Weekly News Digest

(March 3-9)
This weekly news digest highlights the situation in the Eastern Ukraine, covers Ukraine`s
economy and the implementation of reforms, and also analyses international and Ukrainian
statements of the week as well as the trends of international support to Ukraine.
The situation in the ATO area remains tense. 154 attacks have been carried out during the
last week, resulting in 6 Ukrainian soldiers killed and 22 injured.
Ukrainian side, under the supervision of the OSCE, had complied with the Minsk
Agreement and completed the withdrawal of heavy weapons from the frontline (including antitank guns "Rapira" and "Ruta", as well as MLRS "Grad" and "Uragan"). The NATO does not
confirm the information about the arms pullback by the gunmen, since it is not carried out under
the supervision of the OSCE observers (whose number had increased to 1000 men). The
National Security Council claims that gunmen are only imitating heavy weapons withdrawal and
are preparing further provocations in Mariupol`s direction.
The self-proclaimed republics are trying to act as independent states. Mobilization
campaign in "DPR" continues. However, many cities lack essential goods (cases of starvation
among the civilians were recorded in "LPR").
The possibility of Russia supporting the independence of the so-called "DNR" and
"LNR" causes great concern, said K. Kosachov, the head of Federation Council Committee on
Foreign Affairs in his statement.
Russian large military contingent is still situated along the border, therefore a possibility
of hostilities resumption remains. In particular, according to the US Army estimates, there are
about 12000 Russian soldiers in the eastern Ukraine (the statement by B. Hodges). The Assistant
Secretary General for Human Rights I. Shimonovich warned that hostilities renewal in the East
of Ukraine is a possible scenario and Mariupol might be attacked. According to the current
information, pro-Russian rebels and Russian Armed Forces are building up weapons and forces
to prepare for offensive in the eastern Ukraine.
Because of its bitter experience, Ukraine has serious doubts that comprehensive peace in
Donbas will be achieved, despite the partial improvement of the situation in the ATO area,
gradual arms pullback and overall decrease of the attacks carried out by the rebels against the
ATO forces (P. Poroshenkos and P. Klimlins statements). Also, Petro Poroshenko asked
Europe and USA to refrain from precocious optimism and continue to carry out its stiff policy,

aimed at both parties complying with the Minsk Agreement. He added that pro-Russian rebels do
not want and are not ready to withdraw heavy weapons from the frontline under the supervision
of the OSCE.
Ukraine is ready for a fair dialogue with Donbas, said V. Prystaiko, the Deputy
Minister for Foreign Affairs of Ukraine. He stressed that Kyiv is ready to talk with Donbas
representatives, not with the field commanders, but with the elected officials, chosen in free and
fair elections. He also emphasized that the elections in LPR and DPR will be held only after the
supervised withdrawal of heavy weapons.
The USA, EU, France, German, Italy and Great Britain leaders agreed to introduce new
sanctions in case of further Minsk Agreement violations. The sides also negotiated to maintain
and strengthen the capabilities of the OSCE SMM to Ukraine and continue to support the
Ukrainian economy and the implementation of the reforms in the country. D. Tusk sharply
criticised Europes policy, saying that the EU, despite of the "constant provocations by President
Putin," is not willing to impose tougher sanctions against Russia, with one of the reason being
too many conflict zones in the world. He said that Ukrainian-Russian conflict is viewed as "just
one of the many" crises that threaten European security and demand an adequate response from
the EU and the US. Donald Tusk urged the European countries to live without illusions and not
put all the responsibility in the security sector on NATO. The Chairman of the Council of the EU
stressed that by military, economic or any other means sooner or later Russia will want to have
full control over Ukraine.
In the recent times, the arbitrary arrest and detention of Ukrainian citizens on the Russian
territory, inhumane treatment of Ukrainians by Russian law enforcement agencies and their
incompatible with human dignity behaviour, usage of unacceptable means of physical and
psychological influence, including torture, became a usual practice, the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs said in the statement. Ukraine believes that such policy violates the universal norms of
the international law, particularly human rights and basic freedoms. Ukrainian side stressed that
such breach of international obligations, including in the sphere of consular relations, became
systematic.
Europe will be able to give a convincing response to the threat to peace in the EU country
members and its neighbors only if it builds European army. "A common European army would
convey a clear message to Russia that we are serious about defending our European values, said
Jean-Claude Juncker in the statement. His idea has already gained some support in Germany (F.W. Steinmeiers, N. Rttgens and U. von der Leyens statements).

The difficult economic situation and hostilities in the country may prevent the
implementation of the reforms in Ukraine. As to the reforms, the following points can be singled
out: 1) implementation of constitutional reform (signing the Decree on the establishment of the
Constitutional Commission, which will introduce changes to the Constitution); 2) gradual
implementation of the judicial reform (purifying the judiciary of corrupt and incompetent
judges, possible prosecution of several hundred judges, who illegally sentenced Maidan peaceful
protesters); 3) steps to implement anti-corruption reform (signing the law "On amending some
laws in support of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau and the National Agency for the
Prevention of Corruption", pressing charges against former high officials, detention and
interrogation regarding the corruption in Customs); 4) implementation of the democratic reform
(signing the changes to the Law of Ukraine "On Protection of Public Morality"); 5)
implementation of the reform of law enforcement agencies (devising a new strategy for
reforming the Prosecutor Generals Office of Ukraine, signing changes to the law "On Police",
expressing suspicions about the unlawful use of force taken against peaceful Maidan protesters
by the law enforcers).
The economy of Ukraine has been characterized by the following trends: 1) deterioration
of the macroeconomic situation (prices for industrial products increased by 4.8% while annual
inflation climbed to 34.5%, continuous declining trend in foreign exchange reserves, forecasts on
growth of overall public debt by 120% in 2015) along with the strengthening of the hryvnia; 2)
long-term and ambiguous trends in the energy sector (reduction in the import of Russian gas and
increase in the volume of gas purchased from Poland, Slovakia and Hungary; the EU's agreement
about building of Eastring gas pipeline, which will connect Ukraine and Turkey; increase of
domestic gas extraction; US willingness to assist Ukraine in the implementation of new projects
in nuclear energy sector); trends of international financial support of Ukraine (a positive decision
of the IMF Board on the approval of the new EFF program in amount of $17.5 billion is
anticipated ; a statement of J. Khan about intentions to allocate 110 million to Ukraine in a
new package of social and financial assistance; Polands willingness to allocate 100 million
loan to Ukraine; standby loans from the World Bank in the amount of $800 million; a possibility
of the US authorities providing assistance to Ukraine in the form of loan guarantees of $1 billion
by the end of the year).
International support to Ukraine is of positive dynamics. The help was provided by the
USA ($120 million to strengthen the security system along with the decision not to supply arms
to Ukraine), Germany (2 million charitable assistance for refugees, humanitarian aid and
ambulance cars, treatment of Ukrainian soldiers), the UK (sending military advisors to train

Ukrainian troops, supplying equipment and non-lethal weapons), Ukrainian diasporas in Spain
and Italy (donated a few ambulance cars). Among international organization, the assistance in
numerous sectors was provided by NATO (joint military exercises with Sweden, Finland and
Ukrainian Army, including NATO's experts tactical medicine trainings), the EU (handing over
special technical equipment for the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission).
The materials used for the weekly news digest include the official websites of the
President, the National Security and Defence Council, the Ministry of the Foreign Affairs of
Ukraine and the Government, Ukrainian Internet newspaper Ukrainska Pravda (Ukrainian
Truth), Dmytro Tymchuks blog Informatsiinyi sprotyv (Informational Resistance),
Ukrainian news agency UNIAN, Ukrainian news program TSN, weekly political magazine
Korespondent ( Journalist), weekly political, economical and the arts magazine
Ukrainskyi Tyzhden (Ukrainian week), etc.