SIMFEROPOL, Aug. 27 - Activ Solar company, which has several large solar power plants in Crimea, owes some $300 million to banks, the head of the Crimean government, Sergei Aksionov, said.

KIEV, Aug. 27 - Ukraine intends to start building a centralized storage facility for spent nuclear fuel in 2015, Yuriy Nedashkovsky, the president of EnergoAtom, the national operator of the Ukrainian nuclear power plants, said during the project's inauguration ceremony.

KIEV, Aug. 28 – The National Bank of Ukraine has decided to temporarily not apply fines to banks for violation of economic requirements, limits for the general (long/short) open currency position due to the situation in Crimea, armed hostilities in Donetsk and Luhansk regions and due to the hryvnia exchange rate devaluation.

KIEV, Aug. 28 - Bogdan Corporation, one the leading Ukrainian automakers, has started large-scale production of JAC passenger cars at an automobile plant in Cherkasy, starting with the production of a pilot batch of the cars.

IVANO-FRANKIVSK, Aug. 28 – Ivano-Frankivsk Regional Council Chairman Vasyl Skrypnychuk has said that fear of responsibility for possible negative environmental consequences after the extraction of shale gas prevents the majority of lawmakers from supporting a draft production sharing agreement (PSA) to be signed between Ukraine, Chevron Ukraine B.V. and Nadra Oleska on the Oleska area.

KIEV, Aug. 28 – A special protective duty will be imposed on supplies of chinaware to the Customs Union of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, including from Ukraine, starting September 29, at $1,479 per ton in the first year of its effect.

KIEV, Aug. 28 – The Finance Ministry at an off-schedule auction on August 27, 2013 set the interest rate for 15-month government domestic loan bonds pegged to the U.S. dollars at 7.75%, which allowed the ministry to raise $101.94 million.

KIEV, Aug. 28 - German energy company RWE will next month begin delivering natural gas that will be stored in Ukraine’s underground gas storage facilities, Energy and Coal Industry Minister Eduard Stavytskiy said Wednesday.

KIEV, Aug. 28 - Ukraine is facing weak external demand for steel, its main export, forcing the government to stimulate domestic demand with new housing construction and other projects, Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said Tuesday.

KIEV, Aug. 27 - Ukraine, partially refinancing its debt to VTB will provide the bank with $1 billion in eurobonds with maturity on June 4, 2014 at a rate of 7.95%.