From RFE/RL's News Desk:
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko hosted children on Orthodox Christmas Eve at his home, where they sang carols, and urged Ukrainians to pray for the troops fighting against the pro-Russian separatists.
Quoting from the Bible, he said, "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends."
The Ukrainian military said on January 7 that rebels had fired at government forces 15 times overnight with mortars, artillery and guns, mostly in Donetsk Province.
More than 4,700 people have been killed since April in the conflict, in which Kyiv and NATO say Russia has given the rebels direct military support, and fighting continues despite a September 5 deal on a cease-fire and steps toward peace.
From RFE/RL's Russian Service:
YEKATERINBURG, Russia -- Russian authorities are investigating a woman in the city of Yekaterinburg on suspicion of inciting extremism online after she joined Ukrainian nationalist groups on the Internet.
Yekaterina Vologzhaninova told RFE/RL that investigators had informed her she came under suspicion after she joined groups called Ukrainian People’s Self-Defense and Russian Right Sector via the social network VKontakte.
Vologzhaninova also says that she shared via the Internet several video clips about President Vladimir Putin's yacht, the Euromaidan protests in Ukraine, and a Ukrainian talk show about the conflict in eastern Ukraine.
She said that police searched her apartment on December 12 and confiscated her laptop, a tablet, a digital camera, and several CDs.
Investigators questioned her regarding her ethnicity and political views and ordered her not to leave the city pending further investigation.
If charged, tried, and convicted, Vologzhaninova could face up to four years in jail.
From Ukraine's Forgotten City Destroyed By War, by Oleg Orlov in The Guardian:
The scale of destruction in the city of Pervomaisk, Luhansk Oblast, recalls wartime Grozny. Such devastation is not to be found in either Donetsk or Luhansk, not in Debaltseve and not even in Ilovaisk, which suffered heavy artillery fire during the summer’s fighting.
At the end of November, I visited this city with a colleague from Memorial, Jan Rachinsky, and a researcher from Human Rights Watch, Tanya Lokshina.
Some blocks of this city, situated 50 kilometres west of Luhansk, have been practically wiped off the face of the earth by Ukrainian artillery barrages. Hardly any houses have escaped unscathed.
We had seen such complete devastation in eastern Ukraine only [once before], in the villages of Khryashchuvate and Novosvitlivka, a few kilometres southeast of Luhansk. On that occasion, though, it was LNR (Luhansk People’s Republic) and possibly Russian artillery that opened fire in August [in order to] dislodge Ukrainian troops from the villages.
Read the full story here.
From RFE/RL's News Desk:
Brent crude fell more than $1 to $49.92 a barrel in early trading January 7 before edging back above the $50 mark.
Slowing global growth and increased supply of oil and gas have pushed prices sharply lower in recent weeks.
The oil traded in the United States, known as West Texas Intermediate crude, has already seen its price go below $50.
Oil producing countries including Russia have been hit as the price of their main export falls.
Three Soldiers Killed As Ukraine Marks Orthodox Christmas
KIEV, Jan 7 (Reuters) -- Three Ukrainian soldiers have been killed in attacks by Russian-backed separatists in the past 24 hours, Kiev's military said on Wednesday, in fresh violation of a ceasefire regularly flouted since it was announced in September.
The deaths, which came as both Ukraine and Russia celebrated Eastern Orthodox Christmas, also coincided with fresh diplomatic efforts to organise a summit in Kazakhstan next week in an attempt to restore peace in eastern Ukraine.
Though large-scale clashes have diminished in a conflict in which more than 4,700 people have been killed, sporadic fighting has continued amid subdued New Year festivities and the run-up to Orthodox Christmas, which was observed quietly across Ukraine on Wednesday.
One soldier was shot dead by a sniper, while two others died in mortar and small arms attacks near the international airport in the industrial city of Donetsk, military spokesman Andriy Lysenko told journalists.
"In the past 24 hours, the situation in the east has not really changed. The terrorists carried out provocative attacks on the forces of the anti-terrorist operation in violation of the ceasefire," Lysenko said.
Putin Visits Shelter For Ukrainians Fleeing Conflict On Orthodox Christmas
MOSCOW (AFP) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin visited a shelter for families fleeing the conflict in east Ukraine on Orthodox Christmas on Wednesday, while the Orthodox Patriarch who heads churches in Russia and Ukraine said his heart was with Ukraine's people.
Putin, who usually celebrates Christmas by attending a midnight service outside Moscow, visited a village church that runs a refugee centre that has taken in almost 1,000 people fleeing the conflict between Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian separatists in east Ukraine.
Millions of Orthodox believers in both Russia and Ukraine celebrate Christmas Day on January 7, following the old-style Julian calendar.
Wearing a jumper and open-necked shirt, Putin lit a candle in a church packed with women and children in headscarves in a village outside the city of Voronezh, about 290 miles(460 kilometres) south of Moscow.
He also toured a shelter for families run by the village's church, which has taken in 980 people from Donbass since the start of the conflict and is currently giving refuge to more than 90 people, TASS news agency reported.
In a Christmas message to Orthodox Christians, Putin said that Christian spiritual traditions and ideals of love and mercy "serve to unite the people and to help it survive in times of harsh troubles."
Patriarch Kirill in a video address aired on an Orthodox television channel said that he wanted to "speak particularly to our Ukrainian flock, to those whose families have faced the harsh consequences of the conflict. May God help you!"
"My heart is with the people of Ukraine," the Patriarch added. "May the Lord reconcile people in Ukraine and in the whole world."
The Moscow-based Patriarch heads dioceses in both Russia and Ukraine.