Viktoria Roshchyna, 27, disappeared in August 2023 while reporting from Ukraine's Russian-occupied territories. Moscow admitted she was in Russian detention the following year.
European foreign ministers approved the creation of a special tribunal for the crime of aggression against Ukraine during a meeting in Lviv on May 9. The tribunal, which will operate under the auspices of the Council of Europe, aims to prosecute Russia's top political and military leadership, including President Vladimir Putin. Ukraine expects the tribunal to start work in 2026. The Kyiv Independent’s Kateryna Hodunova spoke with Dutch Justice Minister David van Weel about the future tribunal and its role in bringing justice for Ukraine.
Turkish officials told Bloomberg that while they don't expect Trump to visit Istanbul, they are not ruling it out, and preparations for any scenario are underway.
Melkonyants was arrested in August 2023 in connection with the activities of the European Network of Election Monitoring Organizations (ENEMO), which was co-founded by Golos's legal predecessor, the Golos association.
Ukraine's underground storage facilities are currently using 19.4% of their capacity. Almost 32%, or 2.79 bcm, less gas is available in the storages than in the previous year, according to the estimates.
The majority of Ukrainians, 71%, do not support holding elections before a full peace deal, even in the case of a ceasefire and security guarantees, according to a poll published by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) on May 14.
"He'd like me to be there, and that's a possibility. ... I don't know that he would be there if I'm not there. We're going to find out," U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One while traveling to Qatar, Reuters reported.
Trump has long demanded that NATO allies increase their military spending, previously calling for the alliance to raise its benchmark from 2% to 5% of GDP.
More than 1,000 Russian government entities and 1,200 private companies are involved in the economy of occupied Mariupol, a major southeastern city occupied by Russia after it invaded Ukraine in 2022, according to a research paper published on May 14.
The measures target almost 200 ships of Russia's "shadow fleet," 30 companies involved in sanctions evasion, 75 sanctions on entities and individuals linked to the Russian military-industrial complex, and more.
A view of a destroyed Russian tank during Russia's war against Ukraine at the Dovhenke village located between Izium and Sloviansk in Kharkiv Oblast, Ukraine on June 22, 2023. (Wojciech Grzedzinski/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
Russia's war in Ukraine has been a "military disaster for the Kremlin," a British diplomat said on Sept. 18, saying the country's significant losses in manpower "paint a bleak picture."
Speaking at the Security Cooperation Forum in Vienna, senior military advisor at the U.K. Delegation to the OSCE, Nicholas Aucott, also said factors such as Ukraine's Kursk incursion and the damaging or destroying of a quarter of the Russian Black Sea Fleet add up to a "stunning Russian military failure."
"It is now two years and 212 days since Russia conducted its full-scale invasion, a military action which Russia envisaged would be over in a matter of days," he said in comments reported by Ukrinform.
"In that context, the current predicament can be construed as nothing less than a military disaster for the Kremlin."
Western intelligence estimates cited by the WSJ on Sept. 17 placed Russian losses at up to 200,000 dead and 400,000 wounded.
This is close to Kyiv's estimates on Moscow's casualties, which is over 637,000 killed and wounded as of Sept. 18.
"At the military level, Ukraine’s effective use of maneuver warfare stands in stark contrast to Russia’s 'meat grinder' tactics," Aucott said.
Ukraine also launched its cross-border incursion into Kursk Oblast in early Aug. 6, allegedly seizing around 100 settlements and over 1,300 square kilometers (500 square miles).
"Ukraine has a clear right of self-defense against Russia’s illegal, unprovoked, and barbaric invasion, and its actions are demonstrative of the ability of Ukraine’s armed forces to achieve strategic surprise and expose Russian weaknesses," Aucott said.
Russia's counterattack in Kursk Oblast aiming to retake Ukrainian-held territory has been stopped, a spokesperson of the Ukrainian military administration in the region told AFP on Sept. 18.
The statement comes a week after Moscow launched a counteroffensive against the western flank of Ukrainian troops in the Russian region.
"They tried to attack from the flanks, but they were stopped there," spokesperson Oleksii Dmytrashkivskyi told AFP.
"The situation was stabilized and today everything is under control, they are not successful."
We are the news team of the Kyiv Independent. We are here to make sure our readers get quick, essential updates about the events in Ukraine. Feel free to contact us via email with feedback and news alerts.
Chris York
