24/12/2014 Ukraine: Daily Highlights - Three-sided contact group negotiations to resolve the conflict in Donbass continued in Minsk behind closed doors

24/12/2014 Daily Highlights by "Digests and Analytics - Ukraine" News Agency

Topics of the day 

Three-sided contact group negotiations to resolve the conflict in Donbass continued in Minsk behind closed doors. The number of terrorist attacks increasing in Ukraine. Public criticizes the tax innovations introduced by the Cabinet.

Key Events In Ukraine

• Deputy head of the presidential administration Chaliy believes the abolition of non-aligned status of Ukraine will correct mistakes of the past. He is confident that NATO is the best security solution for the Europe.
• National Council of reforms approved "Strategy 2020" presented by the President Poroshenko in September 2014.
• Court of Appeals decided to send a case of the Ministry of Justice to ban the Communist Party of Ukraine to the court of primarily jurisdiction for re-hearing.
• Minister of Labour and Social Policy Rozenko said that temporary migrants will receive social assistance from state for no more than six months. During this time, they need to find job opportunities.
  Benefits for the part of population affected int the Chernobyl nuclear power plant accident will be canceled. Allowance for temporary disability from the budget will be cancelled too.
• The official unemployment rate in Ukraine reached 9.3%. totaling 1.78 million unemployed people.
• Civil activists held a picket at the City Council of Kharkiv demanding the resignation of Mayor Kernes. Minor clashes took place between protesters and police.
• Prosecutor General Yarema fired his first deputy, who is widely blamed for corruption by the public.
• NBU again lowered the official hryvnia exchange rate: 15.77 UAH / USD (+0.11 UAH), 19.26 UAH / EUR (+0,06 UAH), 2.89 UAH / 10 RUR (+0.12 UAH)
• National Bank has prepared a draft memorandum on restructuring consumer loans in foreign currency based on the exchange rate set for 01.01.2014.

Kyiv

• Rating agency Standard & Poor's lowered long-term ratings on liabilities in foreign currency  to "junk" level CCC for Kyiv, Lviv, Dnipropetrovsk and Ivano-Frankivsk - with a negative forecast, which indicates high credit risks, but assumes the repayment of existing debt in time with improved market conditions.

War in Ukraine

• Contact group negotiations to resolve the situation in eastern Ukraine took place in Minsk behind closed doors with the participation of former President Leonid Kuchma, the OSCE Representative Tagliavini, Russian ambassador to Ukraine Zurabov and representatives from self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk "republics". Results of the negotiations are not made public. Negotiations are planned to resume on December 26.
• The militants do not stop shelling positions of the Ukrainian army and civilian communities. Two soldiers were injured according to the press center of the ATO.
• The terrorist threat in Ukraine continues to grow. Grenade was thrown in a group of MP’s in Kyıv. There was an explosion near the shop owned by a volunteer helping the army in Kharkıv. Section of railway track was blown up in the Odessa region. SSU arrested a terrorist group in Dnipropetrovsk region which planned a series of terrorist attacks in public places with explosives.
• Ukraine is preparing to deliver humanitarian aid to the most vulnerable social institutions on the occupied territories - boarding schools, nursing homes, psychiatric hospitals. Representative of the President for a peaceful settlement in the Donbass Gerashchenko said that patients and orphans were not evacuated as the militants did not provide humanitarian corridors.
• As a result of overload in Ukrainian electrical network the Crimea was completely disconnected from the power for several hours.

Ukraine and the World

• Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov argues that "elections" on the occupied Donbass territories in the Donbass were held on the basis of the Minsk Agreement and as a result now the Ukrainian authorities have to negotiate with the new "local authorities".
• Transnistrian separatist leader acknowledged that the economy of "republic" is nearing bankruptcy due to EU and US sanctions against Russia.
• Catholics and Protestants celebrate Christmas.

Trends

• Changes in the tax code proposed by the government of Prime Minister Yatsenyuk are directed towards a sharp increase in fiscal pressure on the population and will result in ceasing legal activities by numerous small and medium-sized businesses. These changes will aslo hit hard at volunteer movement. Prime Minister demands from the Parliament to adopt those laws in the package with the budget for the next year.
• Зro-Russian poliitician Medvedchuk will participate in Minsk contact group negotiations on the Ukraine’s side. According to political experts this may indicate the treason by the acting president and an attempt to freeze the conflict in eastern Ukraine similar to South Ossetia.
• According to the deputy head of presidential administration Shimkiv, The National Agency for the Prevention of Corruption, reporting to the Cabinet, will be created before January 25 along with the creation of the Anti-Corruption Bureau and the National Council for Anti-Corruption Policy. According to experts, the subordination of the anticorruption body to state structures would lead to control of its activities by officials and the failure of the reform process.
• Canceling GST exemptions for non-governmental institutions will destroy competition in the education sector.
• Militants have established the production of mortars at one of the factories owned by Ukrainian oligarch Achmetov. Akhmetov has denied his involvement in supporting terrorism.