Ukrainian authorities and pro-Russian separatists wish to re-establish a ceasefire decided in July 2020 in eastern Ukraine, a conflict zone at the heart of new tensions between Moscow and the West, the OSCE said on Wednesday (December 22). . The area is at the heart of new serious international tensions between Moscow and the West, who accuse Russia of massing troops on the Ukrainian border with a view to possible military intervention.
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“I was delighted that the participants expressed their strong determination to fully respect the measures to strengthen the ceasefire agreement of July 22, 2020.The representative of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and a conflict mediator, Mikko Kinnunen, said in a statement. “This is of great importance to people living on both sides of the front.», He continued. The diplomat spoke after a videoconference by the Trilateral Contact Group, which brings together the parties to the conflict.
Ukrainian presidency “cautiously optimistic”
The Ukrainian presidency also declared itself “cautiously optimistic for possible de-escalationOn the front line, after this meeting. “For the first time in a long time, we feel a real possibility of securing the truce“, Welcomed Wednesday evening in a statement the head of the presidential administration Andriï Yermak. “We saw that the other party was also ready for this measure“, he added.
However, the separatists were much more skeptical. “There is no agreement“, the meeting “did not lead to anythingRodion Mirochnik, a representative of the self-proclaimed Lugansk Republic (LNR), said Thursday on Telegram. The authorities of the other self-proclaimed republic, that of Donetsk (DNR), announced that a civilian was injured Thursday morning in a Ukrainian bombardment, according to the official separatist agency DAN.
Continued violations of the ceasefire
In July 2020, the two camps, at war since 2014, had agreed to a ceasefire on the front line. This truce had lasted several months, before finally shattering last February. According to Mikko Kinnunen, daily ceasefire violations were on average five times higher in December 2021 compared to the same month in 2020.
The war in eastern Ukraine, which claimed more than 13,000 lives, erupted in the spring of 2014 after a pro-Western revolution in Kiev followed by Moscow’s annexation of the Ukrainian Crimean peninsula. The political settlement of the conflict, provided for by the Minsk agreements of 2015, has stalled. Russia, despite its denials, is widely seen as the military and financial godfather of the separatists.