Here's an item just in from RFE/RL's news desk:
Mine Blast In Eastern Ukraine Kills One, Traps Nine
A blast at a mine in a separatist-controlled part of eastern Ukraine's Luhansk region has killed at least one miner.
Larisa Airapetian, the top health official of the Russia-backed separatist's self-declared government in the Luhansk region, said on May 4 that the gas explosion at the Maloivanivska mine also had trapped nine miners underground.
Airapetian said four other miners were hospitalized with burn injuries from the May 3 gas explosion.
Airapetian said efforts to rescue the nine trapped miners were underway on May 4.
Three districts of Ukraine's Luhansk region have been under separatists' control since April 2014.
Based on reporting by TASS and Interfax
Here is today's map of the latest situation in the Donbas conflict zone, courtesy of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry (CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE)
Here's some details from RFE/RL's report on Bellingcat's latest findings with respect to Malaysia Airlines Flight 17:
Bellingcat Report Says Russian Buk 322 Shot Down Flight MH17
A team of open-source researchers investigating the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 says it has positively identified a Russian Buk missile launcher that shot down the plane.
A report released late on May 3 by Bellingcat, an independent team of British investigators, says flight MH17 was shot down on July 17, 2014 by Buk self-propelled missile launcher 322 from Russia's 53rd Antiaircraft Missile Brigade of Kursk.
Using photographs posted online since 2010 by members of Russia's 53rd Antiaircraft Missile Brigade, Bellingcat experts matched seven unique characteristics of the Russian Buk M1 self-propelled missile launcher that was photographed in separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine on July 17, 2014.
Those features included partially obscured identification numbers, the font and exact spacing of the digits, wheel types, a dent in the left side panel, the arrangement of cable connections to the missile launcher, white marks on both sides of the vehicle, and the shape and size of oil and soot deposits near the exhaust.
It says Buk 322 had all seven features and was the only possible candidate for identification that had even one feature in common with the Russian Buk photographed in eastern Ukraine just before the plane was shot down.
A Bellingcat report in February linked higher-ups in Russia's military chain of command to the missile attack that killed all 298 people on board the civilian passenger plane.
Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine responded to the latest Bellingcat report by denying the presence of any Russian air defense crews in territory under their control at any time, including the time the Malaysian jetliner was shot down.
The Kremlin also denies that it has sent any Russian military units into eastern Ukraine to support the separatists.
It says all Russian soldiers who have been killed or captured by Ukrainian government forces there have been volunteers.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko says Kyiv has evidence of Russian troops and equipment crossing into eastern Ukraine despite a shaky cease-fire deal brokered in Minsk.
Kyiv also says Russian now has more than 30,000 soldiers deployed in eastern Ukraine to support pro-Russia separatists there.