It so happens that these two holidays are very close in time: the Independence Day of Ukraine on 24 August, and the Miner's Day and, simultaneously, the Doentsk City Day on August 28.
Kiev did not leave Donbass without its special attention on this day either, starting to shell the territory of the Republics with heavy weapons the night before.
According to the DPR authorities, as a result of Ukrainian attacks on the near front districts of Donetsk and Zaytsevo, the northern edge of Gorlovka, the largest city in the north of the Republic, there were damaged 25 houses and buildings, including a kindergarten and a school. In Zaytsevo an artillery shell directly hit a house, in which out of 10 windows, only two are left now.
In addition, for the first time since the spring of 2016, the Ukrainian military shelled Makeevka, a satellite town of Donetsk in the north of the DPR capital. This town had long been considered almost peaceful in Donbass, as the main clashes took place to the north of it, in Yasinovataya, and to the south, in the Donetsk area. The night, however, a kindergarten and nine houses were severely damaged in it, including five private houses and four multi-story ones.
There are only three days before September 1, when children are to go to school and when, following the recent negotiations of the Contact Group in Minsk, another indefinite ceasefire will be announced.
Apparently, Kiev seeks to destroy, for the remaining days, as many educational institutions in Donbass as possible, to maintain the President of Ukraine Poroshenko’s promise made two years ago, ‘Our children will go to school, theirs will stay in cellars’.
The Ukrainian attack on Donbass on the eve of the Miner’s Day also resulted in civilian casualties. Over one night, seven civilians were wounded in Zaytsevo and two districts of Donetsk. During the festive day, on the western outskirts of Donetsk, another two women were shot to death by Ukrainian snipers.
At the same time, despite the high number of victims, the number of attacks that night, according to the DPR Defense Ministry, was twice fewer than in previous days, Therefore, the authorities of the Republic concluded that Kiev had targeted attacks on the residential sector of the localities of the Republic. There had never been positions of the DPR army where the latest attacks occurred, with only civilians living there, including children.
Moreover, the DPR intelligence reports that the Ukrainian positions, from which the territory of the Republic is shelled, are also located in residential areas of Kiev-controlled localities, with the Ukrainian military placing their heavy weapons in schools, kindergartens and even churches.
In one of towns in the Lugansk sector of the front, according to the LPR Intelligence, a unit of the Ukrainian army is also located within 100 meters from a school. Apparently, none of Donbass children should go to school, even in those parts which Ukraine considers its own.
Placing its military and weapons in residential areas of the localities of Donbass, the Ukrainian command turns local people not only into a human shield, but also into a target. Residents of several Kiev-controlled towns in the Donetsk area informed about the arrival in their localities of groups of the mainstream Ukrainian media journalists. From their conversation, locals had concluded that the journalists had come to record the return fire from the DPR army and, subsequently, accuse the Republic of shelling socially important facilities.
At the same time, in the Lugansk section of the front, for three consecutive days, the Ukrainian side has been shelling the only checkpoint where civilians of the Republic can cross the contact line. Soldiers of the LPR army on positions reported that, over the past three days, the number of mortar shells coming from the Ukrainian side had doubled and amounted to over 50.
Residents of a locality on the Ukrainian side of the Lugansk segment of the front informed that the Ukrainian military had set a shooting range in the yard of one of houses, having riddled its walls. The hostess, in case of a complaint, was threatened with physical violence and official accusation of complicity with «separatism."
The LPR Intelligence also reported that, over the past three days, Kiev had delivered a battery of MLRS "Grad" and a few tanks to their segment of the front.
According to the DPR Defense Ministry, in the Donetsk segment of the front, Kiev delivers weapons in platoons and batteries. Over the past week, at the Ukrainian position arrived two platoons of MLRS "Grad", about 10 batteries of 122 and 152mm howitzers, two companies of tanks and four batteries of 120 mm mortars.
The OSCE observers, over the same period of time, found that the Ukrainian side had withdrawn from the weapon storage sites about 100 122 and 152mm howitzers, over 10 100mm anti-tank cannons, about 20 infantry fighting vehicles and armored personnel carriers, as well as 10 220mm MLRS "Uragan" and one air defense missile system.
Air defense systems have a mysterious fate in Ukraine. When on July 17, 2014, over Donbass there was shot down the Malaysian Boeing MH-17, presumably with an air-defense missile system "Buk", Ukraine hurried to state that there was not such a system in its army.
However, on June 26, 2014, Ukrainian TV made a report about several air-defense missile systems "Buk", renovated in Ukraine without Russian spare parts and transferred to the Ukrainian army. The report even showed these systems intruding on alert.
On August 24, 2016, the same system was presented in Khreshchatyk, Kiev's main street, during the parade in honor of the Independence Day of Ukraine. Its passage was accompanied by the proud words from all ;oudspeakers, ‘These air-defense missile systems are ready to shoot down targets at altitudes up to 12,000 meters in conditions of strong interference’.
In addition, during the parade, the President of Ukraine Poroshenko announced the delivery of over 140 pieces of military equipment, mostly forbidden by the Minsk Agreements, to the Ukrainian army fighting in Donbass.
At the same time, out of 12 120mm mortars "Hammer", advertised as a Ukrainian innovative development, one fell apart, according to the DPR intelligence, before coming to the Ukrainian positions in Donbass, and another after the first round.
Moreover, yesterday, the military authorities of the LPR announced that six out of 10 remaining new Ukrainian mortars had turned up in the hands of the LPR army soldiers. While examining them, the LPR engineers found out that "the Ukrainian newest development" was a makeshift remake of old Soviet mortars. Fiat the same time, each "Hammer" costs the Ukrainian budget more than 400,000 UAH.
Soldiers of the DPR and LPR army also noted an increase in the number of nationalists and mercenaries along the entire contact line. A periodic sharp increase in the number of attacks on the territory of the Republics from the Ukrainian side, as well as the Ukrainian units shelling each other, can be explained by the AFU command’s lack of control over the radicals.
Two days ago, in the Lugansk segment of the front, in the buffer zone, there was found an ammunition cartridge left by the Ukrainian military. During examining it in the presence of the OSCE observers, there was discovered a scratched swastika and letters «ПС", the abbreviation for the "Right Sector» in Russian («Правый Сектор»).
75 years ago, Donbass also opposed the army fighting under the sign of a swastika and seeking to destroy its people.
According to the DPR Defense Ministry of Defense, over the past week, the Ukrainian army opened fire on the territory of the Republic more than 3,000 times, with more than 2,500 rounds made from heavy weapons.
Over that week, there were damaged and destroyed 227 buildings, killed five DPR army soldiers and another five wounded. Among the civilians, 9 people were killed and 33 wounded.
On the Day of Miner and Donetsk city, the Head of the DPR, Alexander Zakharchenko said, addressing the citizens of the Republic, that Donetsk had turned into something bigger than just a city; It has become a symbol of struggle for freedom, an outpost of the Russian world and the true hero-city.
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