Here is today's map of the latest situation in the Donbas conflict zone, according to the Ukrainian Defense Ministry:
Here's more from RFE/RL's news desk on the banning of a Czech NGO from separatist-controlled Donetsk:
Separatists In Eastern Ukraine Ban Czech Aid Group
A Czech-based humanitarian organization, People In Need, says it has been banned from operating in the Donetsk area of eastern Ukraine by Russia-backed separatists there.
In a November 26 statement, the nongovernmental aid group said it was one of two international organizations that has been helping residents with home repairs, and with supplies of water and food, ahead of the coming winter.
The statement said "local authorities have taken immediate actions" to close the Donetsk region office of People In Need and have sealed off the warehouse where the group stores humanitarian aid there.
It said the separatists have also ordered all international aid workers to leave areas under their control within 24 hours.
The aid group said the banning order had been delivered to them on November 25.
It said a reason for the decision was not given.
People In Need says it has provided food to nearly 470,000 people in separatist-controlled areas of eastern Ukraine so far in 2016.
It says it has also provided material help or home repairs for more than 100,000 people.
The aid group said it is continuing to operate in the Luhansk separatist area of Ukraine as well as on government-controlled territory.
With reporting by Reuters
He's right. This French article does have some very striking images of life in the Donbas conflict zone:
RFE/RL's Christopher Miller has sent us some details of Saakashvili's rally in Kyiv today:
Saakashvili Holds Rally In Support Of New Political Movement In Ukraine
KYIV -- A diverse crowd of about 1,000 people turned out in central Kyiv for a rally in support of a new political movement headed by Mikheil Saakashvili, the reformist former Georgian president who has launched a second political career in Ukraine.
Saakashvili launched the New Forces movement and called for early parliamentary elections, days after he quit his job of governor of the Odesa region on November 7 and accused President Petro Poroshenko of coddling a corrupt elite.
Poroshenko had brought Saakashvili in to govern Odesa as part of an effort to conduct reforms in Ukraine, where entrenched graft and a costly conflict with Russia-backed separatists who hold part of the eastern Donbas region is hobbling progress following the pro-European protests that pushed Moscow-friendly President Viktor Yanukovych from power in 2014.
The rally on November 27 brought a mix of young and older people, many waving Ukrainian flags and some holding flags of the European Union -- one of the symbols of the Euromaidan protests.
Saakashvili repeated his call for early elections and promised, ""We will win, we will return Ukraine's wealth to its people and will recover its potential."
He told supporters he knows how to "make Ukraine great...and we will do it together."
Saakashvili vaulted to power in Georgia's peaceful 2003 Rose Revolution and led the country for almost a decade, but his party was defeated by an opposition coalition in 2012 parliamentary vote.
He is now sought in Georgia on criminal charges related to his 2004-2013 presidency that he says are politically motivated.