The situation in eastern Ukraine remains tense as figthing flares up again leaving 11 soldiers injured, Ukraine's Anti-Terrorist Operation reported on Feb. 6.
Since August 2015, a record number of 84 attacks was launched by Russian-separatist forces within 24 hours in Donetsk Oblast’s Krasnohorivka, Maryinka, Pisky, Opytne and Shyrokyne.
Russian-backed militant forces attacked Ukrainian positions using grenade launchers, mortars and anti-aircraft warfare – weapons that should have been withdrawn since the Minsk peace deal signed in February.
The ceasefire was also violated in Avdiivka, Zaitseve, Mayorske and near the Donetsk airport. Villages of Novhorodske, Troitske and Shyrokyne near coastal city of Mariupol are also hot spots.
Meanwhile, the next Trilateral Contact Group meeting on the settlement of the situation in Donbas scheduled for Feb. 10 is at risk of failure. The Ukrainian side calls on holding it only after the foreign ministers of the Normandy Group nations will be able to meet on Feb. 13.
Earlier, Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko warned about increased risk of “open war with Russia” citing that the aggressor had not implemented “a single point” of the Minsk truce, which includes a ceasefire between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine.
In an interview with Germany’s Bildt newspaper on Feb. 3, Poroshenko noted that the danger of war is “greater than last year” and Russia keeps building up its military presence on its border with Ukraine.
Since the beginning of 2016, Russia’s army has lost around 42 people in the occupied territory of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, Vadym Skybytsky of Ukraine’s defense ministry said on Feb. 5.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s Security Service detained a militant of the Prizrak (Ghost) Battalion near the village of Orikhove in Donetsk Oblast. According to the Security Service of Ukraine, the man who joined the ranks of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic in May 2014 allegedly planned to sabotage the railway infrastructure in eastern Ukraine.
