KIEV, July 30. /ITAR-TASS/. One Ukrainian serviceman has been killed and 11 others wounded over the past 24 hours in Kiev’s military operation in the country’s east, spokesman for Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council Andriy Lysenko said on Wednesday.

“Eleven servicemen have been wounded. They have been taken to hospitals and are receiving necessary medical aid,” Lysenko said.

The spokesman said the Ukrainian army’s checkpoints and positions had been shelled 25 times over the past 24 hours in the east Ukrainian Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

Director of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s Military and Medical Department Vitaly Andronaty earlier told journalists that a total of 1,236 Ukrainian servicemen had been wounded since the start of Kiev’s military operation in the country’s east in mid-April.

Pro-Kiev troops and local militias in the eastern Ukrainian Donetsk and Luhansk regions are involved in fierce clashes as the Ukrainian armed forces are conducting a military operation to regain control over the breakaway regions, which on May 11 proclaimed their independence at local referendums.

During the military operation, Kiev has used armored vehicles, heavy artillery and attack aviation. Many buildings have been destroyed and tens of thousands of people have had to flee Ukraine’s embattled east.