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Ukrainian military shells Donetsk republic over 400 times in past day — spokesman

One DPR soldier was wounded in the shelling

DONETSK, February 11. /TASS/. Ukrainian armed units have shelled 438 times the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) over the past 24 hours, DPR military spokesman Eduard Basurin said on Saturday.

"Over the past 24 hours, the Ukrainian Armed Forces have opened fire 438 times on the republic’s territory," Donetsk news agency quoted Basurin as saying.

Ukrainian forces targeted Donetsk’s suburbs, the village of Staromikhailovka, the Petrovsky district and former airport. Besides, the town of Yasinovataya, the villages of Spartak, Veseloye, Ozeryanovka and Dolomitnoye along with the DPR southern villages of Sakhanka, Kominternovo, Leninskoye and Novovyboyevo came under shelling. Ukrainian troops used multiple missile launchers, mortars of various caliber, infantry fighting vehicles, anti-aircraft guns, grenade launchers and firearms.

"One DPR soldier was wounded in shelling by Ukrainian Armed Forces," Basurin said.

Earlier in the say, a source with DPR defense agencies said that Ukrainian troops had opened fire with artillery and tank guns on Donetsk’s western outskirts and the outskirts of Yasinovataya. Two residential houses were damaged in the shelling.

On February 8, DPR command presented a plan agreed with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). The plan aims to get the situation along the contact line in embattled Donbass back to normal. It envisages an immediate and comprehensive ceasefire, withdrawal of all weapons banned by the Minsk peace deal, unhindered access for observers of the OSCE Special Monitoring Group (SMM) to weapons storage sites and creation of a one-kilometer zone free of weapons around the Donetsk filter station along with a ban on all offensive operations. However, the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ command ignored the proposal, whereas OSCE SMM Principal Deputy Chief Monitor Alexander Hug refused to act as a mediator in the negotiations.

On February 1, the Contact Group seeking to find a peaceful solution to the conflict in east Ukraine demanded at a meeting in Minsk an end to hostilities in Donbass and withdrawal of all weapons and equipment along the entire contact line to storage sites by February 5. However, according to the DPR command, Kiev has been pulling more weapons to the contact line instead of withdrawing them.