MOSCOW/DONETSK, January 31./TASS/. A cameraman of Russia’s Life television and a journalist of the Donetsk News Agency have been wounded in a shelling in Donbass.
"Life’s cameraman Pavel Chuprin was wounded as he was filming in the Kiev district of Donetsk. According to early reports, he had a penetrating shell fragment wound in the leg," Life reports online.
Sources from the Donetsk News Agency say their correspondent was wounded in Donetsk’s Kievsky district while doing his job.
"He was wounded in the leg, first aid was rendered at the site," the news agency said, adding that the journalist is in a stable condition and is not within the zone of the shelling.
On December 21, the parties to the Contact Group for settling the armed civil conflict in eastern Ukraine made a yet another, tenth, attempt to reach a ceasefire. However the security situation in Donbass has not visibly improved, with Ukrainian troops continuing to shell territories of the self-proclaimed republics.
Attack on reporters
A group of local and Russian reporters came under the Ukrainian military’s fire in the Kievsky district of Donetsk, the Donetsk news agency reported on Tuesday.
"The incident occurred near the 4 Chapayev Street building," the news agency said adding that "reporters of Russian NTV channel and Lifenews TV channel, as well as representatives of the local administration and the republican emergencies ministry came under fire."
NTV has confirmed this information.
RT Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan, in turn, confirmed that an RT representative had come under fire in Donbass. "Our stringer came under fire in Donetsk. He is fine," she tweeted.
Investigative Committee is establishing circumstances of attack
Russia’s Investigative Committee is establishing the circumstances of the attack on Russian reporters in Donbass, the Committee’s spokesperson Svetlana Petenko told TASS.
"Russia’s Investigative Committee is currently establishing all the circumstances of the attack. Investigators will find out if the Ukrainian military shelled the reporters in order to prevent them from covering the developments in Donbass," the Investigative Committee spokesperson added.
According to Petrenko, the probe is being carried out in the wake of the criminal case over the use of banned means and methods of warfare in southeastern Ukraine.
"These facts once again prove that the Ukrainian military continue to deliberately violate the Minsk agreements and the norms of international law, including the Protocol suspending the use of weapons in southeastern Ukraine and the corresponding Memorandum, as well as the Geneva Convention on Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War and the additional protocol to this convention.