Ukraine

The European Union is considering a training mission for Ukrainian officers due to the "ongoing military activities" of Russia, according to an internal EU document. With tensions between Kyiv and Moscow running high, some members of the bloc want Brussels to set up an independent training program called the EU Military Advisory and Training Mission Ukraine (EUATM), Germany's Welt am Sonntag newspaper reported on October 3, citing an EU policy paper it obtained.

Official says the attack was part of a ‘militant campaign’ against President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s bid to take on oligarchs.

The OSCE Chairperson-in-Office, Swedish Minister for Foreign Affairs Ann Linde, expressed regret that no consensus could be reached on the extension of the mandate of the Observer Mission at the Russian checkpoints Gukovo and Donetsk on the Russian-Ukrainian border, an important component of the OSCE’s response to the crisis in and around Ukraine.

[…] “The United States deeply regrets that the Russian Federation has indicated that it will not join consensus to extend the mission’s mandate and financing arrangement at the end of September,” Courtney Austrian, the charge d’affaires at the U.S. Mission to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), said in a September 2 statement.

Washington is promising Kyiv up to $60 million in military aid ahead of scheduled talks at the White House between U.S. President Joe Biden and his visiting Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

An international summit initiated by Ukraine reaffirmed on Monday (23 August) commitments to de-occupy Crimea, seven and a half years after Russian troops occupied the strategic Black Sea peninsula. … The initiative is a new consultative format launched by Ukraine, aiming to bundle efforts to bring Crimea back under Ukraine’s control and increase international pressure on Russia. Top officials from 46 countries and blocs took part in the summit, including all EU and each of the 30 NATO members as well as the US.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy says he is doing "everything" he can to end the war with Russia-backed separatists but that peace and control of territory in the so-called Donbas depends "90 percent" on Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Efforts to bring peace to Ukraine’s Donbas region have been deadlocked for years. The steps the belligerents take to de-escalate violence can save lives, but people still die on the front lines and beyond. Crisis Group’s new visual explainer puts these dynamics in stark relief.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights is condemning pervasive arbitrary detention and torture by both government and Russian-backed separatists in the seven-year eastern Ukraine conflict.  The condemnation comes in a report submitted Friday to the UN Human Rights Council.

[…] This study examines how the SMM was able to implement its mandate in an increasingly complex security environment, drawing lessons to inform future peace operations, for both the OSCE and the international community at large.