Ukrainian Veterans, Nationalists Urge Liberation Of Rebel-Occupied Areas
At least 1,000 members of volunteer military units and nationalist organizations have marched in Kyiv demanding a resumption of military activity against separatists in eastern Ukraine.
The rally on July 3 included members of the right-wing Right Sector group and many veterans of fighting in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions where some 6,400 people have been killed since April 2014.
Marchers at Dynamo Stadium demanded that the territory occupied by Russian-backed rebels be liberated and that the Minsk cease-fire agreement signed in February be revoked.
The demonstration went from the govenrment quarter of Kyiv toward Maidan Square and past the Valeriy Lobanovskyi soccer monument near the stadium.
Police did not intervene in the march and there was no violence reported.
Based on reporting by Interfax and TASS
That concludes our live-blogging of the Ukraine crisis for Friday, July 3. Check back here tomorrow for more of our continuing coverage.
Separatists Withdraw From Ukrainian Coastal Towns
Pro-Russian separatists have withdrawn from Sakhanka, Shyrokyne, and other nearby towns on the Sea of Azov. Visiting one town with OSCE observers, rebel leaders called on Ukrainian government forces to demilitarize the coastal region as well.
Putin Says Sanctions Fail To Split Russian Society
President Vladimir Putin says Western efforts to split Russian society with economic sanctions have failed to yield expected results.
Addressing the Russian Security Council on July 3, Putin said the West wants to punish Russia for its independent course.
"We are pursuing an independent domestic and foreign policy; we are not selling our sovereignty," Putin said. “Not everyone likes that, but it cannot be otherwise.
"We shouldn't expect some of our geopolitical opponents to revise their unfriendly course in the foreseeable future," he added.
Putin also ordered that Russia's national security strategy be updated.
The United States and its allies have imposed sanctions that have restricted Russia's access to capital markets and banned transfers of military and energy technologies.
The move came in response to Russia's annexation of Crimea in March 2014 and its support for pro-Russian rebels in Ukraine.
Based on reporting by AP, TASS, and Interfax
Russia 'Alarmed' By Kyiv's Refusal To Negotiate With Rebels
Russia says Ukraine's failure to agree with separatists on implementing a peace deal is "alarming."
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in Moscow on July 3 that the Kyiv authorities have “routinely demonstrated their inability to come to an agreement."
Lavrov said proposed changes to Ukraine's constitution did not honor a "single requirement" of the peace deal signed in Minsk in February.
He urged the West to pressure Ukrainian authorities to honor the peace deal, saying they were "torpedoing" the agreement and refusing to directly negotiate with rebels.
Separatists in eastern Ukraine have complained they had not been consulted over Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko's proposed constitutional changes, and announced plans to hold local elections in October, sparking criticism in Kyiv.
Based on reporting by AFP and Interfax
Historian Timothy Garton-Ash on what guides Putin.