About 30 servicemen are thought to have been killed in a shelling by militants using Grad multiple rocket launchers of the units of the Ukrainian anti-terrorist operation (ATO) forces near the village of Zelenopillia, Sverdlovsk district, Donetsk region, early on July 11, an advisor to the Ukrainian interior minister, Zorian Shkiriak, has said.

"According to publicly available information, up to 30 [that have been killed]. There might be more victims, because these bloody bastards again meanly shelled [the positions of the ATO forces] with Grad systems, and the destruction there is significant," he said at a briefing in Kyiv on Friday.

Shkiriak said that the response of Ukrainian law enforcers would be rapid and "any questions after another bloody terrorist attack regarding our attitude to those who took up arms against the Ukrainian people, Armed Forces and National Guard soldiers will be clear and understandable."

"They will be punished, either eliminated or captured, and they will answer according to the laws of Ukraine," he said.