Internal Security News

• (RIA Novosti) A Russian bus and customs terminal were damaged as a result of artillery firing from the Ukrainian territory which hit the Novoshakhtinsk border crossing post, located in Russia. The Russian Federal Security Service said that as a result of the firing at Dolzhansky Ukrainian border crossing post, shared with the Novoshakhtinsk border crossing post located in Russia, several shells landed and exploded on the Russian side.
   
• (Interfax Ukraine) Ukrainian government forces destroyed several vehicles belonging to members of illegal armed groups in the area of ​​the anti-terrorist operation in the country's southeastern regions. "In particular, five KamAZ trucks carrying militants were destroyed.”
   
• Two people were killed and a ten-year-old girl injured after a car hit a roadside bomb near the village of Kryva Luka near Kramatorsk.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) Russian media reported that Ukrainian warplanes bombed the village of Staraya Kondrashevka, 20 kilometres from Luhansk, killing seven villagers, including a five-year-old girl, and injuring eight.
   
• Militants robbed a branch of PrivatBank in Donetsk and stole Hr 15 million meant to pay pensions and salaries.
   
• The Ukrainian Defense Ministry denied reports spread on some media sites that 40 paratroopers had been killed.
   
• (RIA Novosti) The union of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk ‘People’s Republics’ in eastern Ukraine is working on its own “White Book” on human rights violations.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) Heavy artillery fire rocked Kramatorsk in Donetsk on the evening of July 2.
   
• (RIA Novosti) The speaker of the ‘unity parliament’ of union of the self-declared ‘People’s Republics’ of Donetsk and Luhansk said that despite Kyiv’s promises, there are no humanitarian corridors in southeastern Ukraine.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) The armed standoff in the east of Ukraine has caused damage to the Luhansk region worth more than 1.3 billion hryvnias (over $100 million).

Diplomacy News

• Russia’s official news agency, Novosti, began referring to the union of the self-declared ‘People’s Republics’ of Donetsk and Luhansk as Novorossiya on its English-language site, having begun doing so on the Russian-language site on June 26.
   
• (Interfax Ukraine) German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said after a four-party ministerial meeting in Berlin July 2 that the foreign ministers of Germany, France, Ukraine and Russia managed to agree on a package of measures which they hope will cumulatively lead to a reliable mutual truce in east Ukraine.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) Ukrainian border guard authorities said in a statement that Russian combat helicopters violated the country’s borders on several occasions after crossing into the Ukrainian air space on several occasions on the morning of July 3.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) Two EU officials said that the EU governments are considering different scenarios to stop new project funding for Russia made by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (ERBD) and the European Investment Bank (EIB) as they seek to widen the scope of sanctions aimed at ending the conflict in Ukraine.
   
• (RIA Novosti) Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Karasin said that an exact date and location for the next round of consultations of the three-party contact group on Ukraine have not been fixed yet, but Moscow insists the meetings should take place in Ukraine.
   
• The US State Department said that Washington believes that the actions of the Ukrainian military in the eastern part of Ukraine are moderate and measured.
   
• NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said that Russia should change its attitude to the events in Ukraine to restore normal relations with NATO.
   
• French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel urged Russia's Vladimir Putin to encourage separatists in eastern Ukraine to reach an agreement with the Ukrainian authorities.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) Russia’s human rights commissioner said the destruction of an orphanage in Sloviansk breaches international humanitarian law.
   
• (RIA Novosti) The Russian Foreign Ministry’s Commissioner for Human Rights said that the ministry may publish a new edition of its “White Book” on human rights violations in Ukraine.
   
• (RIA Novosti) The Russian Foreign Ministry said Moscow expects the results of the four-party ministerial meeting that took place in Berlin on July 2 will persuade Kyiv to return to its previous ceasefire agreement.
   
• (RIA Novosti) The Russian Red Cross approved a long-term assistance program for refugees from Ukraine.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) The EU’s Ambassador to Russia said that the European Union hails Russia’s readiness to allow observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) as well as Ukrainian border guards at its checkpoints on the border with Ukraine.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) The Russian Foreign Ministry’s White Book on large-scale human rights violations in Ukraine is not “a propaganda product” but an invitation to the international community to act, the Foreign Ministry's human rights ombudsman Konstantin Dolgov said.

International Observation Missions

• (RIA Novosti) The leaders of Russia, Germany and France agreed in a conference call that the OSCE should play a more active role in monitoring the conflict in Ukraine.

Governance 

• (Interfax Ukraine) Proposed constitutional amendments stipulate that Ukrainian will remain the sole state language in Ukraine, the country's President Petro Poroshenko said.
   
• (Interfax Ukraine) The Verkhovna Rada appointed Valeriy Heletei defense minister of Ukraine based on the president's recommendation.
   
• (Interfax Ukraine) The mission of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that arrived in Ukraine on June 24 to discuss the first revision of the economic program of the country's authorities supported by the IMF's financing will continue working in the country until the end of the week of July 4, a well -informed source in the governmental circles told Interfax-Ukraine.
   
• (Interfax Ukraine) The Ukrainian government approved a draft law on the anticorruption strategy until 2017 and 10 top-priority steps to fight corruption for the next six months.

Constitutional Reform

• (Interfax Ukraine) Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said that he is hopeful the amendments to the country's constitution proposed by him will help resolve the crisis in Ukraine's eastern regions.
   
• (Interfax Ukraine) President Poroshenko stated that a presidential bill on amendments to the Constitution of Ukraine does not extend the powers of the head of state.