Eurasia Press & News
Pro-Russian forces massing near Ukraine’s port city of Mariupol are continuing to attack government troop positions, Kiev says, fuelling concerns for the fate of an internationally brokered ceasefire.
Continued hostilities there and elsewhere meant a pull-back of heavy weapons could not go ahead as agreed, Ukrainian officials said.
“As Ukrainian positions are still being fired upon there can be no talk yet of a withdrawal of arms,” military spokesman Vladyslav Seleznyov wrote in a statement on Facebook on Monday (local time).
Tensions were also high following a bomb blast Sunday in the normally peaceful eastern city of Kharkiv. In their latest toll, authorities said that three people had died in the “terrorist” attack.
The West has warned of additional sanctions on Russia if the shaky truce should deteriorate further, especially after rebels last week took the strategic town of Debaltseve in defiance of the ceasefire meant to start February 15.
The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, tasked with monitoring the truce, “concludes that the ceasefire is not holding in critical, strategic points,” including near Mariupol and in Debaltseve, the deputy head of the OSCE mission, Alexander Hug, said.
A Ukrainian military commander, Colonel Valentyn Fedichev, said Monday (local time) that, while the number of attacks had generally decreased across the conflict zone, troop positions were still fired on 27 times since Sunday. Two Ukrainian soldiers were killed and 10 wounded, he said.
Insurgent fighters “have not halted attempts to assault our positions in the town of Shyrokine and the Mariupol area,” Fedichev said.
