WSB. vs Haisel Ekow (69 kg). Ukraine-Great Britain. Week 2
XL http://sport-xl.org/
By: Aleksandra Kuznetsova
Go here to read the rest:
WSB. vs Haisel Ekow (69 kg). Ukraine-Great Britain. Week 2 - Video
Jan. 21, 2015: A pro-Russian armored vehicle moves toward Slovyanoserbsk, eastern Ukraine. Moscow has proposed restoring a previously agreed line of division in eastern Ukraine to end an escalation of fighting near Donetsk, and has secured rebel agreement to pull back heavy weapons behind it, Russian foreign minister said Wednesday.(AP)
BERLIN Diplomats from Russia and Ukraine agreed Wednesday on a dividing line from where both sides should pull back their heavy weapons, just hours after separatist forces deployed more arms and manpower to an emerging flashpoint in eastern Ukraine.
Germany's Foreign Minister, who hosted a meeting of his counterparts from Russia, Ukraine and France, said the four parties had agreed that the demarcation line defined in the Minsk agreement of last year should form the basis for the withdrawal. Under the plan, Ukraine and the pro-Russian separatists would pull back their heavy arms 15 kilometers (9 miles) on either side of the line, though there was no agreement on a withdrawal of all troops.
"Today we have finally agreed that the demarcation line mentioned in the Minsk agreement is the line from where the withdrawal of heavy weapons needs to take place now," German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier told reporters after the meeting in Berlin.
Steinmeier said the agreement had been "difficult work" and the talks, which follow a fruitless round of negotiations last week, were "testing the patience of all involved." The parties also agreed that the contact group of Ukraine, Russia, and the OSCE should meet as soon as possible with the aim of laying further groundwork for a high-level meeting in Kazakhstan's capital Astana aimed at reaching a long-lasting settlement.
Separately, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said the "strong support" for the pullback was the meeting's most important result. He said the foreign ministers did not discuss the sanctions that the West has imposed on Russia over the Ukraine crisis, saying: "The sanctions are not our problem, it is the problem of those who introduced them and now do not know how to extricate themselves ..."
Earlier Wednesday, Lavrov had urged measures to contain the unfolding unrest, but said nothing about the rebels surrendering territory they acquired in violation of a peace deal concluded in September in Minsk, Belarus. Ukraine says separatist forces that are backed by Russia have overstepped agreed-upon front-line boundaries between the warring sides by 190 square miles.
A fresh separatist advance is under way in an area northwest of Luhansk, the second-largest rebel-held city. The fighting is centered on two checkpoints along a strategic highway.
Ukraine's Defense Ministry said one of those positions, Checkpoint 31, had been abandoned but that operations were underway to retake it.
The separatist forces appear well-poised to take the upper hand, however.
Here is the original post:
Russia, Ukraine agree on pullback line for heavy weapons ...
The United Nations said the violence in Ukraine is the worst since a September cease-fire, while a separatist leader threatened to mount a new offensive and warned that he will stop taking government troops prisoner.
About 262 people were killed in the conflict Jan. 13-21, an average of 29 a day, the most deadly period since the truce was signed, the UN said. At least 5,086 have been killed since April, Rupert Colville, spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said in a website statement Friday.
The escalating violence has prompted renewed diplomatic efforts to resolve the 10-month crisis, without success so far, amid warnings that time is running out to stop a wider conflict. Separatist leader Alexander Zakharchenko said theres no point in negotiating in the format that resulted in the Minsk cease-fire agreement as his forces are on the attack, the Moscow-based Interfax news service reported.
Standoff in Ukraine
Zakharchenkos statement shows that the Minsk accord doesnt work anymore, Mykhaylo Samus, the head of the Prague office of the Center for Army, Conversion and Disarmament Studies, said by phone Friday.
Ukraine and its allies in the U.S. and the European Union blame Russia for arming and aiding the rebels in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, while Russia accuses the government in Kiev of a military onslaught against its own citizens. The crisis has sent Russia-U.S. ties to their worst since the Cold War.
Defense Ministry officials in Ukraine reported more than 100 attacks by pro-Russian separatists in the past 24 hours. Three servicemen died and 50 were wounded in that period, while rebels hold more than 600 prisoners, military spokesman Andriy Lysenko told reporters in Kiev Friday.
Russia has 9,000 troops inside Ukraine, the highest number since the conflict began, and is sending 30 to 40 vehicles with weapons across the border daily, Lysenko said. The government in Moscow on Tuesday dismissed the notion its soldiers are involved as absolute nonsense.
The separatists will no longer take Ukrainian servicemen prisoner, the DAN rebel news service cited Zakharchenko, leader of the self-proclaimed Donetsk Peoples Republic, as saying. Zakharchenko said his forces dont need exchanges of prisoners after a mortar attack killed eight people at a bus stop in Donetsk Thursday, according to DAN, though he did not state what theyd do with captured soldiers. Ukraine denied its troops carried out the bus attack and blamed the rebels.
Its critically important rebel leaders attend talks in the contact group because they signed the Minsk cease-fire, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin said in an interview Friday in Davos, Switzerland. The group, which includes representatives of Ukraine, Russia, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the separatists, should meet this week to discuss a line of contact, withdrawal of forces, prisoner exchanges and humanitarian issues, he said.
Continued here:
Ukraine Death Toll Mounts as Rebels Warn of Fresh Offensive
KIEV, Ukraine, Jan. 23 (UPI) -- For the outside world looking in, the conflict in Ukraine is about big picture issues: energy markets, the economy and fear of aggression from Russian President Vladimir Putin.
But for the 46 million residents of the nation sandwiched between Russia and the European Union, increasing violence punctuates daily hardship.
Rolling blackouts, limited heat and hot water in winter's coldest months, increasing fares for public transportation and rising medical costs add to the struggles of average Ukrainians. Retail prices are up, with wages stagnant and jobs harder to come by.
Ukraine's recent troubles, sparked in March 2014 by Russia's annexation of Crimea, ended 20 years of post-Cold War peace.
"In 2014, we have, for the first time in many years, recalled our parents' toasting their post- Second World War peaceful life as the human being's consummate happiness," says Liudmyla Smotrytska, 73.
Born in Russia, Smotrytska has been living in Lviv, the largest city of western Ukraine, since the end of World War II.
Depicted by the Russian TV propaganda as the center of the "Ukrainian neo-Nazism," Lviv has given refuge to many Crimean Tatars, who fled after Russia moved in.
Later, as fighting in Ukraine's eastern regions has intensified, more Russian-speaking Ukrainians, whom Moscow was intending to protect, have fled their destroyed homes to seek shelter in safer places, such as the Ukrainian-speaking Lviv.
"Many people scared by the escalating violence in the eastern regions have been seeing Lviv as a serene harbor, but the situation seems to be deteriorating even here, in Ukraine's west," Smotrytska said.
The home of Lviv's mayor, Andriy Sadovyi, has been attacked twice. No one was injured.
Read more from the original source:
Ukraine's long, cold winter: Rising prices, escalating violence and Putin
As warmer spring weather approaches, Ukraine is feeling bold enough to talk tough with Russia on natural gas supplies.
The country is willing to cut imports from its eastern neighbor to a minimum this year unless the former allies overhaul their price agreement, the head of Ukraines state energy company said yesterday in Davos.
We could get as much as 90 percent of the gas from Europe if we fail to agree on a price with Gazprom, NAK Naftogaz Ukrainy Chief Executive Officer Andriy Kobolyev said in an interview. We can see Europes desire to work with us because we proved this year that were a very dependable and financially reliable partner.
Putin's Pipeline Politics
European suppliers, including RWE AG, GDF Suez SA (GSZ) and Statoil ASA (STL), stepped into the gap left when Russia cut supplies during a payment dispute in June, according to Kobolyev. Their price is more than 10 percent lower now than that of Russias OAO Gazprom (OGZD), which is charging Ukraine about $330 per 1,000 cubic meters in the first quarter with payments upfront.
Ukraine is trying to reduce reliance on gas shipments from Gazprom, the worlds biggest supplier of the fuel. A deadly conflict in eastern Ukraine has ruined relations with Russia, which depends on Ukraines Soviet-era pipeline network to help supply about 30 percent of Europes gas.
This winter is going to be very difficult, said Andriy Kobolyev, chief executive officer of NAK Naftogaz Ukrainy, after traveling to Slovakia to ceremonially start the first flows of gas from the EU into Ukraine. Close
This winter is going to be very difficult, said Andriy Kobolyev, chief executive... Read More
Close
This winter is going to be very difficult, said Andriy Kobolyev, chief executive officer of NAK Naftogaz Ukrainy, after traveling to Slovakia to ceremonially start the first flows of gas from the EU into Ukraine.
Link:
Ukraine Talks Tough on Russian Gas as EU Supplies More Fuel