MOSCOW. Ukrainian forces are again shelling the Donetsk airport, a source in security agencies of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) said on Tuesday.
“At 2pm Ukrainian forces started shelling the Donetsk airport,” the source told Donetsk News Agency.
According to the source, Kiev forces are using mortars of 82mm caliber. “They have already fired more than five mines. They are also using rocket-propelled grenades, automatic grenade launchers and small arms,” the source added.
DPR defense ministry previously said that Ukrainian forces shelled DPR territory 19 times over last 24 hours.
At the meeting of the Contact Group on January 13 the sides supported the initiative of Russia’s envoy Boris Gryzlov on ensuring complete ceasefire on the territory of Donbass. This is the seventh attempt to fully observe the ceasefire regime in Ukraine’s south-east. At the recent meeting of the Contact Group in Minsk the participants expressed regret over continuing violations of ceasefire regime in Donbass.
The self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk republics said that Ukrainian forces violated ceasefire regime more than 120 times and shelled DPR and LPR territory more than 320 times since December 23 last year.
Ceasefire is envisaged by the Minsk accords signed on 12 February 2015, after negotiations in the so-called “Normandy format” in the Belarusian capital Minsk, bringing together Russian President Vladimir Putin, French President Francois Hollande, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko. The Minsk also accords envisage weaponry withdrawal, prisoner exchange, local election in Donbass, constitutional reform in Ukraine and establishing working sub-groups on security, political, economy and humanitarian components of the Minsk accords.