Ukraine on Friday reported its first combat death since a new ceasefire with pro-Russian separatists went into effect on September 1 before the new school year.
The announcement delivered a worrying signal that one of the most enduring in a series of truces risked collapsing just as tensions between Moscow and Kiev are scaling new heights.
“In the past day, as a result of military activities, one of our soldiers died and two were wounded,” Ukrainian military spokesman Andriy Lysenko told reporters.
Lysenko said separatists attacked Mariinka — a flashpoint town that straddles the buffer zone between the warring sides’ forces.
Ukraine had previously reported the accidental death of two soldiers in incidents involving a tripwire and one of the many landmines that litter the former Soviet republic’s devastated eastern industrial war zone.
Lysenko added that the separatists had also violated the truce by shelling the vicinity of Mariupol with heavy weapons banned by current agreements.
The government-held industrial port has been repeatedly targeted because it provides a land bridge between separatist-held regions and Russian-annexed Crimea.
The warring sides approved their latest truce on August 26 in Minsk — the Belarussian capital where a February 2015 peace deal was signed with the help of the leaders of Germany and France.
But that agreement and the subsequent series of armistices have done little to halt a war that has claimed nearly 9,600 lives over its 28 months and driven about two million people from their homes.
Source: AFP
