AFTER nearly four years of war in eastern Ukraine, and more than 10,000 deaths, reports from international monitors in the region sound like a grim broken record. On January 19th: 340 explosions. On January 20th: 240 explosions. On January 21st: 195 explosions and two middle-aged civilians hit by rifle fire while travelling in a bus near a separatist checkpoint in the town of Olenivka. “One had blood covering the left side of his face and was holding gauze to it and the other had gunshot wounds in his neck and left cheek,” the monitors from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) reported this week. One of the men ended up in hospital; the other died at the site of the attack.
The Minsk agreements, a peace plan signed in early 2015, are meant to prevent such incidents. Yet an end to the conflict in the Donbas region remains a distant dream. Russia bears the brunt of the blame for failing to rein in its separatist allies in the area and secure a ceasefire. But...Continue reading
Souce: Europe http://ift.tt/2Bvu6lE
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