteveR: By the US embassy, Uncle Sam's milking Russia. Protest against western dairy companies pic.twitter.com/ejringF3YY
— Simon Kruse (@crusoes) September 25, 2014
"Will Putin have incentive to move twrds peace if he can get all he wants by dragging out a “peace process” forever?" http://t.co/atoZXs54rz
— Simon Kruse (@crusoes) September 25, 2014
Activist: 10 Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine sent to Orenburg, their discharge falsified for compensation reasons http://t.co/Ro9qHa7qH5
— Alec Luhn (@ASLuhn) September 25, 2014
Gas supplies from #Slovakia to #Ukraine reach almost upper limit of 27 million cubic meters a day http://t.co/M68krgMxSK
— Kyiv Post (@KyivPost) September 25, 2014
Another Ukraine update from RFE/RL's news desk:
Ukrainian Parliament Speaker Oleksandr Turchynov has signed a lustration bill adopted by the parliament on September 16.
Under the law, up to one million public servants, including cabinet ministers, will be screened for loyalty to root out corrupt practices hanging over from the previous pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych's administration.
The law is expected to purge officials linked to the pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine's east and Russia's other structures, including intelligence.
Officials unable to explain their sources of income and assets will be banned from public office for five to 10 years.
After signing the document at a press conference in Kyiv today in the presence of journalists and public activists, Turchynov called on President Petro Poroshenko to sign the bill into the law by the end of the day.
(UNIAN, Reuters, Interfax)