OSCE SMM reports escalation of violence in eastern Ukraine

14:12, 15.04.2016 1 min read

Principal Deputy Chief Monitor of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine (SMM) Alexander Hug says that the situation in eastern Ukraine, also known as Donbas, has gotten worse.

"It is with great regret I have to highlight an increase in (ceasefire) violations, and those who are involved in this do not improve the situation," he said at a briefing on Friday morning.

Hug said both sides have been violating the Minsk peace agreements by not withdrawing weapons to the agreed upon storage sites. "On both sides of the contact line we note more and more weapons absent from the sites they were once withdrawn to," he said.

Hug says that the OSCE SMM has not seen improvements, and what has been happening in Donbas does not correspond to agreements made in Minsk.

"The level of ceasefire violations registered by the SMM has remained consistently high," he said.

In his words, the geography of the violations spreads to other areas and the SMM is very concerned about this.