Ukraine

NATO has entered a closer partnership with Ukraine, recognizing the former Soviet republic as an enhanced opportunities partner (EOP) after Kyiv demonstrated its "commitment to Euro-Atlantic security."

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is urging Ukrainian authorities to enforce legislation penalizing violence against journalists after a reporter was assaulted by officers in Kyiv last week while he was filming an anti-lockdown protest.

To help Ukraine find peace, the EU, NATO, and member states must seek new approaches to arms control discussions with Russia and European security as a whole. They should also consider a more flexible sanctions policy, such that progress in Ukraine may lead to incremental easing.

German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said April 22 he would hold talks next week with his Russian, Ukrainian, and French counterparts to revive efforts to end the conflict in eastern Ukraine.

The United Nations, the European Union and the United States welcomed the release and exchange of prisoners in eastern Ukraine, which has been torn by a 6-year-old armed conflict. The U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he remained hopeful this “humanitarian action” ahead of Orthodox Easter “will serve as a positive step toward more progress, including a permanent cease-fire,” his spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in a statement.

Ukrainian government forces and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine have started a prisoner swap, the office of Ukraine’s president said on Thursday. It is the first swap of 2020 and Ukraine will take back 19 of its citizens, the president’s office said in a statement.

Russian-backed armed formations in the breakaway Donbas region have since Saturday (21 March) denied access to the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe’s (OSCE) mission monitoring the conflict, Ukraine’s State Border Guard Service reported on Tuesday.

The Chief Monitor of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) to Ukraine, Y. Halit Çevik, welcomed today the extension of the SMM’s mandate for another year.

The armed forces of the Luhansk and Donetsk People’s Republics (LPR and DPR, respectively) are preparing for a higher intensity of conflict, according to a 24 February briefing by the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence (MoD) on operations of Ukrainian forces.

Two high-ranking officials from the … OSCE expressed deep concern over the recent upsurge in fighting in eastern Ukraine that killed at least five combatants and wounded at least eight others near a front-line town from which the warring sides withdrew forces in November.