Kremlin planned Ukraine invasion, report says

Russian news agency claims document outlines scheme to annex southeastern zone

A Russian newspaper claims to have an official government strategy document outlining the invasion of Ukraine that was prepared weeks before the Ukrainian government col- lapsed last year.

The editor of Novaya Gazeta, Dmitri Muratov, reported the document during an interview with Echo of Moscow, a radio station. In the interview, he did not reveal how the newspaper came into possession of the document in the media-unfriendly Russian world, but said he had confidence it was authentic.

Novaya Gazeta is considered a rarity in Russia these days, an indepen- dent investigative newspaper that’s known to anger the Kremlin regularly. The editor said the paper’s plan is to publish the full details of the strategy document next week.

Viktor Yanukovych, then Ukrainian president, fled Ukraine for Russia on Feb. 22, 2014.

Muratov said the Russian document appears to have been drafted between Feb. 4 and 15 last year. He said the overall strategy included plans on how to break Ukraine into autonomous sectors, immediately attaching southeastern Ukraine to Moscow’s tax union, with a longerterm plan for annexation.

The Associated Press reported Saturday that Ukrainian military and separatist representatives exchanged dozens of prisoners under the cover of darkness at a remote front-line location Saturday evening. One hundred and thirty-nine Ukrai- nian troops and 52 rebels were exchanged, according to a separatist official overseeing the prisoner swap.

In another development, the Obama administration is weighing a new round of sanctions against Russia in response to its continued “landgrabbing” in eastern Ukraine despite a ceasefire agreement, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Saturday in London. With files from Star wire services