06/19/2015 Ukraine: Daily Highlights - The Constitutional Court upheld the deprivation of immunity of deputies and judges

The Constitutional Court upheld the deprivation of immunity of deputies and judges

06.19.2015 Daily Highlights by the Digests & Analytics Ukraine News Agency

Topics from Media and Social Networks

• The Constitutional Court upheld the deprivation of immunity of deputies and judges.
• All deputies of the head of the Security Services of Ukraine fired.
• "The Peacemaker" project team announced plans of a full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine.
  

Key Events in Ukraine

• President issued a decree on dismissal of all deputies of the head of the SSU without reasons given.
• President Poroshenko held a meeting with heads of law enforcement agencies on the fight against corruption, smuggling and abuse at customs. He demanded to coordinate the actions of all agencies.
• The Constitutional Court confirmed the creation of a draft law to deprive the immunity of deputies and judges with the constitution.
• The parliament didn’t adopt the law on the free transfer of oil, arrested Odessa oil refinery owned by fled oligarch Kurchenko, to the army.
• The deputies refused to send a parliamentary inquiry to President Poroshenko about his arrangements with the oligarch Firtash during the presidential election campaign.
• The Government supported the draft resolution on the state support for the development of the IT industry.
• General Prosecutor Shokin announced the beginning of court hearings of criminal cases against former President Yanukovich and senior officials of his regime, which will allow the recovery of funds received by them from criminal activity.
• SBU has blocked 250 terminals of the payment system iBox, which operated illegally in the occupied territories of Donbass, paying "taxes" in favor of the DPR and the LPR.
• Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said that the conflict with the fighters from unit "Tornado" have settled.
• Foreign Minister Klimkin said that only two points out of the necessary 15 of the plan to liberalise the visa regime with the EU were implemented.
• According to the Minister of Finance Yaresko, Ukraine has sent a new plan of debt restructuring to the International Club of creditors, envisaging a reduction of the debt, the change in the maturity and interest rate. Current repayments on Eurobonds are paid on time on June 22.
• The official exchange rate returned to the value of the previous day before the weekend: 21.64 UAH/USD (+0.31 UAH), 24.45 UAH/EUR (+0,12 UAH), 4.02 UAH/RUR 10 (+0.02).

Kyiv

• PayPass contactless system using MasterCard was launched in the capital's subway.

Ukraine at War

• More than 50 shelling were recorded in the combat zone in the Donbass in the region of Donetsk airport, Marinka, Krasnogorovka, Beresove as well as in the Luhansk region. According to official statistics one soldier was wounded. Family couple was blown on the mine in Marinka, man was killed. There are civilians injured during the shelling.
• Russia blocked extension of the OSCE monitoring mission in the Donbass and on the Russian-Ukrainian border.
  Mission UAVs recorded the movement of militants heavy equipment and artillery in areas adjacent to the boundary line pretending to be training exercises.
• The "Peacemaker" team has published documents about the invasion of the Russian army in Ukraine. Those documents list Ukrainian army units and infrastructure to be destroyed by air strikes, artillery and rocket forces.
• Local residents held a rally In Donetsk in front of the State Administration, where DPR government is located demanding an end to shelling and the withdrawal of military equipment from residential areas. The rally was dispersed by armed guards.

Ukraine and the World

• France arrested 40 accounts of Russian banks and eight buildings, which are owned by the Russian state.
• Russian President Putin said at a meeting with representatives of foreign news agencies that Russia does not recognize the jurisdiction of the Hague tribunal which ruled in favor of Yukos, since Russia did not signed the European Energy Charter and will protect its assets in the courts.
• British Prime Minister Cameron said that Russia's aggression is the same threat to the world as Islamic terrorism, and is a huge challenge for Europe at the international security conference in Bratislava.
• Chiefs of General Staff of the Visegrad Four (Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Poland) have agreed to send their experts to train the Ukrainian military personnel.
• Russia threatens Sweden with redirecting of troops and missiles in its direction in the case of joining NATO.
• British lawyers arrived in Ukraine to prepare a collective civil lawsuit against Russian President Putin on behalf of the families of those killed in the crash of flight MH-17 near Thorez.

The Trends

• According to some experts, a draft law on local elections adopted by the Verkhovna Rada in the first reading retains majority system previously operated under the guise of open lists and the public has virtually no means of influence on their formation.
• Minister of Justice, Petrenko said that Venice Commission approved the "Law on the cleansing of power", but the committee itself says that the project still need hard work, in particular lustration process and the fight against corruption should be separated.