Moscow urges full implementation of Ukraine truce deal

Moscow says all the terms of a peace deal recently reached in the Belarusian capital, Minsk, to end the fighting in eastern Ukraine must be “unconditionally observed.”

“All the sequences of actions have been mentioned in the package of measures for the implementation of the Minsk agreement. All those terms have to be observed unconditionally,” said Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin, on Sunday.

Pro-Russians accuse Kiev of truce violation

Peskov’s remarks came hours after a military official of the self-proclaimed republic of Donetsk accused Kiev of breaching the recently-inked truce deal.

“At 02:00 am, the Ukrainian armed forces opened mortar and artillery fire on the DPR [the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic] and LPR [the self-proclaimed Lugansk People’s Republic] positions,” said Eduard Basurin, the spokesman for the Donetsk forces.

Basurin also threatened to retaliate the Ukrainian army’s attacks on pro-Russia forces.

Following the reported incident, Alexander Zakharchenko, the head of the self-proclaimed republic of Donetsk, called for an urgent meeting to address Kiev’s alleged violation of the truce.

East Ukraine ceasefire deal

Putin, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande and Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko were in the Belarusian capital, Minsk, on February 11-12, for marathon talks over a ceasefire deal for Ukraine.

The negotiating sides agreed on the withdrawal of heavy weapons from Ukraine’s frontlines and a ceasefire, which officially went into effect at 2200 GMT on Saturday.

Back in September 2014, the representatives of Ukraine, Russia, and the self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Lugansk had signed another ceasefire deal in Minsk. However, the truce was violated on an almost daily basis by both the Ukrainian military and the pro-Russia forces.

Source of conflict

Donetsk and Lugansk are two mainly Russian-speaking regions in eastern Ukraine, which have been hit by deadly clashes between pro-Russia forces and the Ukrainian army since Kiev launched military operations in April last year to crush pro-Russia protests there.

In May 2014, the situation in the two flashpoint regions started to worsen as residents overwhelmingly voted for independence from Ukraine and joining the Russian Federation in a referendum.

The fighting has taken a heavy toll on thousands of people. More than 5,500 people have died and some 12,200 wounded in the conflict, the UN says. Around 1.5 million people have been also forced from their homes over the past months of turmoil.

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