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Kiev moves 130 artillery units, tanks and IFVs to contact line — DPR defense ministry

According to the local defense ministry, up to 60 people from the Ukraine’s Right Sector volunteer corps were spotted arriving to the Zaytsevo village

© EPA/ANASTASIA VLASOVA

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MOSCOW, January 20. /TASS/. The self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) intelligence has spotted more than 130 units of Ukrainian military equipment on the Donetsk, Mariupol and Gorlovka directions, DPR defense ministry said on Wednesday.

"DPR intelligence continues to register instances of movement of military equipment and servicemen of the Ukrainian Armed Forces to the contact line. Fourty-one tanks, five self-propelled artillery systems, eight infantry fighting vehicles and three Grad multiple rocket launcher systems were spotted in settlements of Tarasovka, Maksimilyanovka, Maryinka, Georgiyevka, Novomikhaylovka, Granitnoye and in the Mariupol region," Donetsk News Agency quoted DPR defense ministry as saying.

Two units of engineer equipment for demining, two mortars of 120mm caliber, 13 vehicles with ammunition and up to 18 Giatsint howitzers of 152mm caliber were also spotted, the defense ministry said. Up to 60 people from the Ukraine’s Right Sector volunteer corps were spotted arriving to the Zaytsevo village "to strengthen national battalions and foreign mercenaries," the defense ministry added.

Weaponry withdrawal is envisaged by the Minsk accords signed on 12 February 2015, after negotiations in the so-called "Normandy format" in the Belarusian capital Minsk, bringing together Russian President Vladimir Putin, French President Francois Hollande, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.

The Minsk accords also envisage ceasefire, prisoner exchange, local election in Donbas, constitutional reform in Ukraine and establishing working sub-groups on security, political, economy and humanitarian components of the Minsk accords.

The Ukrainian forces and the self-defense forces of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk republics have repeatedly accused each other of violating ceasefire and other points of the Minsk agreements.

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Ukraine crisis Eastern Ukraine

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