Ukrainian Gets Six-Year Prison Term In Russia For Spying
A court in Moscow has sentenced a former defense factory chief from Ukraine to six years in prison on espionage charges.
The Moscow City Court on October 14 found Yuri Soloshenko, the 73-year-old former head of the Znamya electronics plant in Poltava, guilty of spying after a trial behind closed doors.
The Russian Federal Security Service said that Soloshenko was arrested in Moscow in August 2014 while trying to buy secret components for the S-300 air-defense missile system.
Both Russia and Ukraine have the Soviet-designed weapon in their arsenals.
Soloshenko did not appeal the court's verdict and will remain in pretrial detention until his sentence takes effect.
Russia has seen an unprecedented number of espionage and treason cases reach trial over the past year amidst its tug-of-war with Ukraine.
Just last week, a court in western Russia sentenced a man to 12 years in prison for allegedly spying for Ukraine.
Based on reporting by AP, AFP, and TASS
Ukraine Vows To Challenge Russia During Stint On UN Council
By RFE/RL
Ukraine is expected to win a seat on the UN Security Council in an October 15 vote and is vowing to stand up to Russia, which has used its veto power to wage a strategic tug-of-war with Ukraine and the West.
Ukraine has no opposition so far for the Eastern European seat on the council. It says it is committed to maintaining global peace and security by challenging the clout of its powerful neighbor, Russia, which is a permanent member of the 15-country United Nations decision-making body.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin, who traveled to New York to campaign for his country's election, said that Ukraine has a broader global agenda but that its tone with Russia will "definitely not be conciliatory."
"For the first time, we have an absolutely unique, unimaginable situation...that a permanent member of the UN Security Council is an aggressor in Ukraine, waging a hybrid war against Ukraine," Klimkin said.
He indicated Ukraine foresees gradually limiting and eventually abolishing the right to veto on the council, which is held by permanent members Russia, Britain, China, France, and the United States.
"Abuse of the veto right -- its usage as a 'license to kill' -- is unacceptable," Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko told the UN in September.
France also wants to limit the use of the veto. It has sought to persuade the other four permanent members not to use their veto when action is required to address a mass atrocity.
Russia has vetoed two resolutions on Ukraine -- one affirming Crimea as part of Ukraine and one aiming to set up an international criminal tribunal to prosecute those responsible for the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine.
Richard Gowan, a fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations focusing on the UN, told the German dpa news agency that despite Ukraine's vow to fight Russia, the country will not radically change the dynamics on the council.
Lithuania, which currently represents Eastern Europe, has already harshly criticized Russia over Ukraine.
He noted that despite scathing comments from other Security Council members over the Ukraine conflict, Russia has largely ignored the criticism, which Ukraine's presence will not change.
"I foresee some token diplomatic fireworks from the Ukrainians, but no real change to how the council functions," he said.
During the vote October 14, UN member states will select five nonpermanent members to sit on the Security Council in 2016 and 2017. Candidates will need to get approval from two-thirds of the UN's 193 member countries to win a seat.
Currently, five countries have announced their candidacies for five positions that are becoming vacant at the end of the year: Egypt and Senegal from the African regional group, Japan to represent Asia-Pacific, Uruguay from Latin America, and Ukraine to represent Eastern Europe.
While all countries are running seemingly unopposed, the requirement for a two-thirds majority makes the outcome of the elections somewhat uncertain.
The newcomers will begin their two-year stint on January 1, replacing Chad, Chile, Jordan, Lithuania, and Nigeria.
With reporting by dpa, AFP, and AP
This ends our live blogging for October 14. Be sure to check back tomorrow for our continuing coverage.
Russian computer attacks have become more brazen and more destructive as the country grows increasingly at odds with the U.S. and European nations over military goals first in Ukraine and now Syria.
Along with reported computer breaches of a French TV network and the White House, a number of attacks now being attributed to Russian hackers and some not previously disclosed have riveted intelligence officials as relations with Russia have deteriorated. These targets include the Polish stock market, the U.S. House of Representatives, a German steel plant that suffered severe damage and The New York Times.
U.S. officials worry that any attempt by the Russian government to use vulnerabilities in critical infrastructure like global stock exchanges, power grids and airports as pressure points against the West could lead to a broader conflict, according to two people familiar with the debate inside government and who asked to not to be named when discussing intelligence matters. When NATO officials met last week, they voiced alarm about Russia’s rapid involvement in Syria, including the firing of cruise missiles, and vowed the biggest reinforcement of their collective defense since the end of the Cold War.
Dutch referendum plan threatens to derail EU-Ukraine pact:
Election officials in the Netherlands have cleared the way for a referendum that could disrupt a keystone of closer ties between the European Union and Ukraine.
The Dutch authorities said a signature drive by Euroskeptic groups succeeded in forcing the nonbinding vote to challenge the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement signed last year.
Backers regard the deal as crucial for anchoring Ukraine to the West, while Moscow views it as a challenge to Russian interests in its so-called near abroad.
Like 21 other EU governments, the Dutch have already approved the agreement, which requires passage in all 28 member states to enter into full effect.
But a "no" vote, even in a nonbinding referendum, would almost certainly force a rethink in the Netherlands and provide momentum to opponents in any states where passage is still pending.
Legislation entered into force in the Netherlands in July setting a threshold of 300,000 citizens to trigger a nonbinding referendum on laws and treaties.
The Dutch election board on October 14 declared nearly 428,000 signatures valid in the GeenPeil (No Poll) citizens movement's petition drive, setting the stage for the vote within six months.
That time frame makes it likely the referendum takes place in the first half of 2016, when the Netherlands holds the EU's rotating presidency.
The signatures were collected thanks to an intensive campaign by the political and satiric blog GeenStijl (No Style), the citizens group Burgercomite EU, and Eurocritical think tank Forum voor Democratie.
Geert Wilders, the leader of the populist anti-EU and anti-immigration PVV party, has backed the initiative.
The main party in the ruling Dutch coalition, the VVD, described the organizers as "friends of [Russian President Vladimir] Putin," a sensitive accusation in the wake of the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over eastern Ukraine last year. One hundred ninety-three of the 298 people who died in that crash were Dutch.
Dutch investigators on October 14 announced their conclusion that the plane was downed by a Buk surface-to-air missile fired from a part of eastern Ukraine that was mostly under the control of Russian-backed separatists.
The campaigners against the EU-Ukrainian Association Agreement have said their aim is to give ordinary Dutch citizens a chance to have their voices heard and force a broader debate about the EU and the direction it is heading in one of the bloc's founding member states.
Despite the EU's recent expansion, GeenPeil claims, the bloc is built on a "fragile foundation" because of a lack of democratic participation by European citizens.
There are also concerns that the pact will be a precursor to Ukraine's EU membership and will commit the Netherlands to siding with Ukraine in its ongoing conflict with Russia.
The referendum's outcome would be advisory in nature, but Jan Roos, who runs the GeenStijl blog, told a press conference in The Hague on October 14 that "If people support the referendum, it will make it impossible for the cabinet not to listen to what voters have to say."
Bloomberg.com quoted Adriaan Schout of The Hague-based Institute for International Relations as saying EU negotiators might have to dilute their commitments to Ukraine or narrow their focus to improved trade terms to win back Dutch support.
"The established pro-European parties would be well-advised to take this [referendum] very seriously," professor Rudy Andeweg, a senior political lecturer at Leiden University, told the AFP news agency. (AFP, Bloomberg, EUobserver.com)