Opponents of vaccination for COVID-19 are blocking traffic on Hrushevskoho Street and a number of other main streets in Kyiv adjacent to the area where the government is located on Wednesday.
Several hundred people are taking part in the protest, and none are wearing masks, an Interfax-Ukraine correspondent reported from the site. The protesters demand lifting the quarantine restrictions and resuming regular classes in school, among other things, and they oppose the vaccine mandate.
The protesters began gathering near the Ukrainian parliament at 8:00 a.m., and more protesters are coming in.
Once traffic has been blocked, the protesters plan to hold a meeting near the building of the Verkhovna Rada.
Police are trying to persuade the protesters to unblock the streets for public transportation at the least.
The new Ukrainian airline Air Ocean Airlines, on Saturday, October 30, on An-148 aircraft operated its first flight on the route Kyiv-Mykolaiv, according to the Facebook page of the state-owned enterprise Antonov.
Antonov notes that Air Ocean Airlines was founded in September 2020, its main activity is regular and charter flights in Ukraine and abroad on An-148 and An-158 aircraft.
“We are planning to start flights with duration of 2-2.5 hours, which, according to our estimates, will be the most economically profitable,” Viacheslav Heriha, executive director of the airline, is quoted as saying.
Today, the Air Ocean Airlines fleet consists of two An-148 aircraft. According to the state-owned enterprise, the supply of one more aircraft is planned by the end of this year. During the first and second quarters of 2022, three more aircraft will be supplied. In total, the company plans to operate up to ten aircraft of this type. They are owned by Cyprus Aircraft Leasing 2 (CAL) LTD and transferred to the airline in accordance with lease agreements.
Air Ocean Airlines has already launched its website but it is currently undergoing technical work.
The Verkhovna Rada intends to simplify the procedure for granting citizenship to foreigners who protect the territorial integrity of Ukraine.
The adoption of the relevant bill No. 5630 at the first reading was supported by 302 MPs at an extraordinary plenary session on Tuesday.
The bill proposes to simplify the procedure for obtaining Ukrainian citizenship by citizens of a state recognized by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine as an aggressor or occupier who have been persecuted for political reasons, by foreigners and stateless persons who are doing military service under contract in the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and are also directly involved in measures to ensure national security and defense of Ukraine, the containment of the armed aggression of the Russian Federation in Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
In addition, the final and transitional provisions of the draft law provide for the possibility of submitting a declaration of renunciation of foreign citizenship by persons who received Ukrainian citizenship before the entry into force of this draft law.
Ukraine from Monday, November 1, joined the Eurocontrol joint route charge system, which became the final stage of the incorporation of European practices in the field of air navigation and made it possible to introduce a European system of interaction in the air navigation sector in Ukraine, the press service of the Ukrainian State Air Traffic Services Enterprise (UkSATSE) has said.
“Ukrainian air navigation is now fully integrated into the pan-European system. The process that lasted 17 years has finally come to an end. It covered the large-scale adaptation of Ukrainian air navigation to modern world standards and technical procedures. This is a step forward to improve interaction between the state and business,” Minister of Infrastructure Oleksandr Kubrakov said.
According to him, the new system for setting rates and payments for air navigation services is transparent, understandable and convenient for airlines to use. At the same time, it becomes impossible to accumulate debts of air carriers for using UkSATSE services.
UkSATSE notes that now the collection of fees for air navigation services on the route in the airspace of Ukraine from Ukrainian and foreign airlines will be carried out through the Central Route Charges Office of Eurocontrol (CRCO).
“Technical integration gives concrete advantages to each participant of the aviation market. For airlines it is an open and standardized process of setting rates, their annual updating and convenient payment of bills. For UkSATSE it is a full coverage of its own expenses at the expense of rates and a guarantee of their full payment by airlines. For Ukraine – it is a certificate of the inflexibility of the European integration course in foreign policy,” Head of UkSATSE Andriy Yarmak said.
RETAIL TURNOVER IN UKRAINE BY REGIONS IN JAN-AUG 2021 (UAH MLN)
In January-October of this year, enterprises engaged in operations with ferrous scrap increased procurement of scrap metal by 38.2% compared to the same period last year, to 3.444 million tonnes.
According to the recent information of the Ukrainian Association of Secondary Metals (UAVtormet) on Tuesday, export of scrap metal for the specified period amounted to 503,500 tonnes, which is 15.5 times more compared to the same period in 2020 (32,400 tonnes).
At the same time, import of scrap in January-October amounted to 19,800 tonnes, which is 30% more than in January-October 2020 (15,200 tonnes).
Over ten months of 2021, the supply of scrap to the country’s metallurgical enterprises increased by 18.6% compared to the same period last year, to 2.777 million tonnes. The level of scrap metal stocks at metallurgical enterprises as of November 1, 2021 was estimated at 130,000-135,000 tonnes.
