RFE/RL contributor Mykola Semena's separatism trial set to resume:
By RFE/RL
The trial of Crimean journalist Mykola Semena, indicted on separatism-related charges in the Russia-controlled territory, resumes on April 3 after a two-week adjournment.
Shortly after it got under way, the presiding judge halted the proceedings following a defense request for a more open and accessible process by holding the trial in a larger courtroom.
Semena, an RFE/RL contributor, is being prosecuted for an article he wrote criticizing Moscow's seizure of the Black Sea peninsula from Ukraine in 2014 and expressing support for a blockade of the territory initiated by Ukrainian activists.
The trial at a Russian court in the Crimean capital, Simferopol, began amid mounting international pressure on Moscow to drop the case against Semena, 66. He faces up to five years in prison if convicted.
The charges stem from a 2015 article he wrote for RFE/RL's Krym.Realii (Crimea Realities) website that Moscow-installed authorities in Crimea allege called for the violation of Russia's territorial integrity.
The column was part of a wide-ranging discussion on the website about options for Crimea and was a response to an earlier column that opposed a blockade.
Outside the court on March 20, Semena, who is barred from leaving Crimea and must request permission to travel outside Simferopol, said that he was not guilty and that the article he wrote does not include calls for the violation of Russia's territorial integrity.
"Crimea's status is in dispute," he said.
The start of Semena's trial followed a European Parliament resolution calling on Moscow to free more than 30 Ukrainian citizens who are in prison or face other conditions of restricted freedom in Russia, Crimea, and parts of eastern Ukraine that are controlled by Russia-backed separatists.
The nonbinding resolution urged Russia "to allow all the above-mentioned people to travel freely, including Mykola Semena, who is being prosecuted for his journalistic work for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty."
Washington has also called on Russian authorities "to drop spurious charges against Mr. Semena and release him and all other Ukrainians held by Russia for political reasons."
Ten members of the U.S. Congress have signed a letter urging prosecutors to drop the charges, which they said appeared to be "part of a concerted effort by Russian and Russian-backed authorities to clamp down on independent media."
Russia seized control of Crimea in March 2014 after sending in troops without insignia, engineering a takeover of the regional legislature, and staging a referendum that was swiftly dismissed as illegitimate by Ukraine, the United States, and a total of 100 countries in the UN General Assembly.
Moscow has portrayed its takeover of Crimea as necessary to protect ethnic Russians and other residents of the peninsula from oppression by pro-Western officials that took power in Kyiv following the 2014 ouster of former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych.
That narrative has been rejected by Ukraine and Western governments, which accuse Russia-backed authorities in Crimea of rights abuses against Crimean Tatars and others opposed to Moscow's rule there.
Natalya Poklonskaya, the former Russia-installed prosecutor-general in Crimea who filed the charges against Semena and who now serves in the Russian parliament, has accused RFE/RL's Krym.Realii of providing "justification for acts of sabotage and extremism" and inciting "ethnic hatred." (w/RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service)
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That concludes our live-blogging of the Ukraine crisis for Saturday, April 1, 2017. Check back here tomorrow for more of our continuing coverage.
Ukraine Rejects Eurovision Call To Allow Russian Entry
By RFE/RL
Ukraine has strongly rejected calls from the organizers of the Eurovision Song Contest for Kyiv to lift an entry ban on Russia's entry in this year's competition.
"It is unprecedented and unacceptable to demand such extraordinary decisions from Ukraine for the sake of Russia," Deputy Prime Minister Vyacheslav Kyrylenko said in a radio interview that he posted on his Twitter account on April 1.
Kyrylenko also reiterated that Russia can take part in Eurovision in Kyiv "only if their participant is someone who has not violated Ukrainian law."
The comments came after the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) urged Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Hroysman to lift the "unacceptable" ban on the Russian singer.
In a letter to Hroysman on March 31, EBU head Ingrid Deltenre warned that "several" unspecified countries have said they would consider boycotting the competition in Ukraine if Kyiv insists on barring Russia's entry.
She also warned that Ukraine's public broadcaster UAPBC "might be excluded from future events."
Russia selected singer Yulia Samoilova as its contestant earlier this month. But Ukraine says she is barred from entering the country because she violated Ukrainian law by performing in Crimea in 2015. Russia illegally annexed the Ukrainian peninsula in 2014.
Russia slammed Kyiv's ban, saying Ukraine has "a regime infected with Russophobic paranoia."
On March 24, Russia rejected a compromise offered by the EBU under which Samoilova would be allowed to compete via satellite link.
Ukraine won the right to host the Eurovision contest, the final of which is set for May 13, by winning last year with its entry, a song by Crimean Tatar performer Jamala about the 1944 deportation of Crimean Tatars by Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.
With reporting by AFP and Interfax