RFE/RL's news desk has some more details on the Russian customs authorities' push to impose tougher punishments for breaking food sanctions:
Russian customs officials have drafted a bill that calls for prison sentences for those who violate the country's retaliatory sanctions on Western food imports.
The draft bill, published on August 20 by the Federal Customs Service, calls for banned foreign foods to be listed as "strategically imported" -- a label currently reserved for radioactive nuclear materials and poisons.
The legislation would stiffen penalties against those found guilty of smuggling banned food from the European Union, the United States, and other blacklisted countries.
It would allow authorities to file criminal charges, with prison terms of up to seven years, against individuals and companies found guilty of smuggling.
For organized groups smuggling large amounts of banned foods, the punishment would be up to 12 years in prison.
The Kremlin's food bans were imposed in 2014 in retaliation for Western sanctions that were imposed against Russia over Moscow's illegal annexation of Crimea and its support for pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine.
(AP, TASS, Interfax)
It seems the Russian customs authorities almost literally want to "go nuclear" on food sanctions:
The Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has cancelled the diplomatic passports of former Ukrainian Prime Minister Mykola Azarov and 88 other former officials.
According to the ministry’s statement, these persons were no longer eligible to use their diplomatic passports and failed to return the documents back to the ministry as required by law.
Azarov fled to Russia following the Euromaidan protests that toppled the government in February 2014. The Ukrainian prosecutor's office is preparing a package of documents to ask for Azarov’s extradition. In Ukraine he is accused of abuse of power while in office.
Heorhiy Tuka, the head of Luhansk Oblast military-civilian administration, published a list of facilities in the region that will be restored on the $1.8 million given to the local government by Japan.
According to Tuka, the money will be spent on restoration and modernization of hospitals, orphanages, nursing homes, bridges and other facilities in those Luhansk towns and villages that are currently under control of the Ukrainian government.
“In the name of all residents of the Oblast, I sincerely thank the government of Japan for their assistance,” Tuka wrote on Facebook.
Germany to treat nine seriously wounded Ukrainians
Berlin (dpa) - Germany's air force is to pick up nine seriously
wounded Ukrainians Thursday for medical treatment at German military hospitals.
A medical evacuation Airbus, described by the German Luftwaffe as an "intensive care ward with wings," is to land in the late afternoon in Berlin, where five of the wounded are to be treated.
The remaining four will then be flown in the same Airbus A310 Medevac jet to the northern port city of Hamburg for treatment in another military hospital.
The armed forces said a team of German medical officers chose the nine, all wounded in fighting in eastern Ukraine with pro-Russian separatist rebels.
Germany has led tough sanctions against Russia over its annexation of Crimea from Ukraine and its support for the rebels in eastern Ukraine while spearheading diplomatic negotiations to end the conflict.
Berlin was hosting a meeting Thursday of diplomats and experts from Russia, Ukraine, France and Germany on constitutional changes being demanded of Ukraine to allow the east autonomy from Kyiv.
Four Ukrainian soldiers killed as fighting tests truce
KYIV, Aug 20 (Reuters) -- Four Ukrainian servicemen have been killed and 14 wounded in fighting with pro-Russian rebels in the past 24 hours, the Ukrainian military said on Thursday, as a new wave of violence rekindled concerns a ceasefire deal could be crumbling.
A notable increase in military and civilian casualties in the past two weeks has prompted the leaders of France and Germany, who helped broker the six-month-old truce, to arrange new talks with President Petro Poroshenko to discuss how to preserve the peace.
Ukrainian military spokesman Oleksander Motuzyanyk reported renewed rebel shelling of government positions near the separatist-held city of Donetsk and mortar fire in villages near the strategic Kiev-controlled port city of Mariupol.
"In this area the enemy does not engage in direct fighting with the Ukrainian army, but regularly fires chaotically from howitzers and GRAD multiple rocket launchers," he said.
Separatist officials accused Ukrainian troops in turn of shelling rebel territory, including residential areas.
On Wednesday, NATO warned Russia, which the West accuses of supporting the separatists with equipment and fighters, that any attempt by the rebels to take more of Ukraine's territory would be unacceptable.
Poroshenko will meet German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande in Berlin on Monday to discuss the latest escalation in the conflict, which has killed over 6,500 since erupting in April 2014.