The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine is deeply concerned about the sharp aggravation of the security situation in the anti-terrorist operation area.

During 22-24 July 2016 only, Russia-backed militants shelled Ukrainian Army positions 189 times. And the weapons, which have long had to be withdrawn from the Line of contact under the Minsk Agreements, continue to be defiantly and blatantly used.

Positions of Ukrainian troops and civilian infrastructure facilities, including residential buildings, were shelled 89 times by 122 mm cannons, 30 times by 120 mm mortars and 50 times by 82 mm mortars. Six firefights, which resulted in losses among the personnel of the ATO forces, occurred near the settlements of Novozvanivka, Trudovskaya and Avdiyivka.

The presence of a considerable amount of Russian heavy weapons, which should have been withdrawn according to the Minsk Agreements, is recorded in the vicinity of the Line of contact.

The purposeful escalation of the security situation takes place against the background of the massive supply by the Russian Federation of the armament, military equipment and ammunition, the dispatch of new mercenaries and regular servicemen of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation into Donbas.

Since the beginning of July of this year, 19 military trains with armament and military equipment have crossed the uncontrolled section of the Ukraine-Russia state border. In violation of international law and commitments in the field of arms export control, Russia has delivered 19 T-72 tanks, 3 Multiple Launch Rocket Launch Systems "Grad", 2 self-propelled artillery systems, 11 APCs.

130 tanks (6600 tons) with fuel and lubricants, 14 train cars with ammunition (about 560 tons) have also been delivered from the territory of the Russian Federation. 9 truck convoys, which consisted of, inter alia, 44 trucks with ammunition, 34 fuel trucks and 77 pieces of motor vehicles, have entered the temporarily uncontrolled territory.

Russian UAVs have illegally crossed Ukrainian-Russian border three times and after accomplishment of the reconnaissance missions in the airspace of Ukraine returned to their bases in Russia.

One can clearly see a tendency to intimidate the observers of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine, obstruct their activities on monitoring and verification under the mandate that was approved including by the Russian Federation.

This has been proven by continued restrictions on the OSCE SMM access to the areas, which are temporarily uncontrolled by Ukraine, including those adjacent to the Ukraine-Russia state border; obstruction of the work of the Mission by denying permission to further expand its field presence in the uncontrolled territories; organization of paid and well-directed protests and “unarmed resistance” against OSCE SMM's intentions to properly perform its functions.

It’s quite obvious, that the argument about the “internal Ukrainian nature” of the conflict in Donbas, which official Moscow is actively trying to impose on the international community, is a mere attempt of the Russian Federation by any means to divert attention from its real role as the organizer and direct participant of the conflict, and a party to it.

Such Kremlin’s rhetoric is supported by the stance of the Russian Federation delegation to the Minsk talks, where it tries to play the role of an outside observer and an advocate of illegal armed groups of certain areas of Donbas, rather than to force them to fully implement the Minsk Agreements.

Similar behaviour is also demonstrated by Russia with regard to the Normandy format arrangements, refusing to implement them or deliberately trying to distort their meaning. In particular, this applies to the framework principles of the disengagement of forces from the Line of contact, which were agreed by military advisors in this format on 15-16 June 2016.

We must admit that leaders of the militants in Donetsk and Luhansk, and their Kremlin curators have deliberately chosen the path of further escalation of the conflict instead of peaceful settlement by consistently implementing the Minsk Agreements.

It is clear that the armed provocations by the illegal armed groups will necessitate the Armed Forces of Ukraine to take decisive actions in response in order to make terrorists abandon their plans for the escalation of the conflict by force.

While strictly abiding by its commitments, the Ukrainian side will continue to do everything possible to stop loss of human lives in Donbas, and to restore peaceful life, constitutional order and respect for human rights in the temporarily occupied territories.

We demand from the Russian Federation, as a party to the Minsk Agreements, to ensure the fulfillment of its commitments without delay, to withdraw its militaries, mercenaries and weapons from the territory of Donbas, to stop illicit supply of weapons and military equipment to militants, and to unblock the activities of the OSCE SMM.

We call on our international partners to strengthen political and diplomatic pressure on the Kremlin in order to stop the dangerous escalation of tension in Donbas.