Despite ceasefire agreement between Ukraine and the pro Russian rebels, seven Ukrainian soldiers were killed late on Sunday when a separatist shell hit their armoured personnel carrier near the main airport at Donetsk in eastern Ukraine, a military spokesman said on Monday.
This records the largest single number of Ukrainian soldiers killed since a fragile ceasefire came into force on Sept. 5.
Ukraine’s Defense Ministry says four servicemen have been killed in clashes with pro-Russian forces since the start of a ceasefire five days ago. Head of Defense Ministry’s Military Medical Department Vitaly Andronatiy told reporters on Tuesday that 29 other Ukrainian soldiers were also injured during the ceasefire.
After the ceasefire agreement, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko ordered troops to stop all hostilities by 15:00 GMT the same day and instructed the Foreign Ministry to oversee monitoring of the ceasefire along with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
Meanwhile, the airport in the eastern city of Donetsk has been reportedly the scene of gunfire and shelling overnight Tuesday. The city council of Donetsk said on Tuesday that a school and several residential buildings were hit by shelling. Shelling was also heard in the east of the port city of Mariupol where a woman was killed.
Kiev and pro-Russian forces accuse each other of repeated breaking of the ceasefire.
A report released by the Dutch Safety Board said there was “no evidence of technical or human error” on MH17. Dutch experts say the Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 broke up in mid-air after being hit by “numerous objects” that “pierced the plane at high velocity”.
However this evidence is consistent with the plane being struck by shrapnel from a missile.
All 298 people on board in the MH17, died when the plane came down, amid reports it was shot down by pro-Russian rebels.
Dutch aviation investigators relied on information from the black box flight data recorders, air traffic control, satellite images and photos from the scene to compile the preliminary report.
They said the plane “broke up in the air probably as the result of structural damage caused by a large number of high-velocity objects that penetrated the aircraft from outside.” The cockpit voice recorder revealed no signs of any technical faults or an emergency situation, the experts said. The investigators have not visited the crash site because of fighting in the area but they said photographic evidence of the wreckage suggests the plane split into pieces during “an in-flight break up”.
Maintenance history showed the aircraft was airworthy and had no known technical problems when it took off from Amsterdam, the report added. Experts also added that it was manned by “a qualified and experienced crew”. Radio communications between the pilot and Ukrainian air traffic control confirm that no emergency call was made.
President Perto Poroshenko said, pro Russian rebels have released 1200 captives in Ukraine.
This releases followed the Friday’s ceasefire deal, he said, which included an exchange of prisoners. He was speaking during a visit to the strategic south-eastern port city of Mariupol, which has come under shelling from pro-Russian rebels in recent days.
Mr Poroshenko announced his arrival on twitter saying, “Mariupol is Ukraine. We will not surrender this land to anyone.”
