05/18/2015 Ukraine: Daily Highlights -The hryvnia exchange rate failed in the interbank market

The hryvnia exchange rate failed in the interbank market

05.18.2015  Daily Highlights  by the Digests & Analytics Ukraine News Agency

Topics from Media and Social Networks

• The hryvnia exchange rate failed in the interbank market.
• The US wants to participate in the settlement process in the Donbass.
• The General Staff of Russia demands to return of its "former" commandos.
• The anniversary of the Crimean Tatars deportation
• Obama's Twitter.

Key Events of Ukraine

• President Poroshenko signed a law, forbidding the soldiers in operating reserve to break the contract with the Armed Forces before the end of the special period.
• The State Statistics Committee reported that in April, compared to March, the decline in industrial production in Ukraine accelerated from 21.1 to 21.7%, growth is not recorded in any of the industries. Compared to the same period last year, the retail trade turnover in the first quarter in comparable prices fell by a quarter, in Kiev it fell by 19%.
• The Ministry of Justice reported that the Cabinet of Ministers did not pursue a material claim regarding the Crimea annexation against the Russian Federation and continues to collect information on violations of property rights of Ukraine by the Russian authorities.
• Ukraine and the United States signed an agreement on the provision of credit guarantees for $ 1 billion.
• "Privatbank" is to increas its authorized capital by 5 billion UAH and invites the former head of the National Bank Stelmakh to head its supervisory board.
• The hryvnia exchange rate failed in the interbank market: 22.12 UAH/USD (+1.42 UAH), 25.19 UAH/EUR (+1,74 UAH), 4.49 UAH/10 RUR (+0.36 UAH).

Ukraine at War

• Mariupol direction fighting moved to Chermalyk. In Lugansk region there are fights in the area of ​​the Troitske and Schastya, intense skirmishing continues near Donetsk and Gorlivka. According to official data, due to the fightings during the day  two soldiers were killed and four were wounded. The official reports did not incluse the losses incurred when the armored vehicle tripped a land mine in the Luhansk region, where two soldiers and two volunteers were killed.
• Russian General Staff said that at the time of detention of two soldiers of the main intelligence directorate of the Russian General Staff special forces in Schastya they did not act as soldiers of the Russian Federation army and hopes for "good sense of the Ukrainian leadership" and their early release. According to the Ukrainian General Staff, special forces where detained Russian soldiers served, hastily left the territory of Ukraine. The head of the SBU Nalyvaychenko announced that Russian saboteurs can not be exchanged and will bear responsible for the commission of a terrorist act.

Ukraine and the World

• Assistant Secretary of State Nuland said that the United States would like to participate in the peace process in the Donbass in the framework of working subgroups and monitor the provisions implementation by all the parties which signed the memorandum. Nuland warned the Russian leadership of the consequences of the Minsk Agreement violations.
• The OSCE believes that the laws on decommunisation signed by president Poroshenko could restrict the media freedom.
• Foreign Minister Klimkin said that according to the results of the tripartite negotiations, Russia has no objections to the full implementation of a free trade zone between Ukraine and the EU.
• In Romania, a large-scale exercises of NATO forces with participation of the US and Bulgaria units began .
• French diplomat who attended the talks with Yanukovich during the Maydan events in February 2014, claimed that Russian snipers participated in the shooting of activists.
• The NATO Parliamentary Assembly introduced an amendment on the recognition of Ukraine's Euro-Atlantic prospects to its final declaration.

The Trends

• Despite the statements of politicians and MPs, the rating of the Yatsenyuk’s government  keeps plunging, and this allows many experts to predict that it will change soon, although this is not possible without parliament coalition reformatting. Yatsenyuk and the "People's Front" parliamentary fraction are trying to save the situation by discussing the possibility of the personal sector’s income indexation, however, it might be too late for these actions.