The mayor of Kremenchuk, an industrial hub on the Dnieper that's about 200 kilometers southeast of Kyiv, was shot and killed this morning. Kursk-born Oleh Babayev was an ethnic Azeri and ally of Yulia Tymoshenko. He was elected mayor in 2010.
The Russian Foreign Ministry says additional sanctions imposed by the European Union over Moscow's role in the Ukraine crisis threaten cooperation over security issues.
"The additional sanction list is direct evidence that the EU countries have set a course for fully phasing out cooperation with Russia over the issues of international and regional security. This includes the fight against the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, terrorism, organized crime, and other new challenges and dangers," a ministry statement said.
"We are sure the decisions will be greeted enthusiastically by international terrorists."
Here's the "Novaya gazeta" cover that has everyone talking, showing the motorcade of hearses carrying victims of the MH17 downing in eastern Ukraine and titled, "Forgive us, Netherlands." Powerful, and daring, stuff.
Seems odd that, with all that is happening, the Russian Embassy in London would choose this point -- an alleged misidentification of Putin's daughter -- to protest to the editor of the "Daily Mirror."
@BishopK also notes that the Dutch Police, via this Twitter feed, will be posting updates in Dutch and English as they help secure MH17 crash site and investigate.
Here's more via agencies and our newsroom on the apparent deportation by Ukraine of British national and RT contributor Graham Phillips, after considerable concern at his disappearance while covering the conflict in eastern Ukraine.
A British freelance reporter working for Russia's RT television in eastern Ukraine says he has been deported and banned from the country for three years.
Graham Phillips told the Kremlin-backed TV channel on July 26 that he was "in Poland" after Ukrainian forces deported him.
He says he has been deported and banned for three years because "I work for RT."
Phillips says he was detained July 22 while trying to cover fighting between government forces and Russia-backed separatists near Donetsk airport.
He claims that after several interrogations he was taken to Kyiv and then to the Polish border, where he was "dumped out."
This isn’t the first time Phillips has claimed he was detained in Ukraine. In May, he was reportedly seized at a military checkpoint near Mariupol and held for 36 hours.
Phillips' claims could not be independently verified.
Based on reports by rt.com, AFP, ITAR-TASS
AFP quotes Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott complaining that more than a week after Flight MH17 came down in eastern Ukraine, human remains are still at the crash site.
Abbott said on July 26 that Australian investigators have had access to the site and that "plainly there were unrecovered body remains" there.
There were 37 Australian nationals and residents among the passengers.
Australia is sending 190 police officers to Europe to participate in the Dutch-led international operation to secure the crash site.
Ukrainian officials say around 200 bodies have been recovered so far, with the first remains sent to the Netherlands on July 23.
The last remains recovered so far are expected to be sent to the Netherlands later today.
Here's our overnight wrap-up of the EU's latest sanctions moves:
The European Union has added to its sanctions list 15 individuals and 18 entities over their role in the Ukraine crisis.
Among the individuals subjected to travel bans and asset freezes are Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) director Mikhail Fradkov, Federal Security Service (FSB) director Aleksandr Bortnikov as well as Pavel Gubarev, self-described leader of the so-called Republic of Donetsk.
Sergei Beseda, who is responsible for FSB's intelligence operations and international activity, is included as well.
Kadyrov has expressed support for the annexation of Crimea and has said that he was ready to send 74,000 volunteers to eastern Ukraine.
The governor of Russia's Krasnodar region, Aleksandr Tkachyov has, like Kadyrov, been added for his support for the current Crimean authorities.
Three more members of Russia's Security Council are on the list -- Nikolai Patrushev, Rashid Nurgaliev and Boris Gryzlov -- as well as Mikhail Degtyarev from the State Duma.
Six separatists from eastern Ukraine have also been blacklisted.
Pavel Gubarev, one of the so-called leaders of the self-proclaimed People's Republic of Donetsk is on the list as is his wife Ekaterina Gubareva.
They are joined by the defense minister and the first vice prime minister of the self-styled republic, Fedor Berezin and Vladimir Antyufeyev -- former "minister of state security" in Moldova's separatist Transdniester region.
Also on the list are the self-described president of the so-called Republic of Novorossiya, Valery Kaurov and Serhy Zdriliuk -- a senior aide of the paramilitary leader Igor Strelkov, who has already been blacklisted by the EU.
The 18 entities consist of nine companies and nine institutions set up by pro-Russian separatists who have proclaimed independence in eastern Ukraine.
Among the institutions slapped with sanctions are the self-proclaimed separatist entities of Luhansk and Donetsk in eastern Ukraine as well as Novorossiya.
Six military separatist groups fighting in eastern Ukraine will also have their assets frozen: the Luhansk guard, the Army of the Southeast, the Donbass People's militia, the Vostok battalion, Sobol and the International Union of Public Associations ”Great Don Army."
The nine economic entities on the list are companies from Crimea whose ownership was transferred contrary to Ukrainian law after the region's annexation by Russia, including the Kerch ferry enterprise and the Kerch commercial seaport, the Sevastopol commercial seaport, the “Nizhnyaya Oreanda" resort, the Azov distillery plant, the Novy Svet sparkling wine factory, the Magarach national institute of wine, agricultural company Massandra and Universal Avia.
The EU list of sanctions now has 87 individuals and 20 entities in Ukraine and Russia. EU ambassadors might decide to expand the numbers further when they meet in Brussels on 28 July.
According to EU sources, the 28-member bloc's leaders are also expected to agree on restrictions to exporting oil technology as part of a new sanctions package targeting Russia while excluding the Russian gas sector from the punitive measures.
EU members have shown hesitance to impose penalties impacting Russian gas, which Europe relies on heavily for energy.
The sources said that the exclusion of gas-extraction technology from the sanctions improves the likelihood that EU leaders will agree on a sanctions package punishing Russia for its role in the Ukraine crisis.
EU Council President Herman van Rompuy said in an official letter sent to EU heads of state that the gas exclusion is based on "the need to preserve EU energy security," according to two sources who read from the letter.
Barring any major developments that ends the live blogging for tonight.