Our newsroom quotes Russian news agencies as saying the president of Belarus, a traditional Russian ally who has been hosting multilateral talks on the Ukraine conflict, will join Western leaders in boycotting an upcoming military parade in Moscow:
Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka says he will travel to Moscow to participate in events marking the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe on May 7 and 8, but he will not attend a Victory Day military parade in the Russian capital on May 9.
In an interview with Russia's ITAR-TASS on April 18, Lukashenka said he will preside over a Victory Day parade in Minsk on May 9 instead.
Belarus has traditionally been one of Russia's closest allies, but Lukashenka has been critical of Moscow's policies regarding Ukraine.
The Belarusian president, however, criticized politicians who have refused to travel to Moscow because of the conflict in Ukraine, saying that it is "an incorrect move" against "the Soviet people and the people of Eastern Europe, who we at that time liberated."
Representatives of about 25 countries -- including India, China, Serbia, and North Korea -- have confirmed that they will attend the May 9 parade in Moscow.
Based on reporting by ITAR-TASS and Sputnik News
Volunteers in Russian-annexed Crimea turned out in Simferopol to redecorate a highway overpass with more Russia-friendly images.
What appears to be a Russian antiwar blog has posted a video that purports to show sexual shenanigans in the White House, which houses the Russian government. There are numberous reasons to doubt the authenticity of the video, which zooms in on two shadowy figures on a middle floor of the building at night. It looks like it is mostly being used to promote a web tome on "Sex in the U.S.S.R."
Interfax quotes Russian President Vladimir Putin as saying that he won't rule out his administration's recognition of the pro-Russian, breakaway Ukrainian regimes in Luhansk and Donetsk. He reportedly made the comments during the Vestia On Saturday program and added, after saying, according to Interfax, "I wouldn't like to talk about this now because, whatever I say, everything might be counterproductive," but that, "We'll see what circumstances arise."
From our newsroom:
Kyiv Lists Russian Military Units Allegedly In Ukraine
Ukraine's army chief of staff has listed for the first time some of the specific Russian military units alleged to be fighting against Kyiv alongside pro-Moscow rebels in eastern Ukraine.
Viktor Muzhenko, in an interview published by Ukraine's Defense Ministry on April 18, said, "Regular Russian army troops are still in Ukraine" despite a ceasefire agreement signed in February which ordered the withdrawal of foreign fighters from the frontline.
Russia has repeatedly denied claims by Kyiv and the West that it is arming and sending troops to help separatists who have gained control of parts of the east.
Muzhenko named the Russian army's 15th Mechanized Infantry Brigade, the 8th Mechanized Infantry Brigade, the 331st Airborne Regiment, and the 98th Airborne Division.
He said he had "proof" that Russian regular troops had fought in three clashes in the east in February, including a fierce battle for the rail hub of Debaltseve, which is now controlled by the separatists.
Based on reporting by AFP and lugansk-news.com
Russian and international news agencies quote Ukrainian authorities as saying that masked men have toppled several more statues of Soviet leader V.I. Lenin in eastern Ukraine in a fresh show of anti-Russian sentiment as Kyiv battles pro-Moscow separatists.
Two statues were demolished at universities in the government-controlled city of Kharkiv late Friday, a week after the parliament approved a bill banning Soviet symbols in Ukraine.
The law, which also bans Nazi symbols, has yet to be signed into law by President Petro Poroshenko.
On April 17, the pro-Kyiv governor's office in Luhansk, an eastern region partly split between the government and separatists, said another Lenin statue had been daubed in yellow and blue, Ukraine's national colors, and later toppled in the village of Stanytsya Luhanska.
Authorities in a government-controlled part of another contested region, Donetsk, also said unidentified people used cables to tug down a Lenin statue in the city of Kramatorsk on April 17.