OSCE SMM should monitor Donbas truce round-the-clock - Kyiv
KYIV. Aug 22 (Interfax) - The Donbas truce should be monitored and verified by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe Special Monitoring Mission (OSCE SMM) round-the-clock and should be provided with Russia's security guarantees, Darka Olifer, a spokeswoman of second Ukrainian President and Ukrainian envoy to the Trilateral Contact Group (TCG) in Minsk to Leonid Kuchma, has said.
"A permanent and steady truce in Donbas should be followed by the OSCE SMM's round-the-clock monitoring and verification and the provision of security guarantees, above all, by Russia. The OSCE SMM should operate specifically along the uncontrolled section of Russian-Ukrainian border with security zones being set up in these border regions, and in a region free of heavy weaponry and military hardware inside the populated localities of Kalmiusske, Kumachove, Sakhanka, and Novoazovsk," Olifer wrote on her Facebook page following the TCG talks in Minsk on Wednesday.
"The issue of return to the disengagement line established by the Memorandum signed on September 19, 2014, is particularly pressing," she said.
The Ukrainian side has seen about 1,500 attacks by the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics, specifically with Grad multiple rocket launchers, tanks, artillery guns, and mortars banned by the Minsk Agreements, during the 'bread truce' from July 1 to August 20, 2018, Olifer said.
"There are some casualties among the troops and civilians. The OSCE SMM has seen attacks on nine populated localities over this period of time," Kuchma's spokeswoman added.