Kiev continues to escalate situation in its eastern region of Donbas as the ceasefire violations by the Ukrainian militants have intensified over the last weeks, Russian Permanent Representative to the OSCE Alexander Lukashevich said Thursday.
VIENNA (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 05th October, 2018) Kiev continues to escalate situation in its eastern region of Donbas as the ceasefire violations by the Ukrainian militants have intensified over the last weeks, Russian Permanent Representative to the OSCE Alexander Lukashevich said Thursday.
"Shelling by the Armed Forces of Ukraine intensified. As a result, just last week, according to SMM [OSCE Special Monitoring Mission], six civilians were injured," Lukashevich said at the meeting of the OSCE Permanent Council.
The envoy noted that the Ukrainian militants also damaged a number of houses in the Donbas region.
"Kiev pulls up anti-aircraft missile systems to the line of contact. The SMM reports from September 28 and October 1 reported the detection of two Buk air defense missile systems at the railway station in Mariupol and a few more at the railway junction in Rubizhne. Who are they going to shoot down?" Lukashevich underlined.
Moreover, the Armed Forces of Ukraine seem to be receiving drones from abroad as the SMM report from September 27 reported about observers noticing a group of five people, some of which had UK flags on their sleeves, who were launching drones without any identification sings, the envoy added.
As the Donbas militants reportedly downed a drone on October 1, Lukashevich stressed that "the use of drones by the Ukrainian side in violation of the seventh paragraph of the Minsk memorandum from September 19, 2014, among other things, threatens SMM drones that can be mistaken for enemy targets and shot down for security reasons."
Ukraine has been in a state of civil war since 2014, when Kiev launched a military offensive against the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk people's republics after they refused to recognize a new government. In 2015, Russia, Ukraine, France, and Germany brokered the Minsk peace accords in a bid to end hostilities in the area. Another attempt to facilitate the settlement was the establishment of the Contact Group on Ukraine that includes Ukraine, Russia and the OSCE. However, the warring parties continue to record ceasefire violations.
