A Ukrainian soldier dies in renewed fighting in the conflict zone in eastern Ukraine. International observers are worried. The separatist leaders mobilize in the middle of the tense situation.
The conflict in eastern Ukraine is coming to a head. On Saturday, the government army and Russian-backed separatists continued fighting in the east of the country. According to the army, one soldier was killed.
The insurgents in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions announced a general mobilization of men for combat operations in view of the situation. To this end, he signed a decree, said the head of the insurgents in the Donetsk region, Denis Puschilin. Meanwhile, the evacuations of towns and villages in the regions to Russia continue.
Puschilin called on the reservists to contact the military reporting offices. “I appeal to all men in the republic who are able to hold a gun in their hands to stand up for their families, their children, their wives, their mothers,” he said in a video. Such an appeal was also made in the neighboring Luhansk region. Men aged 18 to 55 are not allowed to leave the region. The separatist leader there, Leonid Passechnik, spoke of a “worrying situation”.
Fragile truce
In the conflict zone, both sides once again accused each other of violating the current ceasefire. The insurgents said several dozen shells had been fired into their area since midnight. The Ukrainian army also spoke of two dozen injuries by the separatists. This information could not be independently verified.
The conflict in eastern Ukraine has been going on for almost eight years. In the Donetsk and Luhansk regions not far from the Russian border, government troops equipped by the West are fighting Russian-backed separatists. According to UN estimates, more than 14,000 people have already been killed, mostly in the separatist area. A peace plan from 2015 is not implemented. Tensions have flared up since 2014.
According to international observers, the violations of the ceasefire are increasing massively. In the conflict regions, the mission of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) registered hundreds of cases of shelling.
In the Luhansk region, 648 violations of the ceasefire were found, including 519 explosions, according to an OSCE statement published on Saturday night. For the Donetsk region, 222 violations were reported, including 135 explosions. That was a significant increase compared to the past few days.
Evacuations by insurgents
OSCE observers also tried to clarify the circumstances of the shelling of a kindergarten in the government area in Stanytsia Luhanska. However, they were not allowed closer than 30 meters to the impact hole by local authorities, citing Ukrainian investigations. They could therefore not have provided any information on the type of weapon and the direction from which the bullet came. Previously, Ukraine had brought international journalists to the building. The incident happened on Thursday.
Meanwhile, evacuations from towns and villages in the separatist areas were underway. Since Friday evening, people have been taken to the Rostov region in southern Russia, where accommodation was available. According to Donetsk data on Saturday morning, more than 6,000 people have already been brought to safety, including 2,400 children. The Luhansk insurgents, for their part, spoke of 13,500 at noon.
The Russian authorities in Rostov declared a state of emergency because of the large number of people. “Of course we take into account the experience of 2014. But there is also a fundamental difference: it was summer in 2014 and the possibilities for accommodating many people were completely different,” said the governor Vasily Golubev. According to the Interfax agency, other regions of Russia also offered support.
explosions reported
The separatist leadership had called for people to flee, citing an impending attack by Ukrainian government troops as the reason for their appeal. Ukrainian government officials and the military have repeatedly emphasized that they are not planning any offensive against the region.
According to the authorities, a total of 700,000 people were to be brought to safety from the Donetsk region. Russian President Vladimir Putin instructed the government in Moscow to help the refugees. Among other things, 10,000 rubles (around 116 euros) should be paid out per person.
On the night of Saturday, the authorities in the Luhansk separatist region reported two gas explosions. A fire on a gas line was extinguished after a short time, the company Luganskgas announced and published several videos. The extinguishing work and the search for the cause were also carried out in the second place, it was said. Dozens of households were therefore cut off from the gas supply. After the shelling of a water pipe in the Donetsk region, the local authorities spoke of problems with the drinking water supply.
Source: Stern
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