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Moscow Court Upholds Extending Pretrial Detention Of Ukrainian Sailors
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WATCH: Moscow Court Upholds Extending Pretrial Detention Of Ukrainian Sailors

Live Blog: A New Government In Ukraine (Archive Sept. 3, 2018-Aug. 16, 2019)

-- EDITOR'S NOTE: We have started a new Ukraine Live Blog as of August 17, 2019. You can find it here.

-- A court in Moscow has upheld a lower court's decision to extend pretrial detention for six of the 24 Ukrainian sailors detained by Russian forces along with their three naval vessels in November near the Kerch Strait, which links the Black Sea and Sea of Azov.

-- The U.S. special peace envoy to Ukraine, Kurt Volker, says Russian propaganda is making it a challenge to solve the conflict in the east of the country.

-- Two more executives of DTEK, Ukraine's largest private power and coal producer, have been charged in a criminal case on August 14 involving an alleged conspiracy to fix electricity prices with the state energy regulator, Interfax reported.

-- A Ukrainian deputy minister and his aide have been detained after allegedly taking a bribe worth $480,000, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau said on Facebook.

*Time stamps on the blog refer to local time in Ukraine

21:21 2.5.2019

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20:46 2.5.2019

Here's an item from RFE/RL's news desk on Rafael Lusvarghi's sentencing today:

Ukraine Sentences Brazilian Who Fought For Russia-Backed Separatists To 13 Years In Prison

Rafael Lusvarghi at his trial in Pavlograd. (file photo)
Rafael Lusvarghi at his trial in Pavlograd. (file photo)

A Brazilian citizen has been sentenced to 13 years in prison for fighting for Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine.

Rafael Lusvarghi, 34, came to Ukraine in 2014, after Russia annexed Crimea and Moscow-backed separatists began battling Ukrainian government forces in the east of the country.

Lusvarghi fought on the separatist side and appeared frequently in Russian and separatist propaganda videos, before returning to Brazil in 2015.

Lusvarghi traveled back to Ukraine in 2016 and was arrested upon arrival.

He was accused of terrorism and sentenced to 13 years in prison in January 2017 but released in December the same year.

He was discovered by an RFE/RL reporter while living in an Orthodox monastery in Kyiv and was interviewed in May 2018.

Activists from an ultranationalist group captured Lusvarghi shortly afterward and brought him to the SBU headquarters by force. He was then rearrested.

On May 2, Lusvarghi was once again sentenced to prison by a court in Pavlograd, a city in the Dnipropetrovsk region, to 13 years in prison -- the same sentence he received in 2017.

He was found guilty of fighting for an illegal militant formation and participating in terrorism.

Lusvarghi pleaded guilty on the charges of fighting for an illegal formation, but denied the terrorism charges.

Lusvarghi will also have to pay $560-worth of court expenses.

According to Ukrainian law, the year Lusvarghi spent in pretrial detention will reduce his sentence by two years, bringing his prison term down to 11 years.

With reporting by Kyivpost.com
20:28 2.5.2019

19:28 2.5.2019

19:28 2.5.2019

19:21 2.5.2019

You can read more about this individual here.

19:08 2.5.2019

Sounds like quite a story...

18:22 2.5.2019

18:22 2.5.2019

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