Here is today's map of the security situation in eastern Ukraine, according to the National Security and Defense Council:
Ukraine Prosecutor Says Former Naftogaz Officer Shot Himself To Avoid Arrest
Ukraine's prosecutor-general says a former deputy chief of the state oil company Naftogaz fatally shot himself moments before investigators entered his home in the west-central region of Vinnytsya.
Prosecutor-General Yuriy Lutsenko said on December 21 that authorities believe Hennadiy Yuryev, who was being investigated on suspicion of embezzlement, killed himself to avoid arrest.
Yuryev was a deputy head of Naftogaz from 2010 to 2014, when Viktor Yanukovych was Ukraine's president.
Yuryev and several other former Naftogaz managers have been under investigation on suspicion of embezzling some $450 million.
Autopsy results confirming the suicide have not been announced yet.
According to Lutsenko, Yuryev managed to avoid arrest shortly after protests pushed Yanukovych from power in February 2014 by faking his death and secretly moving to Vinnytsya.
Based on reporting by UNIAN and The Kyiv Post
Savchenko removed from Ukrainian delegation to PACE:
The Ukrainian parliament has removed Ukrainian lawmaker Nadia Savchenko from the country's delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE).
A total of 237 lawmakers out of 324 present at a December 22 session of the Verkhovna Rada supported the move.
It came eight days after the Batkivshchyna (Fatherland) party announced that Savchenko, a former military aviator who spent nearly two years in Russian jails, had resigned from the party in late October.
A day before that, Savchenko confirmed media reports that she had met in Minsk with the leaders of two Russia-backed separatist groups in eastern Ukraine.
Batkivshchyna members accused her of "negotiating with terrorists."
Savchenko told RFE/RL on December 13 that she met with the separatist leaders to discuss ways to secure the release of Ukrainians held captive by the separatists and vowed to continue her efforts.
Savchenko, who says she was seized by separatists in June 2014 and taken to Russia, was jailed there and became a national symbol of resilience before her release in a swap deal in May.
She became a lawmaker and member of the Ukraine's delegation to PACE while in Russian custody. (UNIAN, Interfax)