Contents tagged with Donbas

  • Separatist bombardment of Krasnohorivka in Eastern Ukraine causes massive destruction in the town

    On the morning of May 28, separatists fired on the city of Krasnohorivka in the Donetsk region. Pavlo Zhebrivskyi, head of the Donetsk civil-military administration, said on his Facebook page that separatists used fired with Grad multiple rocket launch systems, tanks and mortars. He reported that during the bombardment, a hospital was half destroyed, and two ambulances and a Niva hospital vehicle were smashed. According to him, several peaceful civilians received shrapnel wounds. However, the …

  • The Ukrainian SBU is ready to exchange 200 prisoners with the DPR and LPR

    The Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko agreed to sign an Act of Oblivion that will enable authorities to transfer more than 200 persons to the DPR and LPR in exchange for Ukrainian prisoners.

    The Head of the Security Service of Ukraine, Vasyl Hrytsak informed journalists about the details, reported Interfax Ukraine.

    “When will [there] be a swap? I want it to be today, tomorrow. We prepared for a swap. I’ll tell you the truth. And we are ready to swap more than 200 persons who expressed such …

  • The President of Ukraine promised to issue Ukrainian passports to residents of the Donbas and the Crimea

    President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko gave instructions to issue Ukrainian passports to the residents of the Crimea and the self-proclaimed DPR and LPR. He said this during a meeting on the preparation for the entry into force of the visa-free regime with the European Union, 112 Ukraine TV reports.

    "If problems with issuing passports are objectively raised to those who are in the occupied territory (the territory of the Donbas which is not controlled by the authorities of Ukraine – Ed.), or in …

  • OSCE: The number of civilian deaths is increasing in the Donbas

    Martin Sajdik, Special Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office in Ukraine and in the Trilateral Contact Group said that the number of deaths of civilians in the Donbas increased 120 percent over the last year, Interfax reports.

    "It is very sad that the number of civilians killed during the year increased by 120 percent," Sajdik said in Minsk, having provided the relevant data. He noted that "this is the result of the continued use of heavy weapons and the delaying of mine clearance." …

  • Separatist field commander killed in eastern Ukraine

    The commander of the separatist battalion Hooligan, Vladimir Tsvyah, with the call sign Commander, has been killed in the Donbas, as reported by the journalist from the Russia-1 television channel, Alexander Rogatkin, on his Facebook page. 

    "Volodya Tsvyah, the legendary battalion commander, has died on the front line together with the battalion intelligence chief," wrote Rogatkin.

    The authorities of the so-called Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) have not officially confirmed the death of …

  • Russia imported more than 1 million tons of coal from the separatist-held territories of eastern Ukraine in 2016

    In 2016, roughly 1.04 million tons of coal was exported from the Donbas territories which are not controlled by Ukraine into Russia, LIGA.net reports, citing Russian railway data. In 2015, the volume of smuggled exports was somewhat larger – 1.3 million tons.

    The mined coal is enriched at Donetsk and Luhansk factories and transported through the border with Russia that is not controlled by the Ukrainian authorities. Later on the fuel is exported to European and African countries. Some of the …

  • Ukrainian Foreign Minister called Donbas and Crimea the most dangerous ‘gray areas’ in Europe

    The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Pavlo Klimkin, during a meeting with the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe drew attention to the inadmissibility of the existence of "gray zones" on the European continent, whose inhabitants are de facto outside the protection of the European Convention on Human Rights, as reported by the press service of the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs."The Ukrainian Foreign Minister noted that the Donbas and the Crimea are now 'the hottest …

  • President of Ukraine: another batch of upgraded T-80 tanks is sent to the Donbas

    Kyiv is sending its military in the Donbass a batch of upgraded T-80 tanks, as reported by the President of Ukraine president Petro Poroshenko.

    "The next consignment of the T-80 “good-looking” tanks will be sent to the Ukrainian highly mobile airborne forces in the front line! We continue to work to strengthen our defense capability," wrote Poroshenko on his Facebook page without specifying how many tanks would be received by the military and when.

    Previously, Poroshenko stated that in the …

  • Russian parliament committee proposes creation of tourist zones in separatist republics in Eastern Ukraine

    On Wednesday, May 17, an exhibition titled the “Industrial Heritage of the Donbas” will be opened in the State Duma, RBC news agency reported. It will be organized by MP Iosif Kobzon from the “Yedinaya Rossiya” (United Russia) party and the Lower House Committee for Culture, two sources from the Committee for Culture told RBC. From the unrecognized republics, Eduard Golenko, acting Minister of the Coal Industry of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) is expected to speak at the exhibition, one …

  • US drone conducts reconnaissance over the Donbas

    On Sunday, May 14, the US Air Force RQ-4A Global Hawk, a strategic unmanned aerial vehicle or UAV made a 10-hour reconnaissance flight along the line of demarcation in the Donbas, as evidenced by the data of Western websites monitoring the movement of military aircraft.

    According to their information, a heavy US drone with call sign UAVGH000, which departed from US Naval Air Station Sigonella in Sicily, cruised for a day along the line of demarcation from north to south, collecting …