Russian-led forces in Ukraine’s war-ridden Donbas region attacked Ukrainian positions four times on Dec. 31 – including with a heavy caliber weapon outlawed by the Minsk peace agreements, Ukraine’s military said on Jan. 1.
The attacks violated the latest cease-fire in Ukraine, dubbed the “New Year’s Truce,” which came into force at midnight on Dec. 29.
The press service of the Joint Forces Operation, the military command structure overseeing Ukraine’s defense against the Russian-led military intervention in eastern Ukraine, said that Ukrainian positions on the front line near Novotashkivsk were hit by 120mm mortar rounds.
Under the Minsk II agreement of February 2015, weapons with calibers over 100mm are banned from a 50-kilometer (31 mile) security zone running along the front line between the Ukrainian army and Russian-led forces in Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts.
In the three other incidents, 82mm mortars were used to attack Ukrainian positions, the Joint Forces Operation’s press service said. It said two Ukrainian soldiers have been injured in fighting over the last two days. According to Ukrainian intelligence, two members of the Russian-led forces have been killed over the past day, and three wounded, the press service said.
During the current day (Jan. 1) Russian-led forces attacked Ukrainian positions at Hnutove near the port city of Mariupol in Donetsk Oblast with 82mm mortar shells, the press service added.
While there were fears in Ukraine of a further escalation of Russian military aggression over the Christmas and New Year’s period, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s Special Monitoring Mission in Ukraine reported a decrease in fighting in the Donbas following the sides’ recommitment to a cease-fire on Dec. 27.
Tensions between Ukraine and Russia heightened recently after the Russian coast guard and special forces on Nov. 25 attacked three Ukrainian navy vessels in international waters in the Black Sea near Ukraine’s Russian-occupied Crimea peninsula.
Russia seized the three Ukrainian vessels – one tugboat and two patrol boats – and captured 24 Ukrainian sailors, wounding three of them in the apparently unprovoked attack.
In response, Ukraine on Nov. 28 introduced martial law in 10 of the country’s oblasts or regions that border the sea or Russian-controlled territories, and banned the entry to Ukraine of Russia males aged 16 to 60.
Martial law was lifted without further incident on Dec. 26, but the restrictions on the entry of Russian males reportedly remain in place.
