Michael MacKay, Radio Lemberg, 16.01.2019    Ministers of European governments are making a stronger effort to connect with their eastern partner, Ukraine. Ministerial-level official visits to Ukraine are more significant now after the Russian Federation’s attack on the Ukrainian Navy on 25 November 2018.   A delegation of the foreign ministers of Ukraine, Lithuania, Poland, Estonia, and Latvia planned to fly to Mariupol on the Sea of Above on January 15. Winter weather changed their plans.   The Latvian foreign minister Edgars Rinkēvičs tweeted on January 15: “Ukrainian Air Force pilots tried to get us to Mariupol, unfortunately it was impossible due to weather conditions, good visit to Dnipro instead, military hospital, meeting with journalists and videoconference with mayor of Mariupol.”   In Dnipro, the foreign ministers met Ukrainian soldiers who were wounded in action on the battlefront in Donbas where the Russian Federation is invading Ukraine.   The current chairperson-in-office of the OSCE is Miroslav Lajčác, the Slovakian foreign minister. He went to Kyiv on January 15, where he received a briefing from the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine about its observations of the battlefront in Donbas where the Russian Federation is invading Ukraine.   The foreign ministers did speak with the Mayor of Mariupol, Vadym Boychenko, with an audio/video link. Mayor Boychenko told them about the challenges Mariupol is facing, especially those springing from the Russian Federation’s effective maritime blockade of the Ukrainian ports by strangling the flow of commercial freighter traffic through the Kerch Strait.   Unfortunately, Minister Lajčác use language to appease Russian aggression that is common with the OSCE. He said in a tweet that he wants to “improve the situation of people most affected by the conflict in and around Ukraine.” In fact the

Michael MacKay, Radio Lemberg, 15.01.2019  Russian invader-occupiers are stealing coal which belongs to the people of Ukraine. They are then selling the stolen coal to Western buyers who turn a blind eye to its origins. Profits go towards sustaining the terrorist entities “DPR” and “LPR” in occupied eastern Ukraine and paying for Putin’s War.   The Russian Federation invaded Ukraine in Donbas starting in April 2014. Since the beginning of Russian occupation of some of Luhansk and Donetsk regions, the Putin-Kremlin crime syndicate has stolen about five million tons of coal from Ukraine. The coal is taken by rail through the international border, which only the Russian Federation controls. Poland then becomes the trans-shipment point for Ukrainian anthracite to be sold to the rest of Europe – sold falsely as Russian coal.    The rate of coal theft by the Putin regime from Donbas is increasing. To date, at least $515 million has been taken away from the Ukrainian nation and allocated to the Russian Federation’s war against Ukraine.    Vadym Chernysh provided facts and figures about the theft of coal from Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine. He is the Minister for Temporarily Occupied Territories and Internally Displaced Persons of Ukraine. Speaking to the Ukraine Crisis Media Centre, Minister Chernysh said: “Russians are trying to find sources to support the occupation administration and the occupied territories. … They take Ukrainian coal and Ukrainian gas from the Black Sea shelf using it to support the occupation regime.”    A ship sinking off the coast of Turkey revealed some details about how the chain of coal thievery works. “Coal illegally extracted from occupied Donbas is exported through Russian seaports,” said Minister Chernysh. “For example, the Azov port in Rostov region from where the ship carrying coal departed

Michael MacKay, Radio Lemberg, 14.01.2019   Lieutenant-General Serhiy Nayev commands Ukrainian forces in Donbas that are defending Europe from Russian invasion. He says that “above all, Moscow seeks to create a land corridor to the Crimean Peninsula occupied by Russia.” For the Russian Federation at war with Ukraine, this is the most practical line of attack.   In an interview given to Austria’s Wiener Zeitung on January 9, Lt.-General Nayev said: “Russian occupation forces are currently not attacking, but that does not mean they have stopped their attempts to provoke further conflict. Currently, the enemy is very active, especially in the Mariupol area and the Azov region.”   Since a “New Year’s ceasefire” supposedly began on December 29, the Russian forces invading Ukraine in Donbas have bombarded Ukrainian defensive positions constantly but at a lower rate than previously. The approaches to the east and north-east of Mariupol have been a particular area of preoccupation for the Russians. The 1st  Army Corps (so-called “DPR”) of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation have attacked Ukraine’s entrenched positions near the villages of Chermalyk, Pavlopil, Hnutove, Vodiane, Lebedynske, and Shyrokyne – from the Kalmius River down to the Sea of Azov. Russian invasion-occupation troops open aimed fire with armament of infantry fighting vehicles, grenade launchers of various systems, large-calibre machine guns, and small arms.   On January 12, mercenaries of the Russian armed forces directed small arms fire at an OSCE SMM team near the village of Chermalyk, 25 kilometres north-east of the free Ukraine city of Mariupol. A Ukrainian soldier at an observation post witnessed the attack. According to the Ukrainian side of the Joint Center for the Control and Coordination (JCCC), the provocative actions of the mercenaries of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation

Michael MacKay, Radio Lemberg, 13.01.2019    The Russian Federation is conducting its war against Ukraine with exceeding barbarity. When Russians capture or abduct Ukrainians who are wounded or ill, they torture them by denying them essential medicine and appropriate medical care. These Russians are committing war crimes.   Representatives of the illegal Russian occupation regime in Crimea, Ukraine abducted a Ukrainian citizen, Edem Bekirov, on 12 December 2018. He was crossing from Kherson oblast to the Autonomous Republic of Crimea within Ukraine when the Russians took him captive. Edem Bekirov is a Crimean Tatar – a member of a persecuted minority in Russian-occupied territory. Using illegitimate Russian laws against a Ukrainian citizen within Ukraine, the Russians are charging Edem Bekirov with terrorism offences. There is no substance to these charges, but that doesn’t matter in the Russian Federation and the territory it occupies like Crimea – these are places where there is no rule of law.   Edem Bekirov is severely disabled. He has diabetes and has recently suffered a heart attack. He has undergone heart surgery. Complications from diabetes have required him to have one of his legs amputated and he’s still in recovery from that operation. Given the gravely weakened condition of Edem Bekirov, the charge that he transported and stored heavy boxes of ammunition and containers of explosives is ridiculous. More immediately, his unjust detention while he is critically ill means he could die. His wife, Gulnara, issued an urgent appeal: “I beg you: help save Edem. Keeping my husband in prison means a de-facto death sentence for him.” On January 11, the United Kingdom and the European Union officially demanded the Russian Federation provide necessary medical care for Edem Bekirov. Medical assistance in detention is a fundamental human right.   Pavlo Hryb (on photo) was lured by the Federal Security