More details have emerged of torture methods used to obtain videoed ‘confessions’ from Ukrainians Russia is holding incommunicado and accusing of ‘sabotage’ in Russian-occupied Crimea

Militants from the so-called ‘Donbas people’s republic’ [DNR] have ‘arrested’ 7 teenagers and claim that they were blowing up civilian and military targets for Ukraine’s SBU [Security Service]. The reports, backed only by videos of the lads supposedly ‘confessing’, are chillingly similar to Russia’s recent claim that Ukraine had ‘attacked’ Ukrainian Crimea under Russian occupation.

Militants from the so-called ‘Donbas people’s republic’ [DNR] have ‘arrested’ 7 teenagers and claim that they were blowing up civilian and military targets for Ukraine’s SBU [Security Service]. The reports, backed only by videos of the lads supposedly ‘confessing’, are chillingly similar to Russia’s recent claim that Ukraine had ‘attacked’ Ukrainian Crimea under Russian occupation.

Ukraine’s Cabinet of Ministers has tabled a draft law proposing that books imported from Russia be checked for any ‘anti-Ukrainian’ content. Similar measures earlier targeted specific books and elicited protest. The new draft bill seems more sweeping in its potential scope, and dangerously vague.

Black Sea News, together with the monitoring group of the Maidan of Foreign Affairs, have published a blacklist of 260 foreign ships that entered Crimea since Russia’s invasion and annexation up till August 15, 2016.

One of the many Ukrainian prisoners forcibly moved to Russia after the latter invaded and occupied Crimea has died in a Russian prison, with the Russian authorities having ignored even the European Court of Human Rights

One of the many Ukrainian prisoners forcibly moved to Russia after the latter invaded and occupied Crimea has died in a Russian prison, with the Russian authorities having ignored even the European Court of Human Rights

Fears that new changes to the draconian law on so-called ‘foreign agents’ would be used to crush civil society are proving founded. After effectively paralyzing the Levada Centre, Russia’s main independent pollster, Russia’s justice ministry has again attacked Memorial.

Russian opposition politician Garry Kasparov follows Crimean Tatar leader Refat Chubarov and Kyiv in stressing that the international community must refuse to recognize the results of Russia’s parliamentary elections, which it is illegally holding also in occupied Crimea

Ihor Movenko is in a Sevastopol hospital with severe injuries after being brutally beaten over the Ukrainian symbols and an Battalion sticker on his bike. It was Movenko who had his hands bound after the enforcement officers arrived, and he is now facing charges for so-called ‘extremism’.

Crimean Tatar Mejlis leader Refat Chubarov has addressed all Crimeans calling on them to boycott the Russian parliamentary elections which Russia is insisting on holding in annexed Crimea. His appeal coincides with a Ukrainian parliamentary resolution asking the international community to join Ukraine in not recognizing the elections in Crimea.

Crimean Tatar Mejlis leader Refat Chubarov has addressed all Crimeans calling on them to boycott the Russian parliamentary elections which Russia is insisting on holding in annexed Crimea. His appeal coincides with a Ukrainian parliamentary resolution asking the international community to join Ukraine in not recognizing the elections in Crimea.

The apparent resurrection of a long buried Soviet tradition in Russia’s new Youth Army is not the most alarming feature of a children’s ‘military-patriotic’ formation which in just eight months has opened 76 regional branches and reportedly already has 12 thousand members

Despite the ruling coalition’s fragility in parliament, civil society activists hope MPs will unite over crucial initiatives to ensure the passage of these ten changes:

The sentences could have been much worse which is the only positive thing to say about the conviction on Wednesday of four Crimean Tatars on trumped up charges. The men’s defiant T-shirts and taped mouths said it all.

What Russia was hoping to achieve by risking Umerov’s life and resorting to punitive psychiatry remains unclear. Presumably not the actual result, namely to highlight the Soviet-style repression unleashed since Russia’s invasion and annexation of Crimea

A court in Chechnya on September 5, 2016, sentenced a local independent journalist to three years in prison on dubious drug possession charges, Human Rights Watch has reported

The current ‘trial’ of imprisoned Crimean Tatar leader Akhtem Chiygoz is proving as openly contemptuous of the law as the charges themselves. Chiygoz has been prevented from attending his own ‘trial’, or even properly hearing what is being said, and the prosecutor makes no attempt to conceal his racist views

The current ‘trial’ of imprisoned Crimean Tatar leader Akhtem Chiygoz is proving as openly contemptuous of the law as the charges themselves. Chiygoz has been prevented from attending his own ‘trial’, or even properly hearing what is being said, and the prosecutor makes no attempt to conceal his racist views

The current ‘trial’ of imprisoned Crimean Tatar leader Akhtem Chiygoz is proving as openly contemptuous of the law as the charges themselves. Chiygoz has been prevented from attending his own ‘trial’, or even properly hearing what is being said, and the prosecutor makes no attempt to conceal his racist views