Section: The Gulf Today (United Arab Emirates)
EU extends Crimea sanctions until 2017
Brussels: The European Union on Friday rolled over for another year sanctions imposed to protest Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea from Ukraine, which the bloc deems illegal. The announcement comes amid growing speculation the bloc will in coming days also renew much wider economic sanctions against Russia for aiding and abetting...
Implement Ukraine deal for EU to lift curbs, Russia told
SAINT PETERSBURG: European Union (EU) Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker warned Russia on Thursday that the 28-nation bloc will only lift its sanctions if the Kremlin fully implements a Ukraine peace deal. “The next step is clear, full implementation of the agreement − no more, no less,” Juncker told Russia’s main economic forum in Saint...
Nato eyes Baltics, Poland deployment
Brussels: Nato will deploy four international battalions to Poland and the three Baltic states as part of the wider pushback against Russia’s intervention in Ukraine, alliance head Jens Stoltenberg said on Monday. “We will agree to deploy by rotation four robust multi-national battalions in the Baltic states and Poland,” Stoltenberg told a...
Crimea unveils gun-toting statue to celebrate Russian annexation
Simferopol: The authorities in Crimea on Saturday unveiled a bronze statue of a heavily armed Russian soldier to celebrate the peninsula’s 2014 annexation from Ukraine. The slightly larger-than-life sculpture in Crimea’s main city of Simferopol shows a soldier carrying a Kalashnikov and wearing rounds of ammunition on his chest. A...
OSCE says staff member missing in Ukraine
KIEV: A local staffer for European monitors observing Ukraine’s flaring separatist conflict was returned on Wednesday, a day after going missing in the country’s pro-Russian east. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said a member of its Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) did not return from a planned vacation...
‘Situation in the war zone is worsening’
KIEV: A local staffer for European monitors observing Ukraine’s flaring separatist conflict was returned on Wednesday, a day after going missing in the country’s pro-Russian east. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said a member of its Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) did not return from a planned vacation...
Russia backs arming monitors in Ukraine
MOSCOW: Moscow on Saturday said for the first time it would agree to foreign monitors observing the separatist conflict in east Ukraine to carry arms. Kiev has been pushing for an armed observer mission in the area where the existing unarmed monitors of the fragile ceasefire between government forces and Russia-backed separatists have reported an...
5 Ukrainian soldiers, 2 rebels killed in fresh clashes
Kiev: Five Ukrainian soldiers and two rebel fighters have been killed in fresh clashes between government forces and pro-Russian separatists in the country’s east, the military said on Sunday. “Unfortunately, over the past 24 hours, five Ukrainian soldiers have died and four more have been wounded,” military spokesman Oleksandr Motuzyanyk...
17 die in fire at home for elderly near Kiev
Kiev: Seventeen people died when a makeshift home for elderly people outside the Ukrainian capital Kiev caught fire in the early hours of Sunday, the latest tragedy to shake the conflict-riven country. The fire tore through the two-storey shelter for the elderly which is in the village of Litochky, located some 50 kilometres north of Kiev. “The...
Germany seeks to reduce Russia curbs ‘step by step’
TALLINN: German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier on Friday floated the possibility of a “step by step” reduction of EU sanctions against Russia if there is progress on ending the conflict in Ukraine. “I hope that by the end of June there will be progress and then we can see if we can reduce the sanctions step by step, or if we stay with...
