Kiev violating truce in east Ukraine: OSCE
The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) has pointed to the growing deployment of heavy arms in eastern Ukraine by government forces that violates the terms of the demarcation line.
Speaking at a news briefing in the southeastern Ukrainian city of Mariupol on Friday, OSCE Deputy Chief Monitor Alexander Hug further warned that the heavy weaponry moved to the government-controlled side of the Donbass region by Kiev’s security forces is deteriorating security conditions in the area.
“We can highlight that the security situation has gotten worse in the Donbass over the past few weeks,” Hug said as quoted in a Saturday report by RT.
“In the last few weeks, our observers as well as drones recorded the presence of heavy weapons in areas controlled by the government, which is a violation of the demarcation line terms regarding the withdrawal of heavy weaponry,” Hug added.
He further pointed to the rising presence of military hardware around Komsomolskoe, which is controlled by the self-proclaimed People’s Republic of Donetsk (DNR) that seeks independence from Kiev.
The objective of the OSCE monitoring mission is to oversee the implementation of the Minsk truce agreements reached by Western-backed Ukrainian government and pro-Russia forces in Donbass in September 2014 and February 2015. The February ceasefire accord called for the establishment of a buffer zone and the pullout of heavy artillery from the line of contact.
This is while the organization has also documented the shelling of the buffer-zone regions in eastern Ukraine. In its latest report released Friday, the OSCE stated that artillery fire was coming from the west, which is under the control of Kiev forces.
The Ukrainian conflict broke out in March 2014 following a referendum in the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, in which people voted overwhelmingly for reunification with Russia.
The situation, however, degenerated into a major armed conflict after Kiev dispatched troops to the eastern regions of Lugansk and Donetsk in April 2014 in an attempt to suppress pro-Russia forces there.
The persisting conflict has so far claimed the lives of at least 6,500 people and displaced nearly 1.5 million citizens, according the United Nations figures.
MFB/NN/HRB
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