First Ukrainian President Says Sanctions Not Enough, Must Negotiate For Peace
By RFE/RL
Ukraine's first president, who help usher in the peaceful dissolution of the Soviet Union 25 years ago, said Ukraine's leaders today must find a similarly peaceful resolution of the separatist conflict in the east.
"We heeded our peoples then and signed the [dissolution] accords, and so why can't the country leaders today tap a solution consonant with the aspirations of their nations, which don't want a war?" Leonid Kravchuk said at an Atlantic Council event in Washington on November 18.
While Kravchuk said the West must keep up economic pressure on Russia by maintaining sanctions until it agrees to stop its aggression in Ukraine, he added that "you will not achieve order in the world only through sanctions."
Ukraine's only option in the end is to negotiate peace, he said.
"We have only one prospect ahead of us, and it implies dialogue and agreements,” Kravchuk said. “Other prospects are nonexistent...I'm confident Ukraine has no other pathway than that of peace."
Kravchuk has previously said that while he is ready to take up arms to defend his country, he believes Russia would quickly defeat Ukraine if an all-out war broke out between them.
IMF team says Ukraine shows signs of recovery, progress depends on reforms:
By RFE/RL
An International Monetary Fund (IMF) team visiting Ukraine on a fact-finding mission says the country's economy is showing signs of recovery but the strength and durability of the recovery depend on progress in implementing reforms.
Ron van Rooden, head of the IMF mission team that visited Kyiv from November 3 to 17, said Ukraine's economic growth rate was expected to reach 1.5 percent in 2016 and pick up to about 2.5 percent in 2017.
But he said in a statement issued on November 18 that the strength and durability of the recovery "depend crucially on the implementation of ambitious reforms to support Ukraine's transition to a full-fledged market economy."
The statement said that "decisive steps particularly need to be taken to fight corruption, which remains the most frequently mentioned obstacle to doing business in Ukraine."
It added, "tangible results in prosecuting and convicting corrupt high-level officials and recovering proceeds from corruption have yet to be achieved."
According to IMF policy, end-of-mission statements are meant to convey a team's preliminary findings after a visit to a country and do not necessarily represent the views of the IMF's executive board.
Meanwhile, in what may be Moscow's next "hybrid war" front...: