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A priest stands in front of a hospital destroyed after shelling between Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian separatists in the eastern city of Donetsk, Ukraine, on January 19.
A priest stands in front of a hospital destroyed after shelling between Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian separatists in the eastern city of Donetsk, Ukraine, on January 19.

Live Blog: Ukraine In Crisis (Archive)

Final Summary For January 20

-- A military spokesman says Ukrainian soldiers on January 20 came under attack from Russian regular forces in the north of the conflict zone in eastern Ukraine.

-- Germany's foreign minister says he and his counterparts from Ukraine, Russia, and France will meet on January 21 in Berlin in a bid to de-escalate the conflict in Ukraine.

-- The chief of Russian gas giant Gazprom says Ukraine's discount "winter price" for natural gas will end on April 1. Gazprom CEO Aleksei Miller said in a meeting with Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev that the price for Kyiv would be set in accordance with a long-standing contract, one Kyiv has long sought to change.

-- Russia says a European Union decision to keep sanctions against Russia in place shows the EU is not ready to change an "unfriendly course" toward Moscow. The EU's decision "only confirms the fact that the EU is still not ready to alter its unfriendly course or to give an objective assessment of the Kyiv authorities' actions," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

-- A Georgian man fighting on the Ukrainian side in the conflict in Ukraine has been killed in combat near the Donetsk airport, according to relatives. Media reports in Georgia quote members of Tamaz Sukhiashvili's family as saying he was killed in a battle near the bitterly contested airport on January 17.

-- The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has expressed deep concern over what it says is the "escalation" of violence between government forces and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine over the past two weeks. In a statement, the ICRC said the fighting in and around the city of Donetsk was killing civilians and "preventing" its team from carrying out its humanitarian work.

-- An explosion near a courthouse in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv has wounded 14 people, four of them seriously.

-- Russia says Kyiv is trying to solve the crisis in eastern Ukraine through military force and that could lead to "irreversible consequences for Ukrainian statehood." Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin spoke to Interfax news agency as Kyiv and Moscow accused each other of ignoring appeals for a cease-fire to be respected.

*NOTE: Times are stated according to local time in Kyiv

13:22 27.12.2014

11:54 27.12.2014

More on the prisoner swap from our news desk:

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has welcomed home as heroes 145 soldiers released by pro-Russian fighters in a prisoner swap.

Poroshenko met the soldiers as they disembarked from a cargo plane that landed at a military airport outside Kyiv early in the morning on December 27.

The Ukrainian leader shook hands and embraced the men, who had been held for months by pro-Russian militia fighters in Donetsk region.

Poroshenko praised the soldiers for keeping their "military morale" and "demonstrating the best qualities of a Ukrainian warrior."

The release of the Ukrainian soldiers is part of a prisoner swap agreed with separatist fighters during negotiations in Minsk on December 24.

Kyiv on Friday freed 222 insurgent fighters captured near Donetsk.

A much smaller prisoner swap is due to take place December 27 in Luhansk region.

European mediators hope the swap will reignite stalled peace talks.

11:10 27.12.2014

10:22 27.12.2014

And completely unrelated to any of this, there's this:

Yevhenia Tymoshenko, the daughter of former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, is due to be married December 27 in the capital Kyiv.

Yevheniya Tymoshenko, 34, will marry Artur Chechetkin, an American businessman born and raised in Odesa.

The wedding is due to be held in the Olimpiyskiy Sports Complex in central Kyiv.

Yulia Tymoshenko has asked guests, rather than buying traditional wedding gifts, to donate goods to the military battallion sponsored by her Batkivshchyna Party.

It is the second wedding for Yevheniya Tymoshenko, who was previously married to the British rock musician Sean Carr.

10:21 27.12.2014

And here is Poroshenko meeting some of the prisoners.

10:19 27.12.2014

The main news today is that the prisoner exchange is due to be completed. From our news desk:

Ukraine and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine were due on December 27 to complete their exchange of prisoners.

Ukrainian news agency UNIAN said 146 of the planned 150 Ukrainian government troops were handed over on December 26.

UNIAN said the remaining four should be handed over on December 27.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko met with the recently released servicemen at a military air base early December 27 telling them "as president, and as an ordinary citizen, my heart is filled with joy that you…will be able to greet the New Year with your families."

Ukrainian authorities were supposed to deliver 220 separatist gunmen. It was unclear if all of those people were exchanged on December 26.

State security sources in Kyiv said the separatists would still be holding about 500 government soldiers after the exchange.

21:03 26.12.2014

We are now closing our live blog for today. Until we start up again tomorrow, you can keep abreast of all our ongoing Ukraine coverage here.

21:00 26.12.2014

20:58 26.12.2014

20:58 26.12.2014

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