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Developments in eastern Ukraine

Five blasts heard near Kramatorsk airport - militia

Intense fire and a few blasts were heard from the direction of the city of Slavyansk

© ИТАР-ТАСС/EPA/ROMAN PILIPEY

KRAMATORSK, June 26, /ITAR-TASS/. Five explosions were heard near the airport of the city of Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk Region, a spokesman for the local militia said Wednesday.

The spokesman said that intense fire and a few blasts were heard from the direction of the city of Slavyansk some 10 kilometers from Kramatorsk.

He added that illumination flares could be seen above the city in the sky.

In the past few days, the situation was relatively calm in Kramatorsk.

Kiev’s punitive operation against federalization supporters in Ukraine’s embattled Southeast involving armored vehicles, heavy artillery and attack aviation has killed hundreds of people, including civilians, left buildings destroyed and damaged and forced tens of thousands to cross the border from Ukraine to Russia.

Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko, who won the May 25 early presidential election in Ukraine and took office on June 7, announced a ceasefire in Ukraine’s Southeast from June 20 until June 27. He also presented a peace plan to settle the situation in the Southeast during his first working trip to the Donetsk Region.

Despite periodical reports that the ceasefire has been violated by Kiev, self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic’s (DPR) Prime Minister Alexander Borodai said Monday, June 23, after talks on implementation of Poroshenko’s peace plan, that militias in Ukraine’s embattled Southeast agreed to the ceasefire until June 27.

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