September 17, 2014

16/09/2014 Ukraine: Daily Highlights - Verkhovna Rada ratified the association agreement with the EU, as well as legalized Donbass terrorists

Ускоренное принятие законов об особом статусе территорий восточной Украины и амнистии террористов раскололо украинское общество

16/09/2014 Daily Highlights from “Digests & Analytics Ukraine” News Agency

Fast adoption of legislations on special status of Donbass and on amnesty of terrorists has devided Ukrainian society. Situation could’t been softened even by the synchronous with the EU Parliament ratification of the association agreement with the EU and adoption of the Lustration law. At the same time, terrorists continue to attack Ukrainian army in all directions in Donbass.

Ukraine

  • Verkhovna Rada ratified the association agreement with the EU synchronously with the European Parliament. The process has been broadcasted live simultaneously from both parliaments.
  • Intervention of the President of Ukraine forced deputies to conduct a closed session where they’ve adopted legislations on special status of Donbass territories seized by terrorists, and amnesty for the illegal military units participants. Main parliamentary voting screen has been off during the voting, which provided the opponents of the adopted legislation with arguments for declaring the voting being cheated. Moreover, the breach of the approval process has been stressed, as the documents have been immediately signed by the President right in the Parliament. Adoption of these laws led to mass protests of Ukrainians near Verkhovna Rada. The parliaments fence has been broken, tires have been burned, one policemen has been wounded and deputy Zhuravsky has been thrown into a trash bin. The law on lustration has been adopted with protests in the background. Analytics are skeptical about its implementation after hundreds of amendments have been introduced.
  • Analysis of the elections lists of parties and blocks demonstrates that they contain large numbers of active participants of anti-Maidan repressions, Party of Regions and KPU members, persons accused of corruption, separatism and support of terrorism, facilitated by the fact that the lists are closed.
  • National Bank devaluated Ukraian hryvnya vs the US dollar by 8 copecks: 12.98 UAH/USD (-8 cop), 16.76 UAH/EUR (-8 cop), 3.42 UAH/10 RUB (+1 cop), quotations reached 13.9-14.3 UAH/USD by the end of the trading session.

War in Ukraine

  • Heavy fights for the Donets’k International Airport are ongoing. A tank attack has been repelled and Russian military have been captured. Radio interception of terrorists talks provides evidence that terrorists are ready to use chemical weapons against Ukrainian army and volunteers of the Right Sector, who defend the airport.
  • Ukrainian military strongholds have been shelled and attacked more than 300 times since the announcement of the cease-fire according to the Minsk protocol. 16 Ukrainian military have been killed and tens wounded. Intensity of shelling of Ukrainian positions by Russians and terrorists is steadily growing.
  • Half of the planned fortifications have been built in Zaporizhye Region. Mariupil’ has completed building of the echelon fortifications on the ground.
  • As per the UN data, more than 3 000 persons, including 27 children, have been killed since the beginning of fighting in eastern Ukraine. Shelling of residential areas of Donets’k are ongoing. One woman has been killed and several people wounded, as a result of a stray shell hitting a civilian bus.
  • Russian security service conducted searches, including withdrawal of documents and computers, in the building of the Crimean Tatars Medzhlis and in the «Avdet» newspaper in Simferopol, as well as at homes and offices of Crimean Tatars and pro-Ukrainian activists.

International

  • NASA renewed its space shuttle program of in order to be independent from Russia in terms of astronauts delivery to the International Space Station (MKS). Contracts to build space shuttles will be given to Boeing and Space-X.
  • Russian Defense Minister Shojgu has informed about Russian troops deployment in Crimean direction, which seriously escalates the situation in the Black Sea basin.
  • Canadian Prime Minister announced introduction of sanctions against Russian military enterprises, Sberbank and subjects from Russian Defense Ministry, due to the recently reinforced presence in Ukraine.
  • World leaders clearly understand the challenge for the existing World order and security that coming from Russia. Ex-Secretary General of NATO Rasmussen, Supreme Allied Commander Europe Breedlove and British Minister on European Affairs Lidington, stressed in their speeches that secret and unofficial Russian invasions of border states are a pretext for a full scale war.
  • Exchange rate of Russian ruble vs major international currencies continues its sharp decline. Analytics see the effect of the sanctions as the key reason for that.  

Trends

  • Legislation on special status of Donbass and on amnesty of participants of the illegal militantly units has planted a bomb to the basement of the Ukrainian unitary state, even though the authorities and some experts believe this to be a vital retreat to regain strength and concentrate forces. At the same time, this could increase the refugees flow from the seized territories and additional budget burden, that Ukrainian citizens don't want to be liable for, as well as set a precedent for country division into separate entities.
  • Law on lustration became a useless declaration on intentions without any concrete mechanisms of implementation after more than 400 amendments have been introduced by deputies.

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