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Official reveals number of DPR citizens wounded by notorious Butterfly Mines

The communities of Makeyevka, Yasinovataya and Panteleymonovka were also dotted with such mines
A PFM-1 anti-personnel land mine Alexander Reka/TASS
A PFM-1 anti-personnel land mine
© Alexander Reka/TASS

DONETSK, November 25. /TASS/. Almost 90 residents of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) have sustained wounds of varying severity caused by PFM-1 anti-personnel mines (Butterfly mines) from Ukraine’s armed forces, Head of the DPR mission at the Joint Center for Control and Coordination of issues related to Ukrainian war crimes (JCCC) Ruslan Yakubov told TASS on Friday.

"As many as 87 civilians have already been injured in Lepestok [PFM-1 - TASS] explosions, including four children," he specified.

The first PFM-1 anti-personnel mines were dropped on Donetsk’s residential neighborhoods in July. The communities of Makeyevka, Yasinovataya and Panteleymonovka were also dotted with such mines.

The PFM-1 mine is a Soviet pressure-type anti-personnel mine. These mines can be scattered remotely by launching rockets with cluster munitions. The mine’s casing is made of plastic in colors that make it extremely difficult to identify. The mines are extremely dangerous for civilians as their unusual shape makes it hard to recognize as a dangerous object.

In May 2005, Ukraine ratified the Ottawa Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on their Destruction.