A tweet from President Volodomyr Zelenskiy's spokeswoman:
Good morning. We'll get the live blog rolling today with a couple of news items that were filed overnight:
Moscow Court To Hear Appeals Case Of Ukrainian Sailors
The Moscow City Court will hear arguments on August 16 in the case of six of the 24 Ukrainian crewmen detained in Russia, the TASS news agency has reported.
They, along with seven other sailors, have been ordered to stay in pretrial detention until October 24, while 11 others will be held until October 26.
A lower court prolonged their detention on July 17 as they await trial on charges of "trespassing" in what Russia claims are its territorial waters.
If found guilty, the sailors face up to six years in prison.
Russia has held the Ukrainian sailors since its forces fired on, boarded, and seized their vessels near the Kerch Strait on November 25.
The Kerch Strait is the sole passage from the Black Sea to the Sea of Azov. It runs between Russia and Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula that Russia seized in March 2014 after sending in troops and staging a referendum deemed illegitimate by Kyiv, the United States, and at least 100 countries.
The takeover of the peninsula, and subsequent Russian support for separatist militants who seized parts of eastern Ukraine at the start of a conflict that has now killed some 13,000 people, came after pro-European protests pushed Moscow-friendly Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych from power in Kyiv.
Ukraine called the attack and capture of 24 crewmen a violation of international maritime law.
Western leaders have demanded that Russia release the crew, and the incident has led to the imposition of additional sanctions on Russia.
In May, the U.S. sanctioned six Russians, including at least two Federal Security Service officers and about a half-dozen defense firms, in coordination with the European Union and Canada.
Ukraine the same month won a favorable ruling from the Hamburg-based International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, which ordered Russia to release all 24 sailors and the three impounded vessels.
In a resolution on July 18, the newly elected European Parliament called on Russia “to release without further delay and unconditionally all illegally and arbitrarily detained Ukrainian citizens both in Russia and in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine.”
The sailors were specifically mentioned in the nonbinding resolution.
In a March 12 report, the UN’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights stated that Russia breached international humanitarian law and called the 24 captive Ukrainians "prisoners of war."
Based on reporting by TASS and RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service
Ukrainian Political Prisoner Goes Free In Crimea
A Ukrainian whom Kyiv considered a political prisoner was released early from incarceration in Russian-annexed Crimea on August 6, the office of the Ukrainian presidential mission in Crimea said.
Oleksandr Steshenko is on his way to Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city, said Ihor Kotelyanets, head of the Relatives of Kremlin Political Prisoners Association.
He was sentenced to two years in prison on August 22 on what Ukrainian human rights groups and officials said were trumped-up charges of "inciting ethnic tension" and being part of an "extremist group."
He was detained while crossing into Crimea on April 11, 2018.
Ukrainian officials deemed Steshenko one of 64 political prisoners who are being held in Russia or annexed Crimea.
Thirty-six are Crimean-Tatar and 54 of the prisoners were either arrested in Crimea, incarcerated on the peninsula, or taken from there.
Based on reporting by RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service
This ends our live blogging for August 6. Be sure to check back tomorrow for our continuing coverage.