UN Official Says Peace Negotiations For Ukraine Have 'Lost Momentum'
By RFE/RL
A top UN official said the negotiations aimed at implementing the 2015 Minsk accords and ending the conflict in eastern Ukraine have lost momentum.
Assistant Secretary-General Miroslav Jenca made the comment in a speech before the UN Security Council on February 12, at an event marking the fourth anniversary of the accords.
Jenca said negotiations "appear to have lost momentum" and that neither Russia nor Ukraine appear to be willing to agree on key steps forward.
The conflict, which erupted in 2014 at around the same time that Russia annexed Ukraine's Crimea Peninsula, has killed more than 10,000 people and displaced more than 1 million.
The fighting pits Ukrainian government troops and allied militias against fighters that Western officials say have been funded and equipped by Russian military units.
Signed roughly a year after full-scale fighting erupted, the Minsk accords laid out a blueprint of political steps, including elections, that would end the conflict.
Both Russia and Ukraine have blamed each other for the failure to implement the agreement.
The United States was not directly involved in the Minsk negotiations but has had a special envoy dedicated to resolving the fighting. That envoy, Kurt Volker, said in a post on Twitter that Russia continued to violate the agreement.
"In the four years since [Minsk], Russia has continued to violate the Minsk agreements every day. It's time for Peace for Ukraine," he wrote.
Russia's UN envoy, meanwhile, accused the West of using Ukraine as a pawn in a geopolitical chess game.
"Unfortunately, it is obvious to us that the West is not interested in Ukraine itself, in its fate and well-being of its citizens," Vasily Nebenzya was quoted by the state news agency TASS as saying. "For them, this country is a mere pawn in the geopolitical confrontation with Russia."
The five current European Union members on the Security Council issued a joint statement accusing Russia of continuing to fuel the conflict.
"We call on Russia to immediately stop fueling the conflict by providing financial and military support to armed foundations," the statement said.
With reporting by AP, TASS
That concludes our live-blogging of the Ukraine crisis for February 12, 2019. Check back here tomorrow for more of our continuing coverage. Thanks for reading and take care.
Here is today's map of the security situation in eastern Ukraine, according to the National Security and Defense Council (CLICK TO ENLARGE):
Moscow Court Upholds Prolongation Of Ukrainian Sailors' Pretrial Detentions
By RFE/RL
A Moscow court on February 12 upheld the extension of the pretrial detention of four of 24 Ukrainian sailors detained by Russian forces along with their three naval vessels in November near the Kerch Strait, which links the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov.
Last month, the Lefortovo court in Moscow extended the pretrial detention of the sailors, who are charged with illegal border crossing, until April 24 and April 26.
On February 7, the court rejected the appeals lodged by four of the sailors against the extension of their pretrial detentions.
The appeals of the other 16 Ukrainian sailors from the group will be assessed in the coming days.
Russia has held the Ukrainian sailors since its forces fired on, boarded, and seized their vessels near the Kerch Strait on November 25.
Moscow claims the Ukrainian vessels illegally entered Russian territorial waters near Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula that Russia occupied and took over in 2014.
The sailors face up to six years in prison if convicted.
The United States and other Western countries have called for the Ukrainian sailors' release, calling their detainment illegal.
Russia moved swiftly to seize control over Crimea after Moscow-friendly Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych was pushed from power in Kyiv by the pro-European Maidan protest movement in February 2014.
Putin's government sent troops without insignia to the peninsula, seized key buildings, took control of the regional legislature, and staged a referendum denounced as illegitimate by at least 100 countries.
Russia also fomented unrest and backed separatists in eastern Ukraine, where more than 10,300 people have been killed in the ensuing conflict since April 2014.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) ruled in November 2016 that the fighting in eastern Ukraine is "an international armed conflict between Ukraine and the Russian Federation."
With reporting by TASS and Interfax
Meet Ukraine’s Presidential Candidates:
Who’s Who In A Crowded Field
Ukraine’s presidential race is on, with a record-breaking 44 of at least 89 applicants green-lighted to run. The field is arguably the most diverse in the country’s independent history, with veteran politicians vying against a comedian, journalists, war veterans, career spies, accused criminals, and more.
Each may now canvass an electorate that independent polls say is deeply divided or undecided about who can best steer Ukraine through much-needed reforms and out of a Russia-backed conflict that’s been bleeding the country since Kyiv adopted a more westward path in 2014.
It’s a wide-open contest, although a handful of candidates appear to stand far better chances when ballots are cast in the first of two possible rounds of voting.
READ OUR SPECIAL FEATURE HERE.