Coronavirus
Since the start of the pandemic, Ukraine has registered 355,601 lab-confirmed cases of Covid-19, including 6,590 fatalities and 145,336 recoveries, the Health Ministry has said. The latest daily increase included 6,677 cases.
Tighter quarantine restrictions will be considered if the Covid-19 daily infection rate reaches 15,000 cases, Deputy Health Minister and Chief Sanitarian Officer Viktor Lyashko has said. There will still be a margin of safety "providing an opportunity for the health care system to react without collapsing".
Two deputy heads of the presidential office, Yuliya Kovaliv and Andriy Smyrnov, tested positive for coronavirus and went into self-isolation.
The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine has redirected 61.5m hryvnyas from the project called "Improvement of molecular genetic diagnosis of cancer in Ukraine" to road repairs in Lviv Region, the Nashi Hroshi anticorruption website has said, quoting a 21 October resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers.
Local elections
Over 91% of polling station commissions have finished the count of votes cast in the 25 October local elections. They filled in vote count reports and sent them over to territorial election commissions.
The European Network of Election Monitoring Organizations (ENEMO) assessed that the 2020 local elections in Ukraine were generally free and competitive although the process was affected by challenges mostly related to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Lithuania
Active fight against opposition leader Petro Poroshenko looks like revenge and makes Ukraine similar to countries where political opponents get jailed, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Linas Linkevicius has said in an interview with the Yevropeyska Pravda website.
He noted that the conflict in Donbas and the Russian occupation of Crimea are obstacles on Ukraine's path to NATO. In his words, Ukraine should not expect an invitation to NATO soon and would require the implementation of reforms.
Israel
Ukraine plans to build trust and trade relations with Israel, ambassador Yevhen Korniychuk has said at the 3rd Ukrainian-Israeli Innovation Summit in Kyiv. He added that Ukrainian agriculture would benefit from Israeli technologies, irrigation systems.
Hungary
Hungary’s foreign minister has said Ukraine's decision to bar the entry of two Hungarian government officials over what it called meddling in local elections was "pathetic and nonsense", according to Reuters. In a video message on his Facebook page, Peter Szijjarto said Budapest had not received formal notice of the Ukrainian ban.
Azerbaijan
Ukraine has opened its first honorary consulate in Azerbaijan's Shemakhy, the embassy has said.
Courts
The Constitutional Court has recognised a number of provisions of the anticorruption legislation as being at variance with the constitution, Interfax-Ukraine has learnt from a source. Although the source did not specify the provisions, ex-MP Serhiy Leshchenko said that the Constitutional Court had invalidated the provisions concerning misstatement of income, illegal enrichment, electronic income statements, and the authority of the National Agency for Preventing Corruption. The motion was filed by 47 MPs of the pro-Russian Opposition Platform-For Life faction on 4 August.
Justice Minister Denys Malyuska has said that there are neither legal grounds nor authority to erase any information about Artem Sytnyk as director of the National Anticorruption Bureau of Ukraine and thus he remains in his post.
The High Anticorruption Court has cancelled the resolution of a prosecutor of the Specialised Anticorruption Prosecutor's Office which closed the case of Rotterdam+. The court has thus upheld a complaint by the Nikopol Ferroalloy Plant. As part of the case, energy officials were suspected of acting in the interest of generating companies in January-March 2016 by using an unsubstantiated formula which pushed up the price of coal.
Kyiv's Holosiyivskyy district court has released policeman Yaroslav Levadnyuk from custody, Voice MP Andriy Osadchuk has said on Facebook. Levadnyuk is a suspect in the rape and torture case at the Kaharlyk police station.
The Prosecutor-General's Office has said that a pre-trial investigation into the purchase of faulty body armour has been completed. Eight people, including two generals and the founder of a company which manufactured the body armour.
Economy
Ukraine's state debt increased by 4.55bn hryvnyas up to 2,345.61bn hryvnyas or 82.89bn dollars in September, the Finance Ministry has said.