It has been one month since a group of demobilized Ukrainian soldiers and veterans of the volunteer battalions took it upon themselves (starting on January 25) to enforce a trade embargo with the occupied territories of Donbas (region of eastern Ukraine encompassing the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces). Increasingly, this blockade of several rail and road routes leading into occupied Donbas is spilling over into political protests in Kyiv. The government is accused of profiting from the trade with the Moscow-backed separatist authorities in Donetsk and Luhansk, which simultaneously provides an economic lifeline to the separatists, thus prolonging the war.
Read more at Eurasia Daily Monitor.