KIEV, Oct. 21 – The investment climate in Ukraine recently improved, according to the National Association of Banks of Ukraine.

According to the report, the positive signal is plans of one of the largest transnational banks – Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC) – to restore operation of its representative office in Ukraine.

KIEV, Oct. 24 – Officials in the supervisory board of public joint-stock company Ukrzaliznytsia are to be removed and the board should only consist of independent specialists, Prime Minister Volodymyr Hroysman said.

KIEV, Oct. 24 – Ukraine will build its own centralized spent nuclear fuel storage facility and from 2017 the country would not remove spent nuclear fuel for temporary storage to Russia, Ukrainian Energy and Coal Industry Minister Ihor Nasalyk said.

KIEV, Oct. 24 - Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, Ukraine’s largest, unexpectedly shut down its 1,000-MW reactor No. 2 after discovering a leak in a pipeline of independent contour of the main circulation pump, Energoatom reported Monday.

KIEV, Oct. 23 – MTS Ukraine starting on November 1 is to reduce the cost of incoming and outgoing calls to phones with MTS Ukraine SIM cards by 58.3%, to UAH 12.50 per minute in nine countries visited by tourists, reads a report of the operator in the Uriadovy Kurier newspaper.

KIEV, Oct. 24 - Chornomornaftogaz has begun building a propane-butane plant at the Hlibivka gas treatment plant.

Construction will take 15 months and the updated gas treatment plant is scheduled to reach full capacity in 2014, the company said.

KIEV, Oct. 24 – The Pivdenne design bureau (Dnipropetrovsk) said it is working with Russia and Kazakhstan on the creation of a new superheavy rocket carrier using technologies of the Energia-Buran Soviet program.

KIEV, Oct. 22 – After the coming into force of a law banning tobacco advertising, sponsorship and sales promotion, 98% of trade outlets have removed direct cigarette advertising from showcases and cash desk areas, according to the results of monitoring in five cities of Ukraine and Crimea.

KIEV, Oct. 23 – In Ukraine last year, thanks to reforms in starting a business, the registering of property and paying of taxes, climbed by 15 positions in the World Bank's Doing Business rating, although the country is still behind most other countries, being 137th, between Lesotho and Philippines.

KIEV, Oct. 24 - Ukraine's Pivdenne Design Bureau and Pivdenmash (both based in Dnipropetrovsk) are finishing the drawing up of a contract with Italy's AvioSpA for the production and delivery of engines for the fourth stage of the new European Vega launch vehicle.