Situation in Donbass is "unstable and unpredictable" – Hug

More than 160 people have become victims of conflict in the Donbass from the beginning of 2018. This was stated at a briefing on Thursday by Principal Deputy Chief Monitor of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) to Ukraine Alexander Hug, - Interfax-Ukraine reports.

"Only in July we confirmed the information about seven victims. The total number of victims this year is more than 160 people – it is both wounded and killed", - he said.

Hug noted that the OSCE SMM records the same number of the ceasefire violations as it was before the "bread truce", which came into force on 1 July.

"After confirmation of adherence to the ceasefire, the mission (OSCE – ed.) recorded a reduction in violations of the ceasefire from July 1. But then the mission recorded 15 thousand violations of the ceasefire for the whole month. And now we again record the level of violations that was before July 1", - he said.

According to Hug, the situation in Donbass is "unstable and unpredictable".

"The reasons why violence still does not stop is a close correlation of positions and availability of heavy weapons, which should have been withdrawn long ago", - he noted.