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Recently, the Baltic States have decided to calculate the damage caused to Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia during the rule of the Soviet Union over this region, and to demand compensation from the Russian Federation. UNIAN gathered expert opinions on whether Ukraine could benefit from this experience.

The terrorist attacks in Paris can seriously change the life of Europe. The Verkhovna Rada has finally given birth to amended legislation, required for the implementation of a Visa Liberalization Action Plan with the EU. EU High Commissioner for Foreign Affairs Federica Mogherini confirmed that the lifting of sanctions against Russia is tied to the fulfillment of the Minsk agreements. Putin has shown, once again, his trademark cynicism.

The Ukrainian economy has been falling into the abyss of a second consecutive year, and it seems, it has finally reached its bottom. The Cabinet says that the worst period is behind, while there’s growth ahead. The experts are less optimistic. They believe that, without creating prerequisites for the economic recovery, the economy may remain at the bottom for several years.

In Ukraine, 60% of electricity is generated by nuclear power plants, and the country is completely dependent on imports of nuclear fuel. Attempts to set up own production together with Russia have failed. Director of the State Concern Nuclear Fuel Serhiy Drobot has told UNIAN why it happened and whether it is profitable for Ukraine to implement this project on its own.

European Commissioner for Trade Cecilia Malmström has told UNIAN ahead of her visit to Ukraine about the advantages of DCFTA for the Ukrainians and Europe’s planned actions toward Russia given it pursues with implementing new sanctions against Ukraine due to DCFTA coming into force.

The servants of Themis tried to demonstrate their multi-vector nature, without much success though. The conflict between MPs Kuzhel and Teteruk cannot destroy the parliamentary Coalition due to its lack of unity. The situational constitutional majority failed to pass the bills required to obtain the visa-free regime.

UAH 24.1 to the dollar is an average forex rate set by the Finance Ministry in a draft 2016 budget; 60% of the citizens from the eight EU member states believe that the armed conflict in Ukraine has been instigated by Russia; Ukraine’s public debt amounts to $70.671 billion.

Postponement of IMF mission’s visit to Ukraine, growth of the country’s GDP and forex reserves, continuing gas confrontation with Russia and the new Labor Code - these are the main economic news of the past week.

Verkhovna Rada failed astonishingly to adopt a package of bills required by the European Union to pave way for Ukraine getting a long-awaited visa-free regime with the EU. Vladimir Putin and Sergei Lavrov emphasize the importance of developing ties with a 30-million Russian diaspora around the world. Polish President Andrzej Duda opposed the construction of North Stream-2 pipeline.

Head of the Constitutional Court of Lithuania Dainius Žalimas has told UNIAN about the probability of exclusion of Russia’s Constitutional Court from the Conference of European Constitutional Courts for its ruling, allowing Russia to annex Crimea.

Although the local election campaign has not yet been formally completed (On November 15 and November 27 the major cities will host the second round of mayoral elections), political developments made this year’s Halloween and early November rich on the news.

Four Ukrainian citizens died in a plane crash in Egypt, nine countries in Eastern and Central Europe are going to request NATO increase its regional presence, Ukraine ranks 83rd in the annual Ease of Doing Business rating by the World Bank.

On October 25, when Ukraine was choosing the local authorities, Poland held elections of deputies of the Sejm. UNIAN gathered expert opinions on what Ukraine should expect from the renewed Polish Parliament and future government formed by conservatives from Prawo i Sprawedliwosc (Law and Order) Party.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and his Turkmen counterpart Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedow made another attempt to revive the Ukrainian-Turkmen relations. In Russia, on the falsified pretext, the library of Ukrainian literature is being destroyed. U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey R. Pyatt allows himself some quite an undiplomatic language.

Renowned political analyst Arkady Dubnov told UNIAN why Putin launched a military campaign in the Middle East, and why Russians support a new war.

Ukraine is expanding cooperation with the world’s biggest nuclear fuel producer, Westinghouse. President and CEO of the U.S. industry giant, Danny Roderick, has told UNIAN, what opportunities he sees in the Ukrainian market, whether his company may substitute the Russians in Ukraine, and whether there is any sense in completing construction of the new power units at the nuclear power stations, and a plant for production of nuclear fuel.

When the “Crimea blockade” started on September 20, skeptics predicted it would not live long. A month later, in late October, an UNIAN correspondent visited the roadblocks at the administrative border and found out that the activists are preparing for the winter despite everything, and do not intend to give up.

Local elections were held with some violations, but they created certain prospects for Ukraine. Militants adopted the tactics of blackmail in negotiations with the Ukrainian representatives. The attempts to challenge the law on lustration in Constitutional Court by politicians from the Opposition Bloc saw an emotional response from its authors.

10 political parties violated the “day of silence” before the local elections, 73.8% of Ukrainians said they would not intend to sell their votes, 409.3 kilometers of Ukraine’s border with Russia in the temporarily occupied territories of Donbas is not controlled by Kyiv government.

Russian officials have been voicing Putin’s messages on Ukraine as revolvers. Ukrainian-German business forum in Berlin was accompanied by an exchange of courtesies at a government level. Standard & Poor`s rating agency has significantly increased Ukraine’s credit rating. Unexpected news have come from the US and Canada.