Flight MH17 departed from Amsterdam Schiphol Airport en-route to Kuala Lumpur International Airport on July 17, 2014. Three hours into the flight, the Boeing-777 was shot down by Russian proxy forces using a Buk surface-to-air missile above Ukraine’s Donetsk Oblast.
"I am grateful for the support and the readiness at the highest level to promote diplomacy," President Volodymyr Zelensky said of the phone conservation with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. "We share the same view on the need for a ceasefire."
The convictions mark a significant development in Britain's efforts to counter Russian intelligence operations amid heightened tensions stemming from Moscow's war against Ukraine and repeated Kremlin threats toward Kyiv's allies.
According to the Verkhovna Rada's website, Ukraine completed the ratification of the U.S.-Ukraine minerals agreement on May 12. President Volodymyr Zelensky signed the deal.
"I myself have heard relatives talking: our village is being attacked, let's roll the car out of the garage, maybe they will shell it — at least we will get money. The car is old, we can't sell it," Belgorod Oblast Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.
The new tranche brings total recent EU defense support for Ukraine to 3.3 billion euros ($3.6 billion), marking a significant expansion of European efforts to boost Kyiv's defense industry.
"Russia is ready for negotiations without any preconditions," Putin claimed in an address marking the end of the three-day Victory Day ceasefire. He invited Ukraine to begin talks in Istanbul on May 15.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk at a press conference in Warsaw, Poland, on May 20, 2024. (Photo by Attila Husejnow/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
The Polish government arrested nine people from a Russian spy ring in connection to alleged sabotage plots, Prime Minister Donald Tusk told Polish media outlet TVN24.
"We currently have nine suspects detained and indicted, who have been directly implicated in the name of Russian (intelligence) services in acts of sabotage in Poland," Tusk said.
The individuals were Polish, Ukrainian, and Belarusian citizens. Tusk also suggested they may have been recruited from criminal circles.
Acts of alleged sabotage include "beatings, arson, and attempted arson," not just in Poland but also in Latvia, Lithuania, and possibly even Sweden. Tusk explained that the group planned, for example, to set fire to a paint factory in Wroclaw, western Poland, and an Ikea center in Lithuania.
Earlier this year, a joint operation by Ukrainian and Polish law enforcement agencies led to the detention of a Polish citizen who allegedly offered to Russia to assassinate President Volodymyr Zelensky.
On his own initiative, the suspect meant to spy on the security of the Rzeszow airport in Poland, with the intention of helping Russian intelligence services plan a potential assassination of Zelensky during the latter's visit to Poland.
The Polish authorities detained the suspect and charged him with working for foreign intelligence services. The investigation is ongoing.
Several other suspects have been arrested in recent months in Germany, Austria, and Estonia for allegedly spying for Russia or other forms of collaboration with Russian intelligence.
Rachel Amran is a news editor at the Kyiv Independent. She previously worked on the Europe and Central Asia team of Human Rights Watch investigating war crimes in Ukraine. Rachel holds a master's degree in Russian, Eastern European, and Eurasian Regional Studies from Columbia University.
Martin Fornusek
