LPR withdraws troops from Stanytsia Luhanska in Donbas
Ukraine’s representative to the Trilateral Contact Group (TCG) Leonid Kuchma said that the OSCE’s Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) will soon confirm whether the Ukrainian military and the militants of the Russia-backed Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) have withdrawn from the Stanytsia Luhanska region.
“According to our provisional information, the troops from the Russian side have been withdrawn. However, the OSCE SMM needs to confirm this fact,” he said.
Negotiations to separate the conflicting sides in Stanytsia Luhanska began in 2016, but have repeatedly fallen through due to ongoing shelling by the LPR militants.
On 5 June, the TCG agreed to make another attempt to separate the forces in the Stanytsia Luhanska region as of 10 June. However, once again the militants broke the agreement through regular bombardments.
On 27 June, the OSCE SMM reported that the Armed Forces of Ukraine and the militants had fired signal rockets to indicate their readiness to withdraw. The SMM then observed that Ukraine’s soldiers and the members of the illegal armed group left their advanced positions and withdrew from the separation area with their weapons.