European Council President Donald Tusk said ahead of a summit in Brussels today:
"We should send a strong signal on our readiness to further support Ukraine, also financially, as we have done politically today by making the existing sanctions on Crimea and Sebastopol more effective."
More from our News Desk on those EU sanctions against Crimea:
The European Union on December 18 adopted an investment ban that targets firms and individuals in Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula that Russian annexation from Ukraine in March.
The new sanctions drew swift condemnation from Russia, which called them "absolutely unacceptable."
The ban came after EU foreign ministers decided last month that EU’s non-recognition policy toward Russia’s annexation of Crimea needed to be bolstered with tougher sanctions.
The ban prohibits EU citizens and EU-registered companies from buying real estate in Crimea, from setting up joint ventures with Crimean companies, and from buying Crimean firms, their shares, or other securities.
It also bans the sale, export, or transport of goods using EU-registered vessels and aircraft to Crimean firms in the sectors of transport, telecommunications, and energy – including the exploration and production of oil, natural gas, and mineral resources.
In the tourism sector, EU cruise ships are banned from calling at any port on the Crimean Peninsula.
The Russian Foreign Ministry denounced the sanctions as "nothing but an attempt to punish the residents of the peninsula."
Here's an update on Nadiya Savchenko from our news desk:
Russian President Vladimir Putin has said during his annual news conference that the guilt or innocence of Ukrainian pilot Nadiya Savchenko will be decided by a Russian court.
Savchenko, 33, was captured in June by pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine and transferred to Russian custody in July.
Russian authorities have charged her with complicity in the killing of two Russian journalists who died covering the conflict in eastern Ukraine.
Putin said during the December 19 televised program, "Should pre-trial investigation and the trial itself determine that she had nothing to do with it and that she is totally innocent, she will be released immediately."
Putin mentioned Savchenko was suspected of involvement in the murders of the two journalists and added, "Should her guilt be established determining that she took part in this murder, I presume the Russian court will make an appropriate decision."
It seems some Russian soldiers are leaving France without their Mistral:
A ship carrying Russian sailors who have been training for months on a French-built Mistral helicopter carrier has left a French port with no clear indication about whether Paris will deliver the ship to Moscow.
The Russian navy frigate, named "Smolny," left the French port of Saint-Nazaire and headed out into the Atlantic Ocean on December 18.
A French military spokesman said the departure was not permanent "in the sense that the decision on whether to supply the [Mistral] ship has not been taken."
Tensions between the West and Moscow over Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its role in Ukraine’s conflict have cast doubt on a $1.5 billion deal to supply two French warships to Russia.
The Russian sailors arrived at the French shipyard in June to begin training on a first carrier, the "Vladivostok," which France was due to deliver by the end of 2014.
(Reuters, AP, RT)