Ukraine's Yanukovich Hits Back At EU Over Tymoshenko

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich hit back at the European Union over jailed opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko on Friday, saying he would not pursue integration with the EU at the price of allowing it to interfere in her case. The seven-year prison term meted out to Tymoshenko has been condemned as political persecution by Western leaders and stopped important Ukrainian agreements with the EU on political association and a free-trade zone dead in their tracks. Yanukovich made his remarks in a speech marking Independence Day that also drew several thousand opposition supporters onto the streets of the capital in protest at his government's economic policies and Tymoshenko's imprisonment. Yanukovich, midway through a five-year term in power in the former Soviet republic, said in a keynote address to government and church officials that his leadership was committed to joining the European mainstream. He went on: "But integration at any price in exchange for losing independence or for making economic or territorial concessions or in exchange for allowing interference in our internal affairs - this is a path which we have never accepted and will never accept." The Tymoshenko affair will be a major issue in an Oct. 28 parliamentary election when Yanukovich's majority Party of the Regions faces a strong challenge from the united opposition. The EU and the United States regard Tymoshenko, firebrand leader of the 2004 Orange Revolution street protests and a former prime minister, as the victim of selective justice and say her trial was politically motivated. But Yanukovich, whose first bid for power was overturned by the Orange Revolution but who later went on to beat Tymoshenko in a bitter run-off for the presidency in 2010, has refused to secure her release and allow her to return to political life. Tymoshenko was convicted last October of abuse of office in connection with a gas deal which she brokered with Russia in 2009 when she was prime minister. The Yanukovich government says it saddled Ukraine with exorbitant prices for strategic gas imports which are now impairing the economy. She is appealing against her conviction, but a second trial has been opened against her for alleged embezzlement and tax evasion. Yanukovich, resorting to a tactic used by Ukrainian negotiators before, hinted that Ukraine might opt for tighter economic association with Russia if its path to integration with Europe proved too difficult. "We must multilaterally develop cooperation with our CIS partners. After all that is where there is the biggest market for Ukrainian producers. We should not ignore the integration processes which are going on there," he said. Despite frequently dropping the hint that it will turn to Russia if spurned by the EU, Ukraine has for several years rejected membership of a Russian-led customs union of ex-Soviet republics as an economic blueprint for the future. Several thousand opposition protesters marched in Kiev on Friday to show their solidarity with Tymoshenko and to criticise government reforms, which have imposed higher taxes on small business and forced people to push back the age of retirement. In an audio-recording from jail that was played at Friday's opposition rally, Tymoshenko appealed for uncompromising struggle against what she called "absolute evil" in the country. "Do not leave our young country to the kleptocrats, the occupiers and dictators. Do not adapt yourself to their level of immorality. Do not betray yourselves or the country," she said.

Concerns Over Ukraine's Smuggle Tunnels To EU

BUDAPEST, Hungary -- Ukrainian authorities have launched an investigation into a tunnel network running from its border into neighboring Slovakia, a member of the European Union. There has been mounting international concern that organized crime groups from the former Soviet Union smuggle people, weapons, drugs, cigarettes and other goods into the European Union. Ukraine's secret service, SBU, says it has discovered a suspected smuggler tunnel running from the western Ukrainian border village of Mali Selmenci into Slovakia. In a statement, the SBU says the tunnel's entrance was beneath a retail store, ironically called 'Europa.' The store sold clothing and household merchandise. But the SBU believes the real purpose was to hide a dangerous, four-meter (13-foot) deep, underground tunnel, to smuggle goods or people into the European Union. Ukraine, which is not an EU member, has come under pressure to crackdown on organized crime. Slovaks found an even more advanced 700 meter (2,297 feet) tunnel last month, explained Slovakia's Interior Minister Robert Kalinak. The tunnel was equipped with a small train and tracks running from the western Ukrainian border town of Uzhhorod into Slovakia. Minister Kalinak says, "it was capable of transporting various kinds of goods" and he "suspects also people." Investigators in Slovakia and Ukraine say "sophisticated mining-technology" appeared to have been used to dig out the tunnel, which ran about six-meters (20 feet) below ground. It underscores that crime groups are finding new ways to reach the European Union, where many border controls between member states have been removed. Slovakia, which joined the visa-free EU zone several years ago, claims it has taken adequate steps to protect it. But Finance Minister Peter Kazimir acknowledges that tax authorities lost millions in revenues in the recently discovered tunnel network. He claims 13,100 cartons containing 200 cigarettes each were seized in the July raid, the equivalent of more than two-and-a-half million cigarettes. Kazimir estimates excise tax evasion could reach up to $61-million if "the tunnel was used for a year." The minister has compared the tunnel to those built by drug cartels along the U.S.-Mexico border. Police say the owner of the Slovak warehouse involved in the operation was detained on site, along with a truck driver in a different location. But officials caution a joint investigation with Ukraine is expected to reveal that many more individuals have been involved in the underground operation. Slovakia shares a nearly 100-kilometer (62-mile) long border with Ukraine and security forces say its remoteness and deep forests are often used by smugglers of drugs, cigarettes and refugees from east to west. American and European diplomats are also concerned that weapons and nuclear material from aging, Soviet-era, facilities are illegally transported from the ex-Soviet Union. Back in Ukraine, residents are upset about the smuggler tunnels. A worker constructing a home near the discovered tunnel in the Ukrainian border town of Uzhhorod says he often saw a mini bus arriving there with well-dressed passengers. The man complains he "thought they were intelligent people, but look at what they did." Local residents claim corrupt officials, including mayors and judges, must have known about the tunnels but were paid to look the other way. They also fear authorities will blow up the tunnels or flood them with sewage water to hide evidence. Giving and taking bribes, locals say, has become a way of life in Ukraine following the chaotic collapse of the Soviet Union. That does not surprise watchdog group Transparency International, which ranks Ukraine among the world's most corrupt nations. Concern over Ukraine's borders has added to international pressure on neighboring EU members Slovakia, Poland, Romania and Hungary to step up efforts to keep the 27-nation union safe from illicit trade.

Ukrainian Catholic Leader Hopes To Mend Ties With Russian Orthodox

KOLOMYYA, Ukraine -- The major archbishop of the Ukrainian Catholic Church said he hopes to follow up a Polish-Russian joint message by pursuing a similar reconciliation process with Russian Orthodox leaders. "We should also take such a path of reconciliation -- without this, it will be impossible to stop Russification in Ukraine and Ukrainophobia in Russia," said Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk of Kiev-Halych. "If we somehow try to settle painful questions of the past as Christians in light of the Gospel and to heal our memory solely by means of reconciliation, then we can build something constructive," he said at a mid-August news conference in Kolomyya. On Aug. 17, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church and the president of the Polish Catholic bishops' conference signed a joint message urging Poles and Russians to set aside centuries of anger and prejudice and work together to maintain their countries' Christian identities. Archbishop Shevchuk said the declaration had not specified "what Poles forgive the Russians for and what the Orthodox church intends to apologize to the Latin church in Poland for," but he said the text had provided "a very powerful example." Eastern and Latin Catholics make up 10 percent of Ukraine's population of 46 million, compared to around a third belonging to the country's three rival Orthodox denominations. Church ties in Ukraine have long been tense over Orthodox complaints of Catholic proselytism, as well as over the reclaiming of churches by Eastern Catholics. Archbishop Shevchuk said Russian Orthodox Metropolitan Kirill of Moscow seemed ready to communicate "not only with the head of the whole Catholic Church, but also with the head of a national church." He noted that most Russian Orthodox conversations about Ukrainian Catholics were at the Vatican, "almost always without us."

Ukraine's Yanukovych Flirts With Russia As Election Looms

SOCHI, Russia -- Ukraine's President Viktor Yanukovych hinted on Saturday he may soften his stance against Russia over gas prices and membership of Moscow-backed regional groups, seeking support from the Soviet-era ruler before an October parliamentary election. Ukraine is heavily dependent on Russian gas while about 70 percent of Russia's gas exports to Europe go via Ukraine. Kiev has tried for years to renegotiate a deal struck in January 2009 after Ukraine's squabbling with Moscow left several European countries without gas for almost three weeks when Russia halted exports via Ukraine. Yanukovych, whose party faces an election in late October, met Vladimir Putin in the Russian president's Black Sea residence of Bocharov Ruchei. This was second such meeting in just over six weeks, and despite the fact that the encounter again failed to produce any solid results, the Ukrainian leader said his country may change its stance in gas talks. He gave no further details. "The issue (of gas supplies from Russia) will never be excluded from our relations and will always remain sensitive," he said. "We would like to slightly alter our positions in our relations with Russia." After failing to get a discount from Moscow in prolonged negotiations throughout 2011, Ukraine, which pays more than $400 per 1,000 cubic metres of Russian gas - on a par with Europe - tried to cut the volume of its gas imports, set at maximum of around 50 billion cubic metres (bcm) a year. The Kremlin has hinted that it may sweeten the gas deal if Ukraine joins a Putin-brokered alliance, including fellow former Soviet states of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan. Kiev has resisted the idea of jointly building Putin's vision of a Eurasian Union, but Yanukovych told the Russian president that Ukraine is willing to participate in another Moscow-backed entity, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation. "We would like to become observers in this organisation so that we would be able to take part in integration processes on this territory," Yanukovych said. Yanukovych's Party of the Regions hopes to get a renewed majority at Oct. 28 elections despite signs of flagging support in parts of the country's industrialised east and south, with high gas prices paid by consumers traditionally seen as a major shortcoming of the Ukrainian leadership. Supporting Putin, who is popular among the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine, was crucial for Yanukovych in his victory in 2010 presidential election, when he trounced the leader of the 2004-2005 Orange Revolution Yulia Tymoshenko. Tymoshenko was jailed last year for abuse of office relating to the January 2009 gas agreement.

National Art Museum Of Ukraine's "Sleeping Beauty" Exhibit Invites Men To Awaken Beauties With A Kiss

KIEV, Ukraine -- A group of women were slated to snooze in the central gallery of the National Art Museum of Ukraine this month, inviting worthy male suitors to try and wake the slumbering women with a single kiss. They're not under the spell of an evil witch or a poison apple however; instead, the ladies been recruited to participate in an art exhibit appropriately titled "Sleeping Beauty." The fairy-tale inspired project was imagined by Ukrainian-Canadian artist Taras Polataiko. Influenced by an old story by Charles Perrault, where a young maiden is cursed to sleep for 100 years, only to be awakened by true love's kiss. In the spirit of this "once upon a time" literature, Polataiko cast several female volunteers as his performance beauties, tasked with "sleeping" in the Ukrainian museum for two hours at a time, every day from August 22nd until September 9th. Dressed in white and laid upon an elevated bed, the women lay motionless in the museum's space, awaiting a kiss from that one perfect museum patron. But there's a serious legal catch to the piece. To participate in the exhibit, potential princes have to sign a contract that states, "If I kiss the Beauty and she opens her eyes, I agree to marry her." The female performers have also entered into an agreement that reads, "If I open my eyes while being kissed, I agree to marry the kisser." So unlike the chivalrous charmers of yore, these contemporary heroes are contractually bound to live happily ever after if their princess so chooses. This modern interpretation of damsels in distress gives the woman a say in whether she will be rescued or not, though the performance still adheres to the archaic concept that only a male will awaken the sleeping princesses. "The tension of the performance is in the seductiveness and fear of the ultimate moment," describes the exhibit's press release. "The viewer will have to think twice before kissing the Beauty. The Beauty will have to decide if the ultimate moment has come or not. The show will end the moment the Beauty opens her eyes." The "Sleeping Beauty" exhibit almost experienced it's own unhappy ending in the run-up to its opening, when the artist Polataiko was called to the museum director's office and told by the Ukrainian Ministry of Culture that he would be forced to shut down his work. Polataiko recounted the attempted censorship on his Facebook page, stating that the ministry provided no reason behind their disapproval and later likened the situation to "a return to totalitarianism." The disagreement was later worked out in meetings between the ministry and the museum. Nataliia Mykhailova, a public relations representative at the museum, confirmed the Ministry of Culture's intervention, stating in an email to the Huffington Post: "We really had some difficulties, but now it is all arranged and the exhibition is working as planned." The museum has a history of experiencing resistance on the part of the Ukrainian government, as a serpentine installation erected on the exterior of the museum earlier this summer was almost halted after officials claimed the material was flammable. Taras Polataiko's "Sleeping Beauty" will take place until September 9th at the National Museum of Ukraine's central gallery.

One of world's most venomous fish invade Russian waters

Not that long ago, sharks invaded the coastal waters of Russia's Primorye region in the Far East. Now it is puffer fish that terrify local residents. One such fish is enough to kill 40 people. In addition, biologists expect venomous jellyfish to invade the waters of the region soon. It turns out that it is the warm waters of the region that attract exotic marine creatures. A recent mission conducted by specialists of TINRO Center showed that squid, saury fish and dog-fish, aka puffer fish, inhabit the open part of the Sea of ​​Japan. Now puffer fish can be found in large quantities in the waters from the Gulf of Peter the Great to Moneron Island off the southwest coast of Sakhalin Island, RIA PrimaMedia reports. "The quantity of puffer fish varies depending on the results of spawning, - the press-secretary of TINRO Center, Konstantin Osipov said. - It is impossible to say for certain to which extent the number of this fish has grown this summer." The fish will stay in the waters of Primorye till the end of September. This fish is deadly venomous. There is no antidote to its venom. Its internal organs contain tetrodoxin that has neuroparalytic action. This poison is more than 1,000 times stronger than cyanide.

Boris Yeltsin's monument desecrated with blue paint in Russia

In Russia's Yekaterinburg, unidentified individuals doused the monument to the first Russian President Boris Yeltsin with blue paint at night on August 23. According to the press service of the Central Directorate of the Russian Interior Ministry for the Sverdlovsk region, the vandals committed the action during the time period from 3 to 8 a.m. Cityscape specialists arrived to the monument promptly, covered the monument with special chemicals and then washed the paint off. They currently work on the restoration of the stone letters, which the vandals damaged too. Law enforcers qualified the attack against the monument as vandalism, under article 214 of the Criminal Code. The second part of the article runs: "The acts committed by a group of individuals, motivated by political, ideological, racial, ethnic or religious hatred shall be punishable with a prison term of up to three years." Judging by the scale, height and density of the blue paint attack (the memorial is a 10-meter stele of white marble with the full-length bas-relief of Boris Yeltsin), the act was committed by several people. One person would not have coped with the task. In addition, the fact that the paint attack happened now (the monument has been standing there peacefully since February 2011), implies "the motives of political or ideological hatred." After the verdict against Pussy Riot, a wave of abusive actions committed against various sanctuaries has swept across Russia (and other countries). Desecrating churches could somehow fit into the logic of a radical protest. However, why did they put balaclavas on the statues of Belarusian partisans in the Moscow subway? The trick can not be legally classified as vandalism, of course: nothing was broken or dirtied. However, common people can only care less about the legal nuances. Ordinary passengers of the Moscow subway, who made the statues wear balaclavas, were not acting under the Criminal Code. They were guided by their own conscience, rather than the "freedom of expression". The hooligan was pulled off the pedestal and then handed over to police officers. "He insulted me personally and my grandfathers who fought in World War II," a passenger said after the incident. Another case was more interesting. Someone wrote "Free Pussy Riot" on the Holy Ascension Cathedral in Russia's Pskov region. That seems to be an act of vandalism. However, a criminal case was not filed. The church was not damaged much, the inscription was painted over in a few hours. The memorial to the first Russian president triggered heated debates in the Russian society from the very start. Roman senator Marcus Porcius Cato the Elder (whose personal motto was "Carthage must be destroyed") used to say: "After I'm dead I'd rather have people ask why I have no monument than why I have one." However, the deal was done, and what happened to the Yeltsin monument in the night of August 23-24 is abominable. Action provokes counteraction. Pussy Riot fans do not see any restrictions or common sense for themselves in their aspiration to take revenge for the infamous punk band. Russian bloggers called the incident in Yekaterinburg "an installation, expressing artistic protest against liberal values." Those, who advocate limitless freedom, can enjoy.

Visa-free regime between Russia and EU just around the corner

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov hopes that Russia and the European Union will soon abolish the visa regime. "We hope that soon there will be no visas required for mutual trips. We hope to finalize the work on the list of "common steps" as soon as possible to proceed directly to the elaboration of the agreement on visa-free short-term travel for citizens of Russia and the European Union." The Foreign Minister also said that Russia was completing the talks on the modernization of the adequate agreement between Russia and the EU to simplify visa formalities. He reminded that the Russian-Polish intergovernmental agreement had recently come into force. The agreement regulates the regime of local border movement for the residents of Russia's Kaliningrad enclave and the regions of Poland that are comparable in size, writes TurNavigator.ru. Lavrov expressed a hope that Lithuania would follow Poland's example. Lavrov added at the meeting of Finnish ambassadors and permanent representatives in Helsinki that Moscow did not exclude an opportunity for establishing alliances with the EU in various sectors of economy: "We are ready to consider the creation of strategic alliances in various industries - aircraft industry, shipbuilding, automotive, medical, pharmaceutical and nuclear power industries," said the minister. In addition, Lavrov urged not to scoop when working on international issues: "In Finland, like in Russia, many are familiar with such a sport as rafting on mountain rivers. This sport can work only through teamwork. If someone paddles separately, ignoring the partners, the raft will capsize," he said. "Today, international relations require exactly the same - teamwork. Russia is ready for it," concluded the Russian minister.

Kursk Scared the NATO Fleet

August is a black month for the Russian Navy. On August 12, 2000 the nuclear submarine "Kursk" sank, on August 30, 2003 submarine "K-159" sank in the Barents Sea, on August 7 of 2005 bathyscaphe "AC-28" almost sank off the coast of Kamchatka. The loss of "Kursk" 12 years ago still causes heated discussions: how could this happen? At the time, "Pravda.Ru" was one of the first (if not the first) of the Russian media outlets that published the most horrible theory of death of the missile submarine a year after the tragedy. A group of Russian 'conceptual' scientists thought that the submarine was killed by a collision with a foreign military submarine, presumably American. They say the report turned up on the desks of the top officials of the country. However, there has been no response to it so far. To this day, that theory is not completely rebutted. K-141 "Kursk" was the Russian nuclear missile-carrying cruiser of Project 949A "Antaeus." It was built at the Severodvinsk shipyard "Sevmash" in 1992, and commissioned on December 30, 1994. From 1995 to 2000, "Kursk" served in the Russian Northern Fleet and was based in Vidyaevo. It sank in the Barents Sea, 175 kilometers from Severomorsk at a depth of 108 meters in a crash that occurred on August 12, 2000. All 118 crew members on board were killed. In terms of the number of deaths it was the second largest accident in the postwar history of the Russian submarine fleet after the explosion of ammunition on the submarine B-37. Immediately after the accident a few admirals and officials claimed that "Kursk" was torpedoed by an American submarine. Later, this theory was silenced in favor of the official one. The admirals were ordered to keep silent. However, director Jean-Michel Carré in his film "The Kursk: A Submarine in troubled waters" that aired on January 7, 2005 on French television, argues that "Kursk" was torpedoed by a U.S. submarine "Memphis." According to his theory, "Kursk" was performing a test shot of the new torpedo "Squall", and the tests were observed by two American submarines - "Memphis" and "Toledo." There's nothing unusual there - normally both Russian and NATO submariners watch each other during tests and in the ordinary course of combat training. This is understandable as it is the best way to teach divers combat skills. However, it is done at a safe distance. "Toledo" came dangerously close under the guise of "Memphis" that was "in the shadow." At some point "Kursk" and "Toledo" clashed (a video of "Kursk" sitting at the bottom of the sea shows long gaps in its case) and to prevent "Kursk" from shooting at "Toledo," "Memphis" has opened fire at "Kursk". Some of Russia's top retired military officials still think this theory to be true. Apparently, even if we learn the truth, it will not be any time soon. One way or another, "Kursk" was the most "uncomfortable" of the Russian submarines for the American fleet. A year before the accident the Russian submarine bomber scared the entire NATO. In August - October of 1999 the ship that NATO called "the killer of aircraft carriers", participated in the march into the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea after performing an "excellent" missile firing at the order of the Russian Navy commander. The ship secretly broke into the Mediterranean via Gibraltar. The "Kursk" conducted covert surveillance of the group of the Sixth Fleet of the U.S. Navy in the Mediterranean that included the aircraft carrier "Theodore Roosevelt," used against Serbia during the NATO operation against Yugoslavia. During the campaign in the Mediterranean, "Kursk" performed five conventional attacks at the real targets. As a result of the campaign, 72 crew members were presented with the government awards. In fact, "Kursk" was covering Yugoslavia. The sudden appearance in the Mediterranean of the newest "killer of aircraft carriers" caused panic in the U.S. Navy. All anti-submarine forces of the Mediterranean countries of NATO were involved in the search of "Kursk." However, the K-141 disappeared as suddenly as it emerged, inflicting a crushing blow to the American pride. Several top ranking officials, including the commander of the Gibraltar defense zone, lost their jobs, and "Kursk" and its commander were elevated to the rank of "personal enemies of America." The commander of the nuclear submarine, captain of the first rank Gennady Lyachin, was awarded the title of the hero of Russia. He never received his well-deserved reward because of red-tape. In 1999 captain of the crew, commander Lyachin, was preparing for the new long march as part of a powerful group. after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia was preparing the return to the Mediterranean Sea. On July 30, 2000, the crew of "Kursk" took part in the military-marine parade dedicated to the Day of ​​the Fleet in Severomorsk. On October 15, 2000 the submarine was to access the Mediterranean Sea from Severomorsk, but sank on August 12.

Pussy Riot would be sentenced to longer terms in the West

he Western media continue to comment on the verdict that was brought down against three members of punk band Pussy Riot for their infamous punk prayer at Moscow's iconic Cathedral of Christ the Savior. The three members of the band, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Maria Alyokhina and Ekaterina Samutsevich were sentenced to two years of general regime colony. This is an unusual review: As a rule, Western publications do their best to criticize the Russian government and support the three young women. In Spain, the Pussy Riot case has not received an adequate response, Spanish writer Rosa Regas complained in a blog on the website of El Mundo newspaper. The Spanish youth support the three Russian women only on social networks, saying that the punk prayer was just a political protest. "It's important to realize what courage and bravery these girls shown when they came out in a country like Russia to protest against the support, which the local equivalent of the Pope gives to Putin's dictatorial policies," says the article. According to Regas, the girls used their democracy-guaranteed right to criticize and express opinions. However, the Spanish writer added, in Russia, just like in most Western countries, religions have the power that they receive from the government. Today, the economy takes precedence over the social field. Pre-election campaign strategies are more important than ideologies, "and the church, whatever it may be and what beliefs it may practice, is placed higher than democracy," Regas believes. In the case of Pussy Riot, the church "violates one of the fundamental freedoms of the citizens of democratic countries - the freedom of expression," the article in the Spanish newspaper said. In turn, a journalist of Britain's, The Guardian reproached his government for blatant hypocrisy. He recalled that a month ago, a London court sentenced Charlie Gilmour to 18 months in prison for swinging on the British flag on the Cenotaph - the memorial to war victims - and for throwing an urn at a police car. "How can the British politicians, whose statements clearly aim to influence the compliant judges, criticize other independent states for the same thing?" the British journalist wondered. He is certain should a rock band come to Westminster Abbey and seriously offend religious or ethnic minorities in front of the altar, British judges would definitely stage a show trial. Russian Ambassador to Austria Sergey Nechayev had to comment the Pussy Riot verdict too. In an interview with Die Presse, he stressed that the sentence of two years in a colony was comparable to the punishment for such a crime in other European countries. He cited the example of Austria, where "hooliganism in a church or blasphemy is prosecuted and punished with imprisonment." He also criticized the act in support of Pussy Riot in Vienna, when four masked men broke into the Cathedral of St. Nicholas of the Russian Orthodox Church. There was only a guard and a cleaning lady in the church at that moment. The supporters of the notorious Russian band climbed onto the ambo and unfolded a banner with the slogan "God Loves Pussy Riot, Free Pussy Riot." They took photos of their own act and left. Nechayev set out a hope that the men would be punished accordingly. In turn, The Washington Post columnist Anne Applebaum wrote that the dangerous controversy for the Russian authorities connected with the case of Pussy Riot comes from singer Madonna. This is not because Madonna is a major political figure - this is just because she is not a political figure at all, the columnist believes. Madonna has never been concerned about the persecution of Russian women before. She did not respond to the murder of Anna Politkovskaya and Estemirova, but this is a different story. It goes about her colleagues in show business - pop stars, as the columnist said. According to Applebaum, this is exactly the difference that creates a non-standard problem for President Putin.

Nine-year-old girl follows 'employer' to her death

The whole Russia was shocked with the atrocious murder of nine-year-old girl Anna Prokopenko in Russia's Pyatigorsk. The murderer was arrested several days after the girl's body was found in the woods. The murderer, Vladimir Ambartsumov, told the police that he came up to the girl in the street and offered her a job. Anna, not suspecting anything wrong, agreed to go with the pedophile to his office. The investigative experiment took place on August 1 in the forest, where the schoolgirl's body was found. According to Ambartsumov, as soon as he and the girl reached a deserted place, he immediately attacked her. The girl began to scream and tried to escape, but the criminal ordered her to remain silent and raped her several times. The schoolgirl was trying to escape from the hands of the strong man, but was unable to do so - she only scratched him. After Ambartsumov abused the child, he strangled the girl and carried her body to another place. During the experiment, police officers made the suspect wear a bulletproof vest. Riot police were on duty nearby. Apparently, the police were afraid lest the girl's relatives or local residents should lynch the murderer. As it turned out, the suspect in the murder of Anna Prokopenko was involved in another crime. "It was revealed that Ambartsumov raped a young woman in Pyatigorsk on July 3, 2012. He committed the crime when he was staying at the woman's home," the press service of the Investigative Committee of the Stavropol region told Pravda.Ru. In addition, Ambartsumov had recently been released from prison. Local residents helped detectives find Anna Prokopenko's killer. The suspect's composite sketch had been changed several times as new details of the killer's appearance emerged. As a result, the sketch photo became almost 100% identical to the real photo of the wanted man. The murderer was identified by his own neighbors, who went to police immediately after they saw his photo. The suspect in the murder of the girl agreed for the procedure of DNA expertise. "Ambartsumov, being completely sure that he had not left a trace of his DNA on the girl's body, voluntarily agreed for forensic DNA analysis, - officials from the Investigative Committee said. - The results of genetic expertise confirmed that the biological traces found on the girl's clothes belonged to Ambartsumov. In addition, when studying the recordings of surveillance cameras, the investigators found that the man who was seen next to the girl shortly before the crime looked like Ambartsumov." The footage from one of the cameras showed Ambartsumov and Anna Prokopenko walking down the street. The child is actively talking to the man. The video showed the last several minutes of Anna's life. Investigators said that the girl willingly followed Ambartsumov when he offered her a job. The alleged killer told her that owned his own business to distribute cosmetic products. He told the girl that she would suit well for a promoter. The girl agreed, and Ambartsumov offered the child to discuss details in the office. The schoolgirl from a common family gladly accepted the offer and followed the man. Anna Prokopenko disappeared from a playground on July 23rd. Dozens of volunteers started looking for the girl when she did not return home that day. The girl's body was found two days later, on July 25, at the foot of Mount Mashuk. Witnesses said that they had seen Anna walking away with a stranger. Two suspects were arrested: the guard of a construction site located near the playground, and a suspicious man, who was standing aloof from all at the girl's funeral. As it turned out later, none of them was involved in the murder. If found guilty, Vladimir Ambartsumov will face life imprisonment. Although many would like to see him hang.

Russian submarine sailed incognito along the coast of the U.S

A Russian nuclear submarine of project 971 ("Jaws", in NATO classification), armed with long-range cruise missiles, sailed for a long time without being detected in the waters along the U.S. coastline, the Gulf of Mexico, informs the Washington Free Beacon, citing an unnamed U.S. official. The submarie has the capability of sinking U.S. nuclear submarines or aircraft carriers. "The Akula was built for one reason and one reason only: To kill U.S. Navy ballistic missile submarines and their crews," said a second U.S. official. The submarine is distinctive for its large tail fin. They are equipped with the SSN-21 and SSN-27 submarine-launched cruise missiles, as well as SSN-15 anti-submarine-warfare missiles. The SSN-21 has a range of up to 1,860 miles. The submarines also can lay mines. According to this information, the presence of the Russian submarine off the American coast of was confirmed only after the ship had left the region. "It's a silent submarine, able to approach undetected," the official said. The Akula-class attack submarine is one of Russia's quietest submarines. The U.S. Navy operates a strategic nuclear submarine base at Kings Bay, Georgia. The base is home port to eight missile equipped submarines. Representatives of the U.S. Navy refused to comment on the report. The vast majority o fthe U.S. media is also keeping the incident under wraps. The incident was the second known time Russian submarines have made their way into U.S. territorial waters in 2009. The Gulf incursion took place at the same time Russian strategic bombers made incursions into restricted U.S. airspace near Alaska and California in June and July. On the West Coast, a Bear H strategic bomber flew into U.S. airspace near California and was met by U.S. interceptor jets. In a letter to Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Jonathan Greenert on Friday, Senator John Cornyn (Republican, Texas) demanded "a detailed explanation of the facts" surrounding the incident. Russian Deputy Premier, Dmitri Rogozin, announced months ago that Russia was working on a plan to build 10 new attack submarines and 10 new missile submarines through 2030, along with new aircraft carriers. Russia delivered one of its Akula-2 submarines to India in 2009. Republican presidential candidates have targeted Medicare, Medicaid and other federal entitlement programs for future budget cuts. But, one candidate set his sites on the United States' defense budget, which he said should be on the table, as well. "If you look at defense ... we're spending more than the rest of the world combined," former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman said in a debate with former House Speaker Newt Gingrich. The military industrial complex has to be getting nervous with the talk of cuts in military spending. The Obama administration's has put forth a plan to reduce defense spending by $487 billion over the next 10 years. So they hope the scare tactics will serve them.

US presidents useless - Putin

"I think that the missile defense problem will not be solved if Obama is reelected or not," Putin. President Vladimir Putin has been aware of the fact that the US has been and will continue pointing missiles at Russia and surrounding it with military bases. He knew that the promises from Reagan to Gorbachev were broken in the 90's. He never expected to get treated better than the US treated the Native Americans. Even if Obama promised the moon Putin would not have believed him. So, why the meeting? Two hours alone together and I'm sure Putin broke his smile and terrified Obama with facts Obama thought surely were known to him and his CIA. Revealing to Obama, "We know your plans, where your military and agents are located. WW3 will be on your head and legacy". Obama was faced with only saying he was not in charge and he had no choice. Cold hard facts and laying their cards on the table with the entire world at stake must have made 2 hours seem like 2 years to Obama. Putin told the press, "The United States has been following the path of creating its own missile defense for more than one year, and I do not see anything that could change its approach," He said the European Union, Russia and the United States should all cooperate in developing a missile shield: "This means all three participants would jointly be building that system, and would be able to jointly assess threats, manage that system and make decisions on its use," He knows that will not happen but he continues to offer solutions to the US. Putin had already said a few days before the meeting, that an arms race had begun and that Russia had no choice. He can talk to other countries like China and Iran and receive cooperation from them but not the US government. What is it about America that makes it look down their noses at other nations? They did make friends with the Nazis after the war having several SS officers join the CIA and even Wernher von Braun helped America get to the moon. Then there's those damn Bilderbergers who were started by German born Prince Bernhard (video / photo of him with Nazis salute-1:15) who was a member of the Nazis party and the infamous SS (Schutzstaffel). The world was wrong when it thought the Nazis would come from Argentina. Putin sees the storm clouds gathering and warned last May, "respecting the state sovereignty and each nation's right to make their choices is one of certain guarantees that the tragedy of the past war (WW2) will not recur." President Putin knows the US will not alter its course so he gathers "Allies" all over the world as Churchill did to fight the aggressor nation. The BRICS (Brazil, India, China, South Africa) are just a few countries who side with Russia. Even France is currently having joint military exercises with Russia in the Barents Sea. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton presented Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov with a so called "reset" button in 2009. Hillary said she and Obama wanted to reset their relationship. The only problem was that the button said "overcharged". Hillary laughed and said she wouldn't let Russia overcharge the US. That was the last time I saw Lavrov laugh and smile at a US official because the US government has been charging all over the Middle East creating havoc and unleashing the dogs of war. Love him or hate him, the peace of the world is in his hands. The US will not turn away from violence, therefore it's up to Vladimir and company. President Putin will unite Russia and other countries to stop US aggression. He may even prevent WW3 from happening.

Russia to build world's largest nuclear icebreaker of new generation

On Thursday, August 23, Russia's Nuclear Power Corporation Rosatom signed a contract for the construction of the main universal icebreaker of new generation. The icebreaker will be of dual draft: it will operate on both the rivers of the Arctic region, and on the Northern Sea Route, reports KM.ru. It will also be able to replace "Arktika" and "Taimyr" nuclear icebreakers. The width of those vessels is 30 meters, whereas the width of the new ship will be 34 meters. Thus, the new ship will be able to bring the tankers with the displacement of not more than 70,000 tons. In the future, the Baltic Factory shipyard plans to build two more nuclear-powered icebreakers, says Lenta.ru. If the program is implemented, the ships will be launched in 2019 and 2020. The new icebreaker will require adequate servicing and equipment. "As long as the icebreaker is larger and heavier, it will not fit anywhere. The company will need a new floating dock of a large size and capacity. To service the reactor, one will need to have the new cargo handling equipment," Vyacheslav Ruksha, the head of Atomflot said. "Without the new cargo handling equipment, I will not be able to load the fuel into the reactor systems of the new icebreaker. This means that by the time the construction of the new icebreaker is completed, the cargo handling equipment must be ready too. As soon as we accept the icebreaker for operation, the need for docking the ship may arise at any moment. Our company must have the appropriate docking station," the official added.

Football fans attack McDonald's restaurant in Russia's St. Petersburg

In Russia's St. Petersburg, about 50 youths attacked the visitors of McDonald's restaurant who were sitting on the open veranda of McDonald's restaurant near Moskovskaya metro station at night of August 22. Russian media explained the incident with the vengeance of Zenit football fans, who threatened to attack Anzhi fans after the game within the scope on the Russian Championship in Makhachkala, Dagestan, which took place on Sunday. Officials with the Russian Premier League could not find a confirmation to this fact. It is possible that the hooligan fans decided to punish the offenders their own way. Three citizens of Dagestan were hospitalized with injuries of various degrees after the brawl. Seven residents of St. Petersburg, who took part in the attack, were arrested, Fontanka.ru wrote. At about 9:30 p.m. on Moskovsky Prospect, a group of 25-30 men "on the base of personal hostile relations" attacked three natives of the North Caucasus, officials said. Investigators believe that the incident was based on the conflict between Zenit and Anzhi football fans. Eyewitnesses told Fontanka.ru that dozens of youths with faces hidden under the hoods broke into the veranda of McDonald's restaurant screaming and sweeping all before themselves. The terrified visitors ran in panic inside the restaurant, where the attackers did not break into. Those who did not manage to escape were beaten indiscriminately. The perpetrators were beating one man from Dagestan on the veranda and then dragged him onto the street, where they continued the execution. Two passers-by tried to stand up for the victim, but the assaulters said that the immigrants "rape our women."

Ukrainian Children Get Gift Of Sight In NY

LONG ISLAND, USA -- When Elizaveta Tugay's flight landed in New York on Wednesday, the teen was legally blind. When Tugay, 15, returns to the Ukraine in two weeks, part of her vision should be restored. She will be able to walk without assistance. One day, she might even be able to drive. "I'm very happy," she said Saturday in Huntington. "I want to be able to see." Her two-week medical trip is being coordinated by a Long Island nonprofit called Operation Hearts and Home. Along with seven other Ukrainian children with vision problems, Tugay will receive donated eye care and glasses, even free dental work. Travel costs are also covered by the organization, with its members hosting the five boys and three girls in their homes. "There's a joy to seeing a first with these kids," said Susan Bies, 50, of Massapequa, who has hosted a Ukrainian girl, Alina Berdina, 15, every year since 2007. Initially, Alina came for medical care, but she's since become an extension of the family, Bies said. Operation Hearts and Home has been bringing Ukrainians to the United States for about a decade. Of this year's visitors, five attend a school for visually impaired youth in Kharkov. They're chaperoned by Olga Mackevych, an exuberant, gold-toothed math teacher who said the children's families can't afford medical treatment at home. "These people in New York helped us; helped my children," said Mackevych, 59. The children are evaluated when they arrive, and those in need of new glasses receive them courtesy of Moss Opticians in Huntington. Tugay and one other child will be treated by Dr. Brian Campolattaro, a pediatric ophthalmologist at the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary in Manhattan. Campolattaro will operate on one of Tugay's eyes during this visit. She will have the second procedure on a subsequent trip, with total costs -- covered by the hospital -- estimated at $10,000. Campolattaro donates his time but figures he's coming out ahead. "I can't believe I get to do this for free -- taking that patch off the next morning," he said. "Because I'd pay for that privilege."

Ukraine Looks To Foreign Investors To Shake Russian Gas Dependence

KIEV, Ukraine -- Few expected a breakthrough in the renegotiation of Ukraine’s burdensome gas contract with Russia when President Vladimir Putin met Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich in Yalta on July 12. And perhaps it also came as little surprise that Putin stole the headlines when he arrived four hours late to meet the Ukrainian head of state after what appeared a less than pressing photo op with a leather-clad biker known as the “Surgeon.” The diplomatic snub spoke volumes about how Russia sees itself as the ultimate arbiter in any revised gas deal that would lessen the burden to Ukraine. But in the meantime Ukraine is trying to chip away at its reliance on Russia by attracting foreign expertise to tap in to its shale gas fields and offshore reserves in the Black Sea. Ukraine’s President Yanukovich has wanted to revise the price Ukraine pays for Russian gas since he came to office in February 2010, a year after his bitter rival Yulia Timoshenko agreed the current price for Russian gas with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Ukraine pays one of the highest prices for Russian gas in Europe. Moreover, the terms of the contract require Ukraine to import at least 52 billion cubic meters a year. At $425 per thousand cubic meters last quarter, the gas price, calculated through a complex formula pegged to the price of oil, is a burden for Ukrainian industry – even after Yanukovich bartered Russia to shave $100 off the price of gas in exchange for prolonging the lease of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet until 2042 in an arrangement known as the “Kharkiv discount.” Olga Shumylo-Tapiola, a Ukraine expert and visiting scholar at Carnegie Europe, said Russia is in a position to dictate the terms of any revised deal, but that Ukraine has so far resisted Russia’s proposals which has led to impasse in negotiations that have lasted over a year. Moscow is prepared to make a concession either if Ukraine joins the Moscow-led Customs Union with Kazakhstan and Belarus or relinquishes a swathe of its transit pipeline network and storage facilities. On the latter, Russia has been gunning for a consortium deal whereby Russia’s Gazprom would receive a 50 percent stake. This would remove the leverage over Gazprom afforded to Ukraine’s state-owned Naftogaz by its ownership of the transit pipeline network which carried 104 billion cubic meters of Russian gas to Europe in 2011. Russia has twice accused Ukraine of stealing gas destined for Europe in the last three years and Russia still fears a repeat, should tensions escalate again at the height of winter. Last month, Gazprom agreed to advance Naftogaz $2 billion to finance its purchase of gas so as to secure the safe passage of Russian gas through Ukraine, to prevent shortfalls in westward gas deliveries. Neither of Russia’s proposed solutions has much traction in Ukraine. Yury Korolchuk, an expert with the Kiev-based Institute for Energy Research, warned that even if Ukraine relinquishes a fifty percent stake now, it may find itself having to make more concessions further down the line. “We have to take into account the difficult situation on the oil and natural gas markets – by that I mean the high prices. The economic situation is not getting better in Ukraine, just as it isn’t in Europe. There are negative global trends and the economic crisis continues,” said Korolchuk. “One eventuality is that in five years time, Gazprom will simply come for the other fifty percent [of the transit network]. So in 2012 or 2013 they could get fifty percent of the transit pipelines and reserves and five years later they’ll take the rest. Ukraine will have nowhere to run and it will sell them.” Ukraine is open to the idea of a consortium, but one split between Naftogaz, Gazprom and a third European company. Analysts say that neighbor Belarus’ experience is a warning to Ukraine. Minsk has managed to negotiate Europe’s cheapest price for Russian gas but at the price of entering the Moscow-led Customs Union and relinquishing control over its pipeline infrastructure to Gazprom. Moreover, the long-term value of Ukraine’s transit infrastructure as a bargaining chip is dropping. Fewer Russian volumes are flowing through Ukraine this year due to lower European demand, the opening of NordStream as an alternative route to Europe and an increase of volumes through Belarus. Against this backdrop, Ukraine would like to dispute the terms of its gas contract in court and has tried to coax Russia into legal action, according to Korolchuk. In June, Ukrainian Energy Minister Yuriy Boyko supposedly unilaterally announced that Gazprom had agreed that Naftogaz only import only 27 billion cubic meters in 2012, instead of the contracted volume of 52 billion cubic meters. Gazprom denied the charges outright. It provoked Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller to threaten to sue Ukraine if it does not import at least 80 percent of its contracted volume. But in tandem with this apparent maneuvering, Ukraine, however, has gone on a concerted drive to attract foreign investment into projects that would replace Russian gas imports. Ukraine has successfully courted Chinese sponsorship for a coal revival in order to wean itself off gas. On July 16, the Ukrainian Energy and Coal Industry Ministry told Bloomberg that China has agreed to lend Ukraine $3.7 billion to switch its power plants to coal from gas. Korolchuk said this could cut Ukraine’s consumption of Russian gas by 6 billion cubic meters. Ukraine is also looking to offshore Black Sea reserves. Ukraine’s state-owned Chernomornaftogaz, a subsidiary of Naftogaz, last year bought two drilling rigs from Singapore’s Keppel FELS in a bid to boost domestic gas production. One if these rigs drilled its first well in July at the Odesskoye natural gas field in the Black Sea. The second rig is expected to be delivered by the fourth quarter of 2012. Despite embezzlement allegations surrounding the purchase of the two rigs at $400 million apiece, Chernomornaftogaz has said it hopes to use them to boost domestic gas output to 3 billion cubic meters by the end of 2014. Ukraine has also held a series of tenders to attract foreign know-how and technology to tap into its unconventional gas reserves. Ukraine has the third largest shale gas reserves in Europe with an estimated 1.2 trillion cubic meters, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Shell and Chevron are already partnered to explore and potentially develop the Yuzovskaya shale gas area in eastern Donetsk and the Olesskaya shale gas area in Lviv region respectively. Ukraine is reported to be considering inviting majors to another tender for the Slobozhanska shale gas area in the eastern Kharkiv region in September. “These are good projects,” said Shumylo-Tapiola. “But they are costly and they are not going to materialize very quickly, so I would take it more as an attempt to pressure Russia – for the moment. Maybe they will get serious about it, because those companies that are now allowed to extract in Ukraine are serious about it.” Foreign investors are vying for offshore Black Sea positions too. On June 4, Ukraine invited foreign majors to a tender for the Skifskoye and Forosskoye fields on the Black Sea shelf. Korolchuk said we could see bids from Shell, ExxonMobil, Sinopec, Eni, OMV, Petrobras and Total. He said Gazprom had shown interest in offshore exploration and development in the Black Sea, but does not have the technology to drill deep enough. Russia’s largest private oil company, LukOil, is also partnered with Chernomornaftogaz to explore and produce oil and natural gas by developing the Odesskoye, Bezymyannoye and Subbotinskoye deposits. These signals of intent among foreign investors are a boost for Ukraine, according to Korolchuk. “Ukraine has no choice but to attract foreign investors who can invest in gas production and thus reduce Ukraine’s dependence on Russian gas.” Ukraine now pays Russia $425 per 1,000 cubic meters, which is more expensive than “spot” prices at European hubs ($315 per 1,000 cubic meters in Germany), but cheaper than Platts estimates to be the long-term prices for Russian gas delivered to Germany in the third quarter of 2012 ($460 per 1,000 cubic meters ). There are also the questions of transit fees and the Russian lease at Sevastopol to consider when looking at the economic and strategic cost to Ukraine of buying Russian gas. Ukraine wants to pay no more than $250 per 1,000 cubic meters, and it also wants to cut its Russian imports by a third this year, from 40 billion cubic meters in 2011 to 27 billion cubic meters. But it is not clear what it is offering Russia in return for these concessions, if anything. Gazprom wants to form a joint venture to control the pipes and has been pushing for a deal for over 15 years, but the two seem unable to agree on terms. Ukraine is looking for alternatives to Russia. It has borrowed Chinese money to help it displace gas with coal in the power generating sector, and has done a number of deals with foreign gas producers, hoping to transform itself into a shale gas giant. But the geology of shale is very complicated and commercial production of gas on the scale that would allow it to eliminate Russia must be many years off. It is also considering building an LNG import terminal.

In The West Of Ukraine Officially Refused To Recognize The New Law On Languages

TERNOPIL, Ukraine -- Ternopil Oblast Council recognized the recently promulgated the law on fundamentals of the State language policy “has no legal force on the territory of the region. The relevant decision was taken August 16, 66 deputies have voted for it, 7 did not vote and one abstention. The Ternopil Regional Council decided to apply to the Constitutional Court of Ukraine with the request to recognize the “language” of the law unconstitutional. In progolosovannom draft decree stated that this law has been adopted in breach of article 10 of the Constitution of Ukraine, where it is stated that “the sole State language is Ukrainian. We remind that Russian language as a regional, according to the new law, have already recognized the Sevastopol, Odessa City Soviets and Zaporozhye, Odessa, Donetsk oblsovety. President of Ukraine Viktor Yanukovych signed the law, adopted by the Verkhovna Rada on August 8, the language requiring the Cabinet to provide a set of measures to implement its provisions and to make changes in a number of other laws of Ukraine. According to this document, the Russian language is now becoming regional in 13 administrative and territorial units of Ukraine in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporozhye, Luhansk, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson, Crimea, Chernihiv regions and the cities of Kiev and Sevastopol. On 14 August while interacting with reporters in Sevastopol, Yanukovich said: “there will be time-we’ll see you with advantages and disadvantages. This is not dogma. If you need to make some amendments to the Act-we’ll do it. ” The head of the State noted that it had already established a working group that includes the authors of the law on languages and the people who wanted to work on its improvement. “The law requires that parity has created conditions for Ukraine to have not had any problems in any region and is consistent with the European Charter,” Yanukovych said.

Ukrainian Opposition Filing Lawsuit Against President

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's opposition is filing a lawsuit that seeks the official recognition of "crimes committed by President Viktor Yanukovych against the people of Ukraine." Oleksandr Turchynov, head of the central election headquarters of the united opposition, told journalists on August 20 that 309,711 signatures in support of the lawsuit had been collected as of August 17. The leader of the Front of Changes party, Arseniy Yatsenyuk, said "the united opposition has filed a lawsuit with the Ukrainian Supreme Administrative Court." According to Yatsenyuk, the opposition seeks to charge Yanukovych with the "illegal signing of the law on pensions, the code on taxes and the controversial law on languages, the illegal appointment of the cabinet, and imposing pressure on the judges of Ukraine's Constitutional court." No comment from the presidential office was immediately available.

Nigerians Protest Detention Of A Nigerian Student Facing Life Imprisonment In Ukraine

KIEV, Ukraine -- Nigerians living in Ukraine, and indeed, across the world are protesting the arrest of a Nigerian student for allegedly defending himself against six teenagers who attacked him at the entrance to his apartment block. The student, Olaolu Sunkanmi Femi is currently languishing in jail and may be facing life imprisonment in Ukraine. African Outlook gathered that he was arrested after defending himself against his assailants with a glass from a broken bottle in front of his apartment block on November 5, last year in Luhansk, Ukraine. Witnesses at the scene told African Outlook that one of his friends was physically attacked in front of his apartment by four Ukrainian young men and two women who pulled them to the ground while hurling racist slurs on them. Sunkanmi was said to have managed to get up and defended himself against the assailants with a glass from a broken bottle. “It was while he was defending himself that police arrived at the scene and the Nigerian was subsequently arrested and charged with attempted murder of five people” a Nigerian embassy staff who has knowledge of the case told African Outlook, adding that the victim thus became an accused in a case which has become a celebrated case in Ukraine. What is noteworthy about his case is that Olasunkanmi has since been remanded in detention by the Ukrainian police who refused to take the case to court citing unavailability of the police to get an interpreter for him. Osarumen David-Izevbokun, a Phd student in International Relations and the leader of the Nigerian Students’ Community in Ukraine alongside other Nigerian students have been organizing protests as well as drawing the attentions of the human right groups in Ukraine to the plight of Olasunkanmi who has spent almost seven months in jail without trial. ccording to a source, the female Lawyer handling Olasukanmi’s case, Ludmila Havrysh was reported to have told protesters that her client has not been able to read the file material since it is all written in Ukrainian or Russian which he doesn’t understand and that was why her client had remained in jail. “We heard she wanted to be paid $10,000 when she had not even been able to secure bail for her client who has been in detention for more than six months” the source told African Outlook. When asked if the embassy has been able to secure the service of an attorney for the Nigerian student, a Nigerian Embassy staff who spoke anonymously told African Outlook: “It is not within our mandate to pay for attorney’s fees for any Nigerian in distress, you may check this out with other Nigerian embassies abroad, but we have been working with the Nigerian community leaders here to ensure that we do everything within our means to help Olasunkanmi in time of his need.” In a related development, African Outlook gathered that two Nigerian students are lying critically ill in Ukranian hospitals following attacks on them. One of them, is a 28-year-old Nigerian student of Kharkiv National Radio Electronic University while the second is a 19-year-old Nigerian student from the Poltava Agrarian Academy. They sustained knife injuries inflicted on them by yet to be identified persons. To raise support for Olasukanmi, a Facebook Page: Let’s Support Olaolu Femi has been opened. It is hoped that Olasukanmi’s case would be treated fairly and he would find the necessary help from the Nigerian Embassy soon.

Super-Heavy Carrier Rocket Could Be Created Jointly With Ukraine, Kazakhstan

MOSCOW, Russia -- The space rocket corporation Energia, based in Korolyov near Moscow, has proposed a plan to create a super-heavy carrier rocket, Commonwealth, for long-distance space missions, jointly with Ukraine and Kazakhstan, Energia President and General Designer Vitaly Lopota told reporters on Monday. "Energia is proposing that a carrier rocket, Commonwealth, be created in cooperation with Ukraine and Kazakhstan, with the use of the Energia-Buran know-how," he said. "The Energia-Buran project includes the launch system, which is still viable. At least it can be brought back to life. It also includes the "A" rocket units, used in the Zenit carrier rocket, and also engines made today." "We proposed using oxygen-kerosene engines instead of the hydrogen central part, and make the first and second stages of five units," he said. "Concerning the carrying capacity, it's difficult to speculate, but it could be up to 70 tonnes, which is sufficient to circle the Moon," Lopota said. "If ambitions and political will are there, this project could be accomplished in a few years without falling behind our American colleagues," Lopota added. The Energia rocket is a Soviet-era carrier of super-heavy class, developed by Energia Corporation in the 1980s. Two Energia launches were carried out: on May 15 1987 with a mass-volume mockup model, and on November 15 1988 with the Buran reusable shuttle. The Energia-Buran project was suspended in the 1990s, when five rocket frames at various degrees of readiness were available at the Baikonur cosmodrome and at the Energia corporation assembly premises. They were destroyed. The RD-170 rocket engine, developed for the Energia project, has been upgraded and is used in Zenit Russian-Ukrainian carrier rockets as RD-171, and in American Atlas 5 launch systems as RD-180. The Energia carrier rocket is 59 meters (194 feet) long and is 16 meters (53 feet) in diameter. Its launch weight is 2,400 tonnes. The payload weighs 105 tonnes. Zenit carrier rockets are serially produced at the Yuzhmash company in Dnipropetrovsk, Ukraine. They are powered with RD-171 engines, developed by NPO Energomash, based in Khimki near Moscow.

President Signs CIS Free-Trade Agreement

KIEV, Ukraine -- President Viktor Yanukovych on Thursday signed into law the ratification of a free trade agreement with Russia and six other former Soviet states 10 months after its signature by the prime minister. Yanukovych acted after Parliament ratified the agreement at an emergency session on July 30, and weeks after Russian President Vladimir Putin had complained about Ukraine delaying the ratification. The agreement allows the free trade of goods and services between Ukraine and Russia and six other countries, but it also has a list of exceptions, restricting trade in key commodities, such as crude oil, natural gas, sugar, and others. The agreement was signed by Prime Minister Mykola Azarov in October 2011 at a meeting in St. Petersburg between prime ministers of Commonwealth of Independent States. “For us the most sensitive is sugar,” Azarov said after signing the agreement. “It was always on the list of restrictions, but we have agreed for the first time that we will lift the restrictions in a certain amount of time.” Oleh Medvedev, a strategist for the opposition Batkivshcyna party, criticized the agreement for not giving Ukraine full access to the markets and commodities. “We are free to trade everything, except for selling freely to Russia our sugar – the commodity that we have to sell,” Medvedev said. “And we’re also not free to buy oil and gas – something that we need to buy.” Yanukovych said later the CIS free trade agreement is not aimed at reversing Ukraine’s policy towards integration with the European Union. The agreement would come into effect after it is ratified by the parliaments of the eight countries. Besides Russia and Ukraine the six other signatory nations were Belarus, Kazakhstan, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova and Tajikistan. The joining of Ukraine to the CIS free trade agreement is significant as Kiev had repeatedly refused to accept a deeper integration into Moscow-led trade bloc, known as the Customs Union and which includes Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan. Putin, during his meeting with Yanukovych last month, said joining the Customs Union would help Ukraine to reduce dramatically natural gas prices.

Ukraine Eyeing Chinese Gasification Tech

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine indicated this week it will seek access to Chinese coal gasification technologies as a way to wean its power plants from Russian natural gas. Ukrainian Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said Tuesday he discussed coal gasification as a means to generate power with Li Jiping, vice president of China Development Bank, which last month agreed to extend a $3.66 billion credit line to Kiev. Azarov said the aim of the meeting was to push forward a plan for Ukraine to secure gasification technologies that could enable it move from using increasingly expensive imported Russian natural gas to fire its power plants. The technology would allow Ukraine to tap its supplies of domestic coal, mix the material with water to produce a slurry and convert it into a synthetic gas. The resulting "syngas" would be used to fire power plants. "The issue of substitution of expensive imported gas with coal is a strategic issue for us," Azarov said. "We are interested in China's coal gasification technologies in the hydrocarbon fuel." The prime minister said further talks about the possible large-scale implementation of coal gasification technologies would take place in November when Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych is to make a state visit to Beijing. Ukraine's agreement with China Development Bank calls for the building of three coal gasification plants in the country, with China expected to provide technological expertise for the conversion of Ukrainian power plants from gas to coal. "You are implementing a program to replace the use of natural gas with Ukrainian coal. This program is at the strategic level," Li said. "Specialists of our countries have already reached an agreement on cooperation in the framework of this project and we are ready to provide you with a loan of $3.66 billion to support this program." Kiev is motivated to invest in goal gasification by what it considers the unjustifiably high costs of Russian natural gas, currently set at $425 per 1,000 cubic meters. It has been locked in a dispute with the state-owned Gazprom for two years over prices and has moved to reduce imports from 40 billion cubic meters in 2011 to 27 billion cubic meters this year. The coal gasification deal also comes at a time when Ukraine has been stepping up economic cooperation with China as its relations with Europe and the United States soured due to what the Western countries view as Yanukovych's persecution of political rivals. Beijing two years ago signed a memorandum of understanding with Kiev on coal cooperation, in which coal-dependent China is considering a $1.03 billion investment in the modernization of seven state-owned Ukrainian coal mines. Last year it provided an $85 million to modernize the state-owned Melnikov mine. Beijing and Kiev are also working on $3 billion in deals to support Ukrainian agriculture, Azarov noted. Those investments would cover such areas as trade, fertilizer and cultivation and would include procuring pesticide, seeds and equipment from China in return for Ukrainian agricultural products, the Kiev Post reported.

Murder Charge For Ex-PM

KIEV, Ukraine -- Prosecutors in Ukraine yesterday said they were ready to charge the jailed opposition leader Yuliya Tymoshenko with involvement in murder. In a move likely to increase tensions with the West, deputy chief prosecutor Renat Kuzmin said proceedings would begin as soon as Ms Tymoshenko's treatment for a spinal condition was over. The former prime minister was jailed for seven years in October for abuse of office over a gas contract she signed with Russia in 2009. The US and the EU condemned the trial as politically motivated and Ms Tymoshenko accused her bitter rival President Viktor Yanukovych of a "political lynching" to prevent her challenging him for power. Mr Kuzmin said Ms Tymoshenko would be charged next month with involvement in the 1996 murder of Yevhen Shcherban, a member of parliament and businessman. He told Ukraine's Segodnya newspaper: "We have enough grounds to indict her. As the German doctors who treat Tymoshenko said, she needed eight weeks' relief from stress. We are waiting until this term is finished. When the doctors say it's OK to disturb her, we'll come to her with the new charges. We've got everything ready for it." Ms Tymoshenko, the leader of Ukraine's pro-Western Orange revolution after the 2004 election, has rejected the allegations as "absurd". She was moved to hospital from prison in the city of Kharkiv in May and is being treated by foreign specialists after expressing fears that state-appointed doctors would deliberately infect her with a disease. Mr Yanukovych is under intense diplomatic pressure to free her before parliamentary elections in October. EU political leaders boycotted matches in Ukraine during the Euro 2012 football championship in protest at her imprisonment. The European Court of Human Rights is due to open its hearing into the case on August 28. Mr Yanukovych has rejected criticism of the trial, however, and suggested in an interview in June that Ms Tymoshenko had been involved in the killing of Shcherban, who was shot dead with his wife as they were leaving a plane at Donetsk airport in eastern Ukraine. The gunman was jailed for life in 2003 but investigators allege that Ms Tymoshenko was linked to the killing after $US 2 million was found in his bank account. They claim the money came from companies controlled by Ms Tymoshenko and a close associate, Pavlo Lazarenko, another former prime minister, who is in prison in the US for money laundering. Mr Kuzmin said prosecutors had asked the US authorities for permission to question Lazarenko about the killing. The prosecutor claimed opinion in Europe was beginning to turn against Ms Tymoshenko because of the weight of charges against her. But Ms Tymoshenko's lawyer, Serhiy Vlasenko, said: "I talk to the Europeans all the time, and I know that they firstly think that Ukraine has a fully formed dictatorship, and secondly, that its leaders have neither morals nor conscience." The latest case has been given added impetus by claims from Shcherban's son, Ruslan, that he has evidence to prove that Ms Tymoshenko was involved in the death of his father. He alleged he was present at meetings between Shcherban and Ms Tymoshenko and Lazarenko, and claimed they threatened his father for refusing to "sacrifice his business interests". Ms Tymoshenko is already facing a fresh trial on embezzlement and tax evasion charges. Mr Yanukovych moved to hasten proceedings against her by saying legislation permitted the court to use a video link to hear evidence.

New Law Benefits Russian Speakers In Ukraine

KIEV, Ukraine -- Ukraine's sizable Russian-speaking minority won a major victory on Wednesday when a new law was approved that allows the official use of the language in many regions. Critics see the change as a threat to this former Soviet country's identity and its hopes of moving further away from the Russian fold. The law, signed by Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, leaves Ukrainian as the only state language, but it allows public servants and citizens to file official documentation in Russian at government bodies, courts and other state institutions in the regions where more than 10 percent of residents are Russian speakers. Russian is spoken predominantly in the east and south of the country, while Ukrainian is spoken in western Ukraine. But Ukrainian has picked up across the country since the nation became independent after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. According to a 2001 census, 68 percent of Ukrainians name Ukrainian their native tongue, while 30 percent said it was Russian. Another census is scheduled for next year. Opponents say the law could upset Ukraine's fragile linguistic balance by removing incentives for millions of Russian-speaking Ukrainians to learn to speak and write Ukrainian. Critics also fear the law will push Ukraine closer to Russia and away from the West. Some have called the law a cheap ploy by Yanukovych to win votes in the Russian-speaking east, his support base, ahead of October's parliamentary election. Pro-Western opposition forces led by jailed former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko vowed to annul the "anti-Ukrainian law" and bring Yanukovych to justice. Her party also protested a decision by election officials to ban Tymoshenko and her jailed former Interior Minister Yuri Lutsenko, from running in the election. The legislation that Parliament approved regarding the Russian language caused violent brawls among lawmakers and during street rallies, and Yanukovych's move will likely fuel further protests. In an apparent attempt to assuage his critics, Yanukovych also set up a body to promote the use of Ukrainian.

Canada Supports Democratic Process In Ukraine

OTTAWA, Canada -- Canada will provide 500 observers to work at the parliamentary elections in Ukraine. Such was the joint statement released today by the top Canadian officials. The group from Canada will help assess the credibility of the October 28, 2012, elections in Ukraine. "In recognition of our [Ukraine-Canada] special relationship we are pleased to support this democratic process," said Canadian MP Ted Opitz. The team of Canadian citizens will consist of long- and short-term observers. The long-term observers - 75 persons - will cover the whole territory of Ukraine, being located across the country's 25 regions. They will monitor the compliance of pre-election procedures with democratic and fair elections principles. The main group of observers consisting of 425 people will work in Ukraine during the voting day. They will provide "effective coverage of the representative sample of polling stations", reads the statement of the Canadian government. "These elections are critical to a democratic and prosperous Ukraine. We are proud that Canadian election observers, many from the Ukrainian-Canadian community, will continue to stand by the people of Ukraine," said the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism of Canada Jason Kenney, commenting on the deployment of the observers. Notably, an extensive Ukrainian diaspora resides in Canada. The community of 1.2 million ethnic Ukrainians in Canada is the second largest Ukrainian diaspora in the world (over 4 million Ukrainians live in Russia). At the beginning of August 2012, the Central Election Commission of Ukraine registered the first batch of foreign observers to the autumn elections in Ukraine. The team of 39 representatives of the ENEMO (European Network of Election Monitoring Organizations) received permission to observe Ukrainian elections. The network also plans to provide 400 additional short-term observers. The OSCE will send 100 long-term and 600 short-term observers to the Ukrainian elections, according to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Kostyantyn Hryshchenko. To provide for transparent parliamentary elections, in July 2012, the parliament of Ukraine ruled to equip most polling stations with web-cameras, broadcasting the signal from the stations online. The installation of the web-cameras at the voting stations enables anyone with internet access to watch elections in Ukraine in real time. According to the new law, the cameras may not interfere with the secret ballot system and the freedom of voting.

Ukraine's Usyk Dances His Way To Olympic Gold

LONDON, England -- Oleksandr Usyk won Ukraine's first boxing gold medal of the London Games on Saturday leaving Italy's Clemente Russo with a second successive heavyweight silver medal and fans enjoying another jig of joy. Ukraine dominated last year's world championships, taking home four gold medals including one for Usyk, as they sought to muscle their way to the top of the amateur game just as the famous Klitschko Brothers had done in the professional ranks. However, Denys Berinchyk failed in the former Soviet state's first bid for gold, losing to Cuba's Roniel Iglesias Sotolongo two bouts earlier and more pressure was heaped on Usyk when he fell behind after the first round. "We already had a silver and we didn't need another one," Usyk told reporters. "I showed what I can do, especially considering I was behind in the first round, even though I didn't actually feel any hits from him." "My coach asked me, 'How strong are the Italian's punches?' and I said, 'I don't know, I haven't felt any'. He said, 'Just go back out there and hit him'." Usyk, who at 190 centimeters (6 feet 3 inches) enjoyed a nine centimeter height advantage over the Italian, had boxed cautiously in the opening three minutes and paid the price as the awkward Russo caught him with some swiping left hands. Russo, one of the poster boys of the Olympic boxing governing body's new professional league, may have ridden his luck to reach Saturday's final but he showed far more guile than in previous bouts to chalk up a two-point lead. However, the big Ukrainian opened up in the second round and showed more of the aggression that saw him thoroughly punish Bulgaria's Tervel Pulev in the semi-finals to peg back Russo's advantage and go into the final round level. With both fighters out on their feet, Usyk, who like team mate Berinchyk sports one of the oddest haircuts at the Olympics, delivered some decisive big left hooks in the final minute to take the contest 14-11. The mostly shaved do with a lengthy piece of hair left on top is a traditional Ukrainian number called 'chub', a hairstyle traditionally worn by Cossacks in Ukraine, who are known as good fighters, Berinchyk explained last week. It was not the only thing that marked the pair out at the London Games. Usyk danced his now customary elaborate victory jig - a Ukrainian 'hopak' dance - when the score was announced, adding an extra spin or two while Berinchyk was understandably more restrained when he took to the floor after his defeat. They will likely be celebrating again on Sunday when team mate and hot lightweight favorite Vasyl Lomachenko fights for his second Olympic gold in a row. Losing heavyweight semi-finalists Pulev and Teymur Mammadov of Azerbaijan were back in the arena on Saturday to collect their bronze medals as Italian Russo accepted his silver with regret. "I didn't want silver, I wanted gold," he said.

Olympics Boxing: Klitschko Proud As Classy Lomachenko Wins Gold

LONDON, England -- Ukraine's professional heavyweight champion Vladimir Klitschko was on hand to see his compatriot Vasyl Lomachenko prove once again why he is the best in the amateur ranks as the lightweight romped to a second successive Olympic gold on Sunday. Lomachenko was just about the hottest favourite of the London Games after he followed up the featherweight gold he won with ease in Beijing four years ago with a world title apiece at both feather and lightweight class. It was the same story in London when he rarely had to move into top gear despite moving up a class and he had too much for South Korea's Han Soon-chul, easing to a 19-9 victory and earning a congratulatory hug from Klitschko at ringside. "The first time I was a bit more excited, I am more calm now but I am still very happy and delighted to win another medal," Lomachenko told reporters. The irrepressible Lomachenko was in a different league to the Korean, taking the first round 7-2 with fierce right and left upper-cuts, punishing body shots topped off with sleek footwork that is almost unmatched among the amateur game. The 24-year-old Ukrainian, who sports a tattoo of his father and coach Anatoly's face on his abdomen, continued boxing the kind of fight that would please any coach, keeping Han at bay to widen his lead by a point. He was able to take his foot off the gas in the final round and coast to a victory. Lomachenko, who will join the Olympic boxing governing body's professional league next year meaning he will still be eligible to go for a third gold in 2016, cracked his first smile of the Games when the result was announced. Putting two fingers in the air to acknowledge both his second gold and the second for Ukraine at the Games, Lomachenko left the ring draped in the Ukrainian flag. "I'm really proud of my countryman Lomachenko, it is not a common thing to win two times," Klitschko said from ringside. "It would be really exciting to see him in a professional ring." Lomanchenko jokingly wiped sweat from his brow as he stood on the podium to collect his gold, while losing semi-finalists Yasniel Toledo Lopez of Cuba and Evaldas Petrauskas of Lithuania took bronze. The Ukrainian's father and trainer Anatoliy was full of praise for his son's achievement. "It's always harder to protect your position rather than get it. It's always harder to stay on top than get there," he told reporters.

Ukraine Law Students Pioneers For Their Country

PROVO, USA -- Imagine being the defendant in a court case but your attorney can't look at the available evidence without the prosecutor's permission and can't present evidence on your behalf. While here in the U.S. a system like that is far from reality, in Ukraine those are among the many nuances that makes its legal system so different from ours. However, dressed in suit pants, skirts and blazers and looking every bit like an American lawyer, three Ukrainian law students are forging the way for major change in their country. Kateryna Karatsiuba, Yaroslava Novosad and Marya Melnyk are nearing the end of their three-week internship with the 4th District Court in Provo, where they have witnessed everything from a jury trial to an adoption to a marriage. "Every day is full of wonderful events," Melnyk said. "The whole system works like a great mechanism, a great team. Everyone wants the best decision, and constitutional rights of people is most important. I have been impressed with the respectful behavior between the prosecution and the defense." The three women are here as part of the Leavitt Institute's internship program. Karatsiuba, Novosad and Melnyk, along with 10 other interns from Ukraine who are serving in Brigham City, Salt Lake City and Cedar City, spend three weeks working with a judge. Fourth District Judge Lynn Davis agreed to let the future lawyers observe and participate in his courtroom. "It has been a real privilege to interact with our international guests," Davis said. "It is a great opportunity to just open the door for them and help them develop an appreciation of the U.S. Constitution and liberties." All three interns went through a rigourous process to earn their spot in the internship program, including getting excellent grades, writing several essays and going through personal interviews, but they all say the process was worth it. "I did everything I could because I really wanted to be a part of this program," Melnyk said. "We had been taught about jury trials and other things but I wanted to watch everything with my own eyes and see how it is used here daily." The differences between the U.S. legal system and the one in place in Ukraine are vast. Ukraine does not have jury trials, plea bargains or public defenders, judges can't perform marriages and defense attorneys can't look at evidence without the permission of the prosecutors. Novosad said that while there may be many differences between the systems, theirs is not all bad. "Ukraine is a young country. In the U.S. it is a good program. It's not perfect but close, but it developed over a long time and has a huge long history," she said. "In Ukraine there is lots of difficulties and sometimes it disappoints us, but we can change things. Ukraine is still developing. Anything is possible." During their time in Provo the women have been able to spend a week each working with Davis, a week with the public defender's office and a week working with county prosecutors. They have seen jury trials, jury selection and several felony cases. They also have been able to tour the county jail, visit the forensic lab and do a ride-a-long with members of the sheriff's office. Davis said the interns have been amazed at some of the technology available to the court in Provo. He showed them how any case could be looked up in the computer system, pulling up the entire history of that case including hearings, plea bargains and anything else that may be relevant. It is technology that has not yet made its way to Ukraine, where bulky paper files are still the norm. All three of the students say they are like pioneers for their country, as they hope to learn as much as they can about how the U.S. legal system works, take that knowledge back to Ukraine and work to make changes once they graduate and begin their own careers. Karatsiuba said one of the main differences between the U.S. and Ukraine is the attitude of those working in the legal system. "Like how the judge talks to convicts and the attitude between defense and prosecutor," she said. "Everyone admires their work and are concerned with integrity and try to make society a better place to live." Melnyk and Novosad agreed, saying that in the U.S. everything done is for the good of humanity and focused on human rights and the rights of the ordinary people. When they return to Ukraine at the end of their internship Karatsiuba and Melnyk will be returning to school for one more year, while Novosad, who graduated this spring, is hoping to get a job working in international law. They say it will be up to them to bring the knowledge they have gained in Provo back to Ukraine in hopes of making changes as the system in Ukraine continues to grow and develop in the years to come. "If you want to change a system we need to change ourselves," Karatsiuba said. "To come home will be difficult because I have seen things I like here, but we are the first step to change something."

Ruling Party, Opposition Run Neck And Neck In Ukrainian Election Race

KIEV, Ukraine -- A parliamentary election campaign has been officially under way in Ukraine since July 30. The ruling Party of Regions (PRU) will compete for victory with the united opposition formed by several nationalist parties, the largest of which are Fatherland, which is headed by the imprisoned former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, and the Front for Change (FZ) whose leader is a former parliamentary speaker and former foreign minister Arseny Yatsenyuk. The main intrigue is whether the third most popular party, Punch (“Udar” in Ukrainian and Rusian), which is headed by boxing champion Vitaly Klichko, will side with the opposition in a new parliament as the opposition hopes, or whether it will closely cooperate with the PRU, thus giving President Victor Yanukovych’s party continued control of the legislature. Another question is whether the election will be free and fair. Parliament will be elected on October 28 under the new rules that were passed last year. This is a mixed system where half of the 450-seat unicameral legislature will be elected from party lists according to a proportional system, and the other half will be contested in 225 single-seat constituencies according to a first-past-the-post voting method. This should favor the PRU whose candidates are likely to be backed by rich businessmen who tend to support the government and local authorities that are dominated by the PRU. The threshold for parties will be five percent, the highest ever in Ukraine. It was raised from three percent in order to prompt smaller parties to join larger ones and make the legislature more predictable. Four parties are certain to pass the barrier, and two are almost sure. June opinion polls gave the PRU 16-22 percent support; the united opposition 15-20 percent; Punch more than eight percent; the Communists, who are the PRU’s main allies, around six percent; the populist party Forward, Ukraine (VU) three to four percent and the far-right party Freedom around three percent. If elected to parliament, VU, headed by Natalya Korolevska, a defector from Fatherland, is likely to join forces with the PRU. Tymoshenko’s right-hand man Oleksandr Turchynov has claimed that Korolevska is backed by the administration of President Viktor Yanukovych. Freedom, on the contrary, is likely to oppose the PRU. In July, Freedom and the united opposition agreed not to field candidates against each other in the single-seat constituencies. Punch did not join them despite months of talks on an opposition coalition. Punch and VU are the two youngest parties with the fastest growing electorates. The two advertise themselves as the new faces, which is a serious advantage in a country where politicians are deeply mistrusted and about one-third of voters remain undecided less than three months before voting day. “New leaders for a new country” is Forward, Ukraine’s main slogan. Punch trumpets the fact that more than 80 percent of its members have never been people’s deputies. Among the six favorites of the race, Punch’s Klichko is the only leader who has never worked in the government or been elected to parliament before. Although Klichko styles himself as an oppositionist, he has rejected an alliance with either Fatherland or FZ from the start. He has also made it clear that Punch would cooperate with the PRU in parliament on certain issues if necessary. Klichko says he finances his party mostly himself, but his would-be opposition partners and journalists doubt that Klichko, although being a successful businessman and the world heavyweight boxing champion for years, is so rich. They suspect that Punch may be secretly backed by the ruling elite. The competition will be between faces and sponsors, rather than ideas. Most of the parties, including the two frontrunners, promise low taxes, high wages, corruption fighting and the European vector in foreign policy. The language policy is one of the main dividing lines. The PRU in July pushed through parliament a controversial law that gives Russian the status of a regional language. Russian, which is spoken by most Ukrainians, has thus far had no status at all. The law is a boon to the PRU, whose power base is the eastern and southern Russophone areas. The united opposition, Punch and Freedom have fiercely opposed the law, while the Communists support it, and VU sits on the fence. The law adoption prompted protests in Kiev and the national-minded Western areas, which have subsided by the end of July. The election will be a test for democracy as many, both at home and abroad, fear that Yanukovych and the PRU will be tempted to rig the election if unable to win. They failed the previous test, the local election in the fall 2010. This and Tymoshenko’s imprisonment a year ago have almost made Yanukovych an international pariah, and the process of integration into Europe has become all but frozen. European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and foreign chief Catherine Ashton made it clear in a recent interview that Kiev may forget about the Ukraine-European Union association and free trade agreement, which has been initialed but not yet signed, if the October elections are not free and fair.

Ukraine’s Language Fight May Backfire On Yanukovych

LVIV, Ukraine -- Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych has signed a law that restores many privileges to Russian, a language that was favored in the Soviet era. Under the new law, an estimated half of Ukraine’s districts will allow government business to be conducted in Russian. About one quarter of Ukraine’s 46 million people are believed to speak Russian at home. In July, the language bill sparked fist fights inside Ukraine’s parliament, the Rada. Outside, protesters fought with riot police. In the 21 years since independence from the Soviet Union, the Ukrainian language has made strides, returning to the nation’s center and capital, Kiev, from its Soviet-era stronghold in Western Ukraine. Yanukovych is believed to have played the language card to energize his heavily Russian-speaking electorate in Eastern Ukraine. Ukrainians vote for a new parliament on October 28 and Yanukovych has steadily fallen in public opinion polls since his inauguration in February, 2010. Olexiy Haran, a political scientist with Kiev Mohyla University, says the president provoked the language debate in order to distract voters from Ukraine’s economic stagnation. "The economic situation is not improving, so he needs to sell something," he said in an interview. "It is easy to say, ‘OK now I am going to solve the so-called language issue,' because according to polls language issue is not priority, even for electors of Yanukovych. But because he has nothing to boast about the realization of his socioeconomic promises, he can use this." After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Ukrainian became mandatory in schools, in movies, and on billboards. Oksana Forostyna, editor of a Ukrainian language literary publication Krytyka, says it was easy for her family to switch between the two closely related languages. "I spoke Ukrainian first to my classmates and to my friends at the university, then my parents began to speak Ukrainian to each other when they moved to Kiev," said Forostyna, a native of Lviv. "And after that we switched to Ukrainian. That was very smooth and something very natural." Interviewed in Kiev, she says that since independence the nation’s capital has shifted from a Russian-speaking city to a bilingual city. "When one person speaks Ukrainian and the other answers in Russian, I think it is something so common here that we do not even mention the thing," she said of a phenomenon often observed on Ukrainian television. "People who come here from elsewhere could be very surprised because there are not a lot of places in the world where you can see something like that." Evhenia Tymoshenko moved from Ukraine to London in 1994, at age 14. Last year, she moved back to Kiev to help her mother, Yulia, the imprisoned opposition leader. Speaking in English, she says Ukraine’s linguistic shift is clear. "Even the Russian-speaking people who are not Ukrainian but live here, they prefer to have Ukrainian ... as only public or government language because they like Ukraine, they want Ukraine to be powerful as one state," she said. President Yanukovych apparently picked August, when much of the nation is on summer vacation, to sign the language bill. On Thursday, the day after the signing, there was little public reaction. In Simferopol, the heart of Russian-speaking Crimea, the President’s Party of Regions held a support rally of about 400 people. People waved signs reading: "Crimeans welcome the language law" and "we want to speak Russian." In the city of Lviv, in Western Ukraine, Ukrainian has become universal. Andrei, a Soviet generation engineer, told me he once spoke daily in Russian — in the army and at his factory. When I chatted with him at a World War II memorial, he said it was the first time he had spoken Russian in one year. "There should only be one language, the state language," said Andrei, who like many Ukrainians is bilingual. "That is my opinion, there should be only one language." But several young people I met in Lviv and other Ukrainian-speaking areas could not speak Russian. In the west, students prefer to learn German, English or Polish. Serhiy Kudelia, a Lviv political scientist who most recently taught at George Washington University in the United States, warns that the new language law may backfire on Ukraine’s president. "The introduction of the regional language law may help the opposition to mobilize its voters against Yanukovych," he said, adding that some voters may think that Yanukovych's allegiance lies elsewhere. "[Some voters may think] Yanukovych is really a foreign agent, an agent of Kremlin, and agent of Russia, who is promoting the interests of another country," he said. By pushing the sensitive issue of language this week, Ukraine’s President may have activated his supporters — and his opponents.

Anonymous Promises Revenge For The Takedown Of Demonoid

SAN FRANCISCO, USA -- Ukraine-hosted BitTorrent site came under scrutiny by the local authorities and was ultimately terminated last week, now the international hacking group vows a settling of scores. Anonymous has promised to bring down its wrath on the Ukrainian government after authorities were said to have taken down the file-sharing site Demonoid last week. "Last week, our generous green friend, the Demonoid, was met with a state sponsored Distributed Denial of Service attack... These illegal actions were then followed up with a raid by Ukraine authorities," the hacking group wrote in a blog post on AnonPR yesterday. "In retaliation for your criminal acts against us and the free flow of information, we have already begun an operation against those responsible. Lazers are already being fired." Ukraine-hosted Demonoid was taken down last week after local authorities contacted its Internet Service Provider Colocall. According to the BBC, officials then went to Colocall's office and copied data off of its servers. However, Colocall said that it decided to cease Demonoid's service on its own accord. According to the BBC, it said the reason for the termination was due to a "combination of factors" and there were "too many issues for a single customer." Demonoid was among the Web sites included in the U.S. "Notorious Markets List," which was created to identify "markets, including those on the Internet, which exemplify the problem of marketplaces dealing in infringing goods and helping sustain global piracy." The BitTorrent site was ranked in the top 600 Web sites in global traffic and the top 300 in U.S. traffic. Anonymous said it will use "any means necessary" to restore Demonoid. "Where one has fallen, many will rise to take their place," it wrote in the blog post. Here are its "#OpDemonoid" objectives: Restore Demonoid services by any means necessary and, if possible, facilitate a series of mirror sites operated by free Anons everywhere. In essence, open source Demonoid. Retaliate against those responsible for the interruption. And Lulz. According to the BBC, several distributed denial of service, or DDoS, happened over the last week, but none of them has been lasting. Apparently certain Web pages on the Ukrainian Anti-Piracy Association, the Ukrainian Agency for Copyright and Related Rights, and the National Television and Radio Broadcasting Council of Ukraine were unavailable for periods of time but then were restored.