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Eastern Ukraine Situation Worsening, Kyiv Says

Eastern Ukraine Situation Worsening, Kyiv Says

Ukraine military, pro-Russian separatists accuse each other of escalating violence in Donetsk and Luhansk in defiance of ceasefire. 12 November 2015

Petro PoroshenkoUkrainian President Petro Poroshenko says the country’s security and territorial integrity are being threatened due to a worsening situation in eastern Ukraine, Radio Free Europe writes, citing news wire reports.

Poroshenko told the National Security and Defense Council in Kyiv yesterday that Russian-backed separatists in parts of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk regions are trying undermine the Minsk agreements in part by “provoking” the Ukrainian military.

“These attempts to disrupt the Minsk agreement … demonstrate that risks and threats to national security, sovereignty, territorial integrity, and independence of Ukraine remain considerable,” Poroshenko said, UNIAN reports.

He said the separatists were “provoking the Ukrainian military with subversive activity, by shelling our territory with weapons that should have been withdrawn long ago, by barring the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission from visiting observation posts and weapon storage locations, and denying access to the noncontrolled section of the Ukrainian-Russian border.”

Earlier, Ukraine’s military said separatist rebels had violated the ceasefire 21 times in a single day, prompting government troops to fire back in response, while separatist officials said Ukrainian troops had fired small arms and mortars near Donetsk airport and around the rebel-held town of Horlivka, Reuters reported.

OSCE Parliamentary Assembly President Ilkka Kanerva said in Kyiv yesterday that Ukraine’s eastern border remains a critical issue. “Until the country regains full control of that border, I am concerned that weapons and personnel may continue to flow in,” he said, UNIAN writes in a separate report.

Poroshenko said Ukrainian troops in Donbas are authorized to return fire if attacked by Russian-backed militants. “The Ukrainian servicemen have a firm order to fight back the enemy in case of a threat to their life amid attacks,” he said. “We will not let the enemy take us by surprise.”

• Under the cease-fire deal, both sides agree to withdraw most weapons from the frontline as part of the larger 12-point peace plan signed in Minsk aimed at ending the conflict that has killed more than 8,000 people since April 2014, Reuters writes.

 

• The U.S. Congress this week passed a bill authorizing up to $50 million in lethal military aid for Ukraine and mandating a White House response if Russia violates a key arms control treaty, RFE reported.

 

• “It is not just the security of Ukraine, but the security of Europe and the wider OSCE area which remains at stake in this conflict,” Kanerva said in an OSCE report. “Russia’s breach of international norms has brought us to this point, but we must now focus on accelerating the mutually agreed steps to getting us out.”