Ukraine's law cutting off trade has come into effect:
A Ukrainian government order to cut off trade with the Russian-annexed Ukrainian region of Crimea has come into effect.
Civic activists -- many of them from Crimea's Crimean Tatar community -- who have been obstructing road traffic between the peninsula and the rest of Ukraine since late September said most of their activists will return home but some will remain to monitor compliance with the new policy.
The decision to stop trade across the administrative line was adopted by Kyiv on December 16.
Crimea has suffered significant power blackouts since unknown persons sabotaged power pylons supplying the region on November 21. Power was restored following joint efforts by Russia and Ukraine until further sabotage on December 30. (w/ Kyiv Post)
We're now closing the live blog for today, but we'll be back again tomorrow morning. In the meantime, you can keep up with all our other Ukraine coverage here.
Some incredible images here
Peripheral, but still very pertinent to Ukraine:
Here's today's map of the latest situation in the Donbas conflict zone (CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE):
