Here's another item from our news desk:
Ukrainian Ombudswoman Not Allowed To Meet Sentsov In Russian Custody
Ukrainian ombudswoman Lyudmyla Denisova says she was prevented from meeting with jailed filmmaker Oleh Sentsov, who is on hunger strike in prison in far northern Russia following a terrorism conviction he says was fabricated.
In a video statement on Facebook, Denisova said she arrived at the penal colony in the Yamalo-Nenets region on June 15, but that the warden and the regional prison service chief did not allow her to meet with Sentsov.
She said they gave no explanation of the decision.
Meanwhile, Russian Ombudswoman Tatyana Moskalkova said that Denisova's attempt to meet with Sentsov violated "agreements reached previously."
Sentsov was arrested in Crimea in 2014 after Russia seized the Ukrainian region. A Russian court in 2015 convicted him of planning to commit terrorist acts and sentenced him to 20 years in prison. He denies the accusations.
Sentsov has been on hunger strike since May 14, demanding that Russia release 64 Ukrainian citizens he considers political prisoners.
Western governments and rights organizations have called for Sentsov to be released, and the Russian human rights group Memorial considers him a political prisoner.
The European Parliament on June 14 overwhelmingly passed a resolution calling on Russian authorities to release Sentsov and all the other "illegally detained Ukrainian citizens" in Russia and Russian-controlled Crimea "immediately and unconditionally."
With reporting by TASS
Ambulance called to Crimean court for hunger-striking Ukrainian defendant:
By the Crimean Desk of RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service
An ambulance has been called to a court in Russian-controlled Crimea after defendant Volodymyr Balukh, an imprisoned pro-Kyiv activist who has been on hunger strike for almost three months, felt unwell.
The Rozdolne district court judge adjourned Balukh's trial, which started in mid-May.
Balukh, who was convicted on a weapons-and-explosives-possession charge in August 2017, is now being tried for allegedly attacking a warden in a local detention center. He denies it.
Balukh was sentenced on the possession charge to three years and seven months in a penal facility, where convicts live close to a factory, farm, or other enterprise where they work as part of the punishment.
That sentence had been annulled by an appeals court and returned for additional investigation, but Balukh's retrial ended with the same verdict and sentence in January. Balukh contends the case against him was politically motivated.
The new case against Balukh was launched in March after the warden filed a lawsuit against him claiming that Balukh attacked him. Balukh started a hunger strike on March 19, protesting the new case against him.
Balukh was arrested in December 2016, after the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) said explosives and 90 bullets were found in the attic of his home.
The search was conducted shortly after Balukh planted a Ukrainian flag in his yard and affixed a sign to his house that read Heavenly Hundred Street 18.
"Heavenly Hundred" is a term Ukrainians use for the dozens of people killed when security forces fired on protesters in Kyiv in February 2014, shortly before Russia-friendly President Viktor Yanukovych was driven from power.
After Yanukovych's ouster, Russia seized Crimea by sending in troops and staging a referendum dismissed as illegal by Ukraine, the United States, and about 100 other countries.
The Russian takeover badly damaged Moscow's relations with Kyiv and the West and resulted in the imposition of sanctions by the European Union, the United States, and several other countries.
Rights groups say Crimea residents who opposed Russia's takeover have faced discrimination and abuse at the hands of the Moscow-imposed authorities.
In 2017, the European Parliament called on Moscow to free more than 30 Ukrainian citizens who were in prison or under other conditions of restricted freedom in Russia, Crimea, and parts of eastern Ukraine that are controlled by Russia-backed separatists.