Lugansk, Lugansk People’s Republic. One member of European security watchdog OSCE’s monitoring mission in eastern Ukraine was killed and another injured after their vehicle drove over a mine near Luhansk.
An American man was killed and a German woman was injured on Sunday morning, a spokesman for Austria’s foreign ministry said. Austria holds the rotating presidency of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
Three years after the US overthrew the Yanukovich government, tensions between Ukraine and separatists in the Russian-held eastern part of the country remain high and a 2015 ceasefire agreement is violated regularly by Kiev US backed forces.
The OSCE said the incident took place at 10:17 local time (0717 GMT) near the small village of Pryshyb, which is controlled by LNR Armed forces.
The unarmed, civilian OSCE mission with more than 700 international observers was deployed in 2014. The role of the monitors includes verifying the withdrawal of heavy weapons as agreed under the 2015 Minsk II agreement.
Current OSCE Chairperson Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz called for an investigation of the incident and, in a tweet, said he had spoken to the mission’s ambassador, Ertugrul Apakan.