Ukraine's prime minister offered his resignation on Friday after audio was leaked of him reportedly criticising President Volodomyr Zelensky's understanding of the economy.

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev submitted his resignation to President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday, news wires reported. Russian news agency TASS said Putin thanked Medvedev for his service but noted that his government failed to fulfil all the objectives set for it. Russian media said Putin plans to name Medvedev as deputy of the presidential Security Council.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday proposed a referendum on amending the constitution aimed to increase the powers of parliament while maintaining a strong presidential system, news wires reported.

Ukrainian government forces and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine have started an all-for-all prisoner swap, after which all remaining prisoners of the five-year conflict should return home, the office of Ukraine’s president said on Sunday. The agreement was concluded by Russian leader Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Paris in December.

Russia's President Vladimir Putin officially opened on Monday the railway linking annexed Crimea with Russia and posed in the cab of the first train going along the bridge, but the showdown was immediately condemned by the EU as yet another violation by Kremlin of Ukraine's sovereignty and territory. The bridge itself was opened in May last year for cars, trucks and buses.

Russia and Ukraine have struck an agreement to continue the transit of Russian gas through Ukraine after 1 January 2020 at EU-brokered talks in Berlin, European Commission VP Maros Sefcovic told a briefing on Thursday. The current deal between the two post-Soviet countries expires at the end of the year.

Albanian prosecutors have issued a series of arrest warrants on charges including murder and abuse of office over the deaths of 51 people killed when a 6.4-magnitude earthquake toppled dozens of buildings last month, police said on Saturday. Police and prosecutors said initial investigations showed “the loss of life in the collapsed buildings came also because their builders, engineers and owners had failed to observe the rules, norms and standards of safe constructions.”

The presidents of Ukraine and Russia agreed Monday to revive the peace process on the bloody separatist conflict in eastern Ukraine and exchange all their prisoners, but they failed to resolve crucial issues such as a timeline on local elections and control of the borders in the rebel-held region. At the first meeting between new Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and Russian President Vladimir Putin, the two leaders failed to find a compromise to bring an end to the 5-year-old war that has killed 14,000 people, emboldened the Kremlin and reshaped European geopolitics.

A long-awaited summit in Paris on Monday is aiming to find a way to end the war in Ukraine, after five years and 14,000 lives lost in a conflict that has emboldened the Kremlin and reshaped European geopolitics. The leaders of Ukraine, Russia, Germany and France are holding a series of meetings at the Elysee Palace to try to revive a 2015 peace deal that’s gone largely ignored, as Ukrainian soldiers and Russia-backed separatists continue to exchange fire across World War I-style trenches along the front line slicing through eastern Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and Russian President Vladimir Putin will held on Monday their first face-to-face meeting, participating in Normandy format summit in Paris.