Military mission of OSCE observers arrives in Donetsk region

DONETSK, April 22. /ITAR-TASS/. A group of military observers of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) arrived in Ukraine’s Donetsk region on Tuesday, local media reported.

“We are here at the invitation of the country’s government and monitor the actions of the Ukrainian armed forces in the region, as well as their reaction to the developments,” the mission head, Bundeswehr Colonel Axel Schneider stressed at a briefing in Donetsk.

Asked by reporters to comment on the concentration of Ukrainian troops in the region the OSCE representative replied, “I can currently say that the concentration of Ukrainian armed forces in the Donetsk region does not contradict any international agreements and norms.”

Schneider also noted that the mission had not yet made a decision on which actions it would take for the assessment of the situation in Sloviansk.

During the briefing, military commissar of the Donetsk region, Ukrainian armed forces Colonel Serhiy Kamesh reported to the international inspectors on the number of troops, deployed in the region, as well as specified the tasks that they fulfill. To Schneider’s question on how the local population reacts to the amassment of Ukrainian troops in the region, the military commissar of the region replied that he could not give a definite answer to that question. “The peaceful population is blocking our vehicles,” Kamesh stressed. “People are nervous when they see people with weapons on armored vehicles. Everybody understands well that such movements are made not because everything is fine.”

Representative of the Donetsk region’s police, Lieutenant Colonel Andriy Golubnitsky for his part assured the international observers that the situation in the region remained stable.

The OSCE mission, which includes representatives of the armed forces of Germany, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Sweden and Poland will be monitoring the situation in the region for six days.