Internal Security News

• (Interfax Ukraine) Ukraine's presidential administration said that Kyiv will not hold talks with representatives of the so-called Luhansk and Donetsk People's Republics.
   
• Ukraine's defense ministry said it will not negotiate a new ceasefire with pro-Russian separatists until the rebels have laid down their arms.
   
• Ukrainian President Poroshenko said that the army operation in Donbas represents the birth of a real Ukrainian army, and the current battles in eastern Ukraine are fights for Ukraine's independence.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) Ukraine’s army was moving troops and hardware to the city of Luhansk, the press service of the self-proclaimed Luhansk People’s Republic said.
   
•  (RIA Novosti) Ukrainian Prime Minister Yatsenyuk told law enforcement bodies to check all lawmakers and political parties in the country for possible support of eastern Ukrainian separatists.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) Militants seized a police rapid response center in Donetsk.
   
• (RIA Novosti) Ukrainian Prosecutor General Vitaliy Yarema said the police are authorized to use force to disperse the Euromaidan activists, who have been encamped in downtown Kyiv since last year.
   
• (Interfax Ukraine) Kyiv Mayor and Head of Kyiv City State Administration Vitali Klitschko reiterated that he is against the dispersal of remaining Maidan activists by force.
   
• (RIA Novosti) More than 160 civilians were evacuated from the Russian Matveyev Kurgan checkpoint due to shooting at the adjacent Ukrainian checkpoint.
   
• The State Saving Bank of Ukraine restored its operation in Sloviansk and Kramatorsk.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) Restoration of infrastructure in the eastern Ukrainian cities of Luhansk and Donetsk will cost at least 8.1 billion hryvnias (about $700 million), Ukrainian Prime Minister Yatsenyuk said.
   

Diplomacy News

• (RIA Novosti) Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that there are grounds to suspect Ukrainian law enforcement agencies are withholding information about crimes against humanity committed in southeastern Ukraine.
   
• (RIA Novosti) Russian State Duma Speaker Sergei Naryshkin stated that Ukrainian President Poroshenko’s peace plan was and continues to be decorative and a "cover operation" to continue aggression.
   
•  (RIA Novosti) Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said he would not recommend anyone attack the Crimean peninsula, even if it is an attempt to return it to Ukraine. “I wouldn’t suggest that to anyone. We have a doctrine of national security and it clearly illustrates what actions should be taken in this case." Lavrov also stated that negotiations on the Ukrainian crisis are possible only if the parties refrain from ultimatums and preliminary conditions.
   
• (Interfax Ukraine) Ukrainian pilot Nadia Savchenko, who is accused by Russian investigators of being involved in the killing of journalists, was held in Russia after crossing the border with no papers disguised as refugee, and subsequently indicted for complicity in murder.
   
• The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said in a statement Savchenko had been spirited across the border illegally after she was seized by the separatists. "This is yet more confirmation that the terrorists plan and carry out their crimes in Ukraine in close contact with the intelligence services of the Russian Federation," it said.
   
• A Foreign Ministry spokesman said that Kyiv suspects Russian Secret Services of helping bring Savchenko to Russia, expects the Russian law enforcement agencies to allow visits to Savchenko, and promises to appeal to the international community for help in her release.
   
• (Interfax Ukraine) Ukraine registered a range of “unquestionable” evidence that proves that Russia is actively supporting illegal armed formations, spokesman of the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) Andriy Lysenko said. "In particular, yesterday during a press conference in Donetsk, the leaders of the militants confirmed that they receive armored vehicles, artillery systems, antitank, anti-aircraft and small arms from Russia.”
   
• (ITAR-TASS) US Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland told the Senate Committee for Foreign Affairs that “We are ready to impose more costs - including targeted sector-specific sanctions — very soon,” she told. She noted that this would happen “if Russia does not decisively change course and break its ties with separatists.”
   
• (Interfax Ukraine) Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko instructed the Prosecutor General's Office and the Foreign Ministry to look into military pilot Nadia Savchenko's detention by Russian investigative agencies on charges of involvement in the killing of Russian journalists in the eastern part of Ukraine.
   
• Russian border guards were continuing to prepare to prevent mercenaries escaping from Ukraine to Russia, spokesman of National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) Andriy Lysenko said.
   
• The White House stated that the United States and France believe that Russia should take further steps to de-escalate the situation in the southeast of Ukraine, otherwise it will face new sanctions.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting with Civic Chamber members that Russia will persistently defend its national interests, but “without descending into self-isolationism.”
   
• (RIA Novosti) A Moscow district court arrested in absentia Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov.
   
• (ITAR-TASS) French leader of the National Front and MEP Marine Le Pen told the European Parliament that sanctions imposed against Russia were stupid and called for an independent investigation into the May 2 fire in Odessa. “Sanctions against Russia are an exceptional stupidity that is adding fuel to the fire of conflict (in Ukraine) and is creating a hostile climate with regards to Russia, which is an integral part of a diplomatic settlement to the Ukraine crisis.”
   
• The European Commission said that the European Union and Russia interpret the requirements of the agreement on the CIS in a different way, a high-ranking European diplomat told Interfax-Ukraine before the trilateral negotiations between the EU, Ukraine and Russia on the implementation of the Association Agreement scheduled for July 11, 2014.
   
• (Interfax Ukraine) Ukraine fully ensures the transit of Russian gas to Europe and is not going to take the gas for its own needs, Energy and Coal Industry Minister Yuriy Prodan said.
   
• The Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union (UHHRU) brought a suit to the European Court of Human Rights over the taking and then torturing of hostages by illegal armed units in Sloviansk.
   
• Ukraine said it was confident of receiving further aid under a $17 billion IMF bailout but appealed to Western institutions and donors for further cash and credit to rebuild the east.
   

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