Luhansk republic envoy says Kiev has not fulfilled a single point of Minsk deals

MOSCOW, August 12. /TASS/. The Kiev authorities have not fulfilled a single point of the Package of measures on implementation of Minsk agreements, the self-proclaimed Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) envoy to Contact Group Vladislav Deinego told a roundtable in TASS on Wednesday.

"The Ukrainian authorities have been acting rather differently lately," Deiengo said. "If yesterday they took a tough stance that they were not going to cooperate with DPR [self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic] and LPR, recently the rhetoric has changed."

However, this positive shift was not followed by significant changes since "nothing followed after [Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo] Klimkin’s statement about the importance of holding election in LPR." "Ukraine’s Central Election Commission addressed Verkhovna Rada to provide a list of settlements where local election will not be held," the LPR envoy explained.

Deiengo also noted "Kiev’s obvious reluctance to bring closer the peaceful settlement of the problem" which is only confirmed by the law passed yesterday on allocating additional financing worth around $250 million for building up military presence in Donbas.

"Here, we can see Kiev’s reluctance to lower the tensions of military presence and to follow the path of peaceful settlement of the problem," he added. "The Package of measures was signed by the ‘Normandy Quartet’, by the leaders of respected countries. We hope that they will intervene since Ukraine has not fulfilled a single point of this document," Deienego concluded.

Kiev says deploying weaponry in Donbas "not at variance with Minsk deals"

 The secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, Oleksandr Turchynov, said on Wednesday Ukrainian military are deploying artillery in Donbas while at the same time observing the Minsk agreements.

"We are developing active defense in the east, strengthening our armed forces with new weapons and hardware. Active defense envisages efficient reaction to any provocations by the enemy," he said while examining new pieces of artillery deployed in the troubled Donbas.

According to Turchynov, "the hardware is situated at the distance coordinated by the Minsk protocol."

Almost 100 Ukrainian armored vehicles spotted on contact line

The defense ministry spokesman of the self-proclaimed Donetsk republic said on Wednesday that more than 90 tanks, artillery and armored vehicles of Ukraine’s Armed Forces have been moved towards the contact line in Donbas.

The movement of troops and equipment to the areas close to the frontline comes with the use of fraudulent maneuvers, Eduard Basurin told reporters citing intelligence data.

The vehicles were found in the villages of Kodema, Prohorovka, Nevelsky and Andreyevka.

This comes in violation of the February 12 Minsk agreements which envisage the pullout of all heavy weapons by both sides to equal distance with the aim of creating a security zone on at least 50 kilometers apart for artillery systems of 100 mm caliber or more.

Ukrainian military try to break the militias’ defense 

The Ukrainian military tried to break the militias’ defense near the village of Starognatovka on the Mariupol direction early on August 10.

"After two hours of massive artillery preparation from large-caliber guns, Grad multiple rocket launchers, tanks and mortars near the Petrovskoye, Novaya Laspa and the Belaya Kamenka populated localities, the enemy used six armoured vehicles and six tanks to launch an offensive in the direction of Starognatovka and Belaya Kamenka," Eduard Basurin, the spokesperson for the Defense Ministry of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, told a briefing held at the Donetsk news agency.

He added that foreign drones and powerful field radio-electronic warfare complexes had been noticed in the vicinity of those populated localities since 3 o’clock in the morning on August 10.

A battle broke out between the Ukrainian troops and the militias. The Ukrainian military, Basurin said, were stopped and thrown back to the start line from where they continued shelling Petrovskoye and Belaya Kamenka.

The leadership of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) has asked the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to investigate Ukraine’s offensive near Starognatovka.

"Last night, the Ukrainian military committed another gross violation of the Minsk agreements. They knew that we had lived up to our commitment to withdraw all heavy weapons, including with a caliber under 100mm (from the disengagement line), and decided to take advantage of the situation to move deep into the DPR’s territory," Basurin said.

"We are calling on the OSCE SMM and the Joint Control and Coordination Centre to carry out immediate and detailed investigation into the attack. We also want the world community to be informed about the incident," he added.

Basurin also called on Germany, France and Russia that guarantee the implementation of the Minsk agreements to influence the Kiev leadership and make it end its provocations and stop the shelling of the self-proclaimed Donetsk republic.