DONETSK, February 20. /TASS/. The armed forces of Ukraine shelled six populated areas in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, including its largest city of Donetsk late on Saturday and early on Sunday, the DPR mission to the Joint Center for Control and Coordination (JCCC) said.

According to the report, posted in the mission’s Telegram channel, the towns of Dokuchayevsk, Oktyabr, Sosnovskoye, Aleksandrovka and Spartak were shelled between 21:04 and 23:52 Moscow time.

Donetsk was shelled at 00:03 on Sunday. The fire targeted the Donetsk Factory of Chemical Products.

The situation along the contact line in eastern Ukraine took a turn for the worse in the morning of February 17. The DPR and LPR reported some of the most intensive shelling by Kiev forces in recent months. The shelling damaged some civilian facilities.

On Friday, the leaders of the Lugansk and Donetsk People’s Republics (LPR and DPR), Leonid Pasechnik and Denis Pushilin, announced the evacuation of the republics’ inhabitants to Russia, citing the increasing threat of hostilities. All-out mobilization was announced in the republics on Saturday.