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Aleksandr Malykhin, chairman of Luhansk's separatist election commission, announces results of the referendum in the Luhansk region on May 12.
Aleksandr Malykhin, chairman of Luhansk's separatist election commission, announces results of the referendum in the Luhansk region on May 12.
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Live Blog: Crisis In Ukraine (Archive)

Latest News

-- Self-appointed leaders of the Ukrainian separatist region of Donetsk appealed to Russia to consider absorbing it to "restore historic justice" and to send in troops.

-- Pro-Russian separatists in the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk said they would not allow voting for the May 25 presidential election to be conducted.

-- Diplomats say the European Union agreed to impose sanctions against 13 additional individuals and two companies, believed to be the first time the EU has targeted companies over the Ukraine crisis.

-- Ukrainian President Oleksandr Turchynov called the votes a "sham" and the United States said they were illegal and merely "an attempt to create further division and disorder in the country."

-- RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service said one of its affiliate radio stations in Donetsk was taken off the air by gunmen and replaced by a pro-Russian broadcaster.

-- The Kremlin said Ukrainian officials in Kyiv should hold talks with pro-Russian separatists on the results of the self-rule referendums, adding that it respected the "expression of the people's will."

-- Insurgents in eastern Ukraine said nearly 90 percent of voters backed self-rule in the votes.

*NOTE: Times are stated according to local time in Kyiv
09:49 7.5.2014

10:09 7.5.2014
RFE/RL's news desk has issued this item on reports that government forces have retaken an administration building in Mariupol:
Ukrainian media reports say Kyiv's forces have retaken the city hall in the eastern port of Mariupol after heavy fighting with pro-Russian militants overnight.

Ukraine's Channel 5 television said the National Guard had seized the building, forcing rebels into the streets, where they blocked the main thoroughfare.

By the norning of May 7, the report said that traffic could again move.

The Russian Interfax news agency quoted a pro-Russia source in Mariupol who confirmed that the city hall was now under Ukrainian forces' control.

Separatists also told Interfax that Ukrainian security forces detained 11 people who were campaigning for a referendum on the region's independence scheduled for the weekend.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry called the planned referendum "contrived and bogus", and said Washington rejected it as an "illegal effort to further divide Ukraine."

Pro-Russia separatists have captured official buildings in dozens of towns in eastern Ukraine in recent weeks.

10:12 7.5.2014
The "Moscow Times" has published a report on how property prices in Crimea have skyrocketed since the peninsula's annexation:
"The demand for apartments and commercial-recreational facilities is beating all records from 2005 to 2007," Ruslan Burdeiny, general director of Crimean construction company Monolit, told Itar-Tass. Burdeiny added that he has seen prices rising by 50 to 60 percent in the last two months alone.

Konsol-Stroi, a major Crimean construction company has seen prices rise by 20 to 50 percent in the last month and half. The cost of a square meter has risen to $1,500 from an average of $1,000, according to Konsol-Stroi director Galina Kovalenko, RIA Novosti reported.

Read more here

10:26 7.5.2014

10:46 7.5.2014

10:51 7.5.2014

11:11 7.5.2014
Not surprisingly, with coloring that matches that of the separatist symbol, the St. George's ribbon, this cat has become something of a "poster kitten" for anti-Kyiv activists on social media this morning:

11:14 7.5.2014

11:21 7.5.2014
Some economic news in from the wires:

Ukraine has received the first tranche of its $17 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) worth about $3.2 billion.

The National Bank of Ukraine said the money was received on May 6.

A bank spokesman said more than $1 billion was put in the country's foreign currency reserves and the rest went toward Ukraine's budget.

The IMF Executive Board approved the two-year standby loan on April 30.

Ukraine's treasury was virtually empty after President Viktor Yanukovych was ousted in February.

The country has high debts and faced a situation where it could default on its loans.

National Bank Chairman Stepan Kubiv said on May 5 that the first tranche of the IMF loan will send a "positive signal to foreign investors and domestic entrepreneurs."

11:37 7.5.2014

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