A massive Canadian transport plane has arrived in Kharkov carrying US$4.5 million worth of non-lethal military equipment to help Ukraine "protect its eastern border against Russian aggression." The equipment includes “helmets, ballistic eyewear, protective vests, first aid kits, tents, and sleeping bags,” Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said in a statement on Thursday. [...]

"The hospital became a nightmare," said a patient who survived after a major medical institution in Donetsk was shelled by Ukrainian troops in a series of attacks on residential neighborhoods that resulted in four casualties throughout the city. “This is absurd,” 37-year old Dmitry Kozhur told AP correspondent on the ground. “We came here to keep living, but now we are risking death.” [...]

The UN Security Council failed to adopt a resolution on reinstating the ceasefire at the site of the Malaysian Airlines plane crash in eastern Ukraine after Russia's draft was blocked by Western states. “Unfortunately, some UNSC members have reacted in their usual way as they oppose any criticism of the Ukrainian leadership,” Churkin said, adding that Lithuania, the US, and Australia began [...]

The OSCE monitoring mission on the Russian-Ukrainian border has registered no violations of international law by the Russian side during its week-long stay at the Gukovo and Donetsk checkpoints, mission head Paul Picard said. During his press conference, Picard was asked to comment on Western claims that Russia is shelling Ukrainian territory and has starting deployment troops to the country. [...]

US missile cruiser Vella Gulf has entered the Black Sea in what the American Navy described as a move to "to promote peace and stability in the region." Moscow has considered any such acts as "offensive." The Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Vella Gulf (CG 72) entered the Black Sea on Wednesday as part of the effort to “strengthen the collective security of NATO allies and partner [...]

Activists and police have clashed in the Ukrainian capital's center after communal workers tried to dismantle the camp. It follows a months-old conflict over the camp with the city administration. Camp residents are currently fortifying the old barricades and building new ones, Ria Novosti reported. [...]

The command in Kiev has blatantly abandoned a group of more than 400 soldiers encircled by the self-defense forces, the senior Ukrainian officer who requested sanctuary in Russia with his men has revealed. Lack of ammunition, food, fuel and clear orders from the command on how to act in the condition of encirclement has made the Ukrainian troops cross the border, Major Vitaly Dubinyak, a battal [...]

The US dollar, the dominant global currency since 1944, may lose some of its luster due to the American-led sanctions against Russia over the turmoil in Ukraine. The greenback has been fading in favor since the global financial crisis in 2008. The US-led sanctions against Russia may have backfired on the US because it threatens to “hasten a move away from the dollar that’s been stirring sin [...]

US steps to increase military cooperation with Ukraine, providing its National Guard arms and training amid Kiev’s military operation, can be considered complicity in war crimes, Russian MP Irina Yarovaya believes. “In a situation, when the National Guard of Ukraine is leading punitive operations in the Donbass, the US promises to allocate $19 million for training and equipping this militar [...]

Ron Paul, the former United States congressman who campaigned for the presidency no fewer than three times, is yet again warning the White House not to increase America’s involvement in the escalating crisis in Ukraine. Paul, a 78-year-old retired doctor who spent nearly three decades in the US Congress representing the state of Texas, has spoken out incessantly this year about the ongoing sk [...]

Without waiting for MH17 crash investigators’ conclusions, NATO chief is eager to blame anti-Kiev forces, thus “exerting pressure” on the international team while providing no evidence to back the claims, Russia’s mission to NATO said. The Russian mission to NATO has said that the bloc's Secretary General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen “decided not to wait until the end of #MH17 investigation [...]

The Ukraine crisis is just one pretexts being used by NATO to create tensions with Russia as the alliance seeks a reason to exist, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said. As NATO expands, it tries “to drive” all Europeans under its “roof,” he said. NATO “is looking for a new sense of existence,” Lavrov told Russia’s Itar-Tass news agency in an interview. “Russia turned up. If there [...]

Kiev keeps deploying missile launchers, including SS-21 (Scarab) and multiple rocket systems Uragan and Smerch in Donetsk as it "wants to continue the war" in eastern Ukraine, Russia's Foreign Ministry said in a statement. “The Ukrainian army continues deploy Tochka U [which NATO refers to as SS-21 or Scarab], Smerch [the BM-30 Tornado] and Uragan [the BM-27] missile complexes to Donetsk. [...]

More than 400 Ukrainian troops have been allowed to cross into Russia after requesting sanctuary. It's the largest, but not the first, case of desertion into Russia by Ukrainian soldiers involved in Kiev's military crackdown in the east of the country. [...]

Russian border checkpoint at the Gukovo crossing was shelled from the Ukrainian side twice on Sunday. OSCE observers and journalists were working at the checkpoint when it was attacked. The first shell exploded at Gukovo at around 13:55 Moscow time (0955 GMT), Russian border guard spokesman Vasily Malaev told Itar-Tass news agency. [...]

US steps to increase military cooperation with Ukraine, providing its National Guard arms and training amid Kiev's military operation, can be considered complicity in war crimes, Russian MP Irina Yarovaya believes. “In a situation, when the National Guard of Ukraine is leading punitive operations in the Donbass, the US promises to allocate $19 million for training and equipping this military [...]

US officials are making groundless assertions about Moscow’s involvement in the downing of flight MH17, former CIA and US State Department official Larry Johnson told RT. On July 29 Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) issued an open letter to President Obama calling him to immediately release the evidence on the Malaysian airplane downing in eastern Ukraine. [...]

In the latest step by Washington to increase the pressure on Russia's border with Ukraine, the Obama administration has informed Congress that the US will train and arm the Ukrainian National Guard next year, the Pentagon said. "The Defense Department and State Department have notified Congress of our intent to use $19 million in global security contingency fund authority to train and equip fou [...]

The European Union has "quietly" agreed to lift restrictions supplying Kiev with military technology and equipment which can be used for the "repression" in the country, the Russian Foreign Ministry said. "During a recent meeting of the Council of Europe in Brussels, leaders of EU member states agreed 'on the quiet' to remove restrictions on exports to Kiev of equipment that could be used for i [...]