DONETSK, November 13. /TASS/. Officers of the Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) to Ukraine of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) have deployed a video camera to monitor possible violations in the first out of the three pilot sections of the line of engagement in Donbass, the Donetsk News Agency reported on Sunday.
"Today, OSCE representatives installed a surveillance camera in Petrovskoye [a settlement south of Donetsk - TASS]. Currently, SMM specialists are tuning it," the agency quoted a spokesman for the operations command of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR). The OSCE SMM was unavailable for comment.
"The camera will make it possible to watch the situation in Petrovsloye more closely. It will help reduce risks of possible ceasefire violations by Ukrainian troops at the disengagement section and prevent possible mining of this territory by Ukrainian forces. The situation will be monitored round-the-clock monitoring without permanent presence of the mission’s patrol in this area," the spokesman stressed.
On September 21, the Trilateral Contact Group on the settlement of the conflict in eastern Ukraine reached a framework agreement on disengagement of forces in Donbass. The Contact Group agreed on the principles and a timeframe for disengaging forces of Kiev and militias in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions.
Stage one is to create security zones at three sections of the line of contact, namely near Zolotoye, Petrovskoye and Stanitsa Luganskaya. The agreement envisages withdrawal of armed forces from the line of contact to create security zones at least two kilometers wide and two kilometers deep. The entire disengagement process, including preparatory measures, is to take not more than 30 days for each of the sections and be followed by demining works. The document is also applicable to other sections that might be agreed by the parties in further consultations.
The disengagement process has successfully been concluded near Zolotoye and Petrovskoye. By today, Stanitsa Luganskaya is the only site where disengagement has not taken place.
The Package of Measures to fulfil the September 2014 Minsk agreements, known as Minsk-2, that was signed in Minsk on February 12, 2015, envisaged a ceasefire regime between Ukrainian government forces and people’s militias in the self-proclaimed republics in Donetsk and Lugansk (DPR and LPR) starting from February 15, 2015 and a subsequent withdrawal of heavy weapons from the line of engagement. The deal also laid out a roadmap for a lasting settlement in Ukraine, including local elections and constitutional reform to give more autonomy to the war-torn eastern regions.