24 June 2014
Pro-Russian terrorists detonated two sets of railroad tracks at the Donetsk railroad stations on the morning of June 24, news reports said. Two days earlier, terrorists detonated a railroad track causing 14 cars to derail either partially or completely. Terrorists also detonated a bridge the same morning in the Zaporizhia Oblast, which borders the war-torn Donetsk Oblast. The track serves a line connecting the cities of Dnipropetrovsk and Berdiansk.
Separatists shot up several Ukrainian roadblocks in the Donetsk Oblast in the early morning of June 24 using grenade launchers and mortars, said Vladislav Seleznev, the press secretary of the Ukrainian government’s anti-terrorist operation. On June 23, fighters in certain districts of the Donetsk Oblast town of Kramatorsk shot up on June 23 social sites, schools, nurseries and hospitals, Seleznev said. Over the last 24 hours, attacks were launched against road blocks and military hardware in six districts of the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, he reported. As a result of the shooting, one border officer and five soldiers were injured, he said. The separatists used sniper rifles not possessed by Ukraine’s Armed Forces, he said.
Separatist leaders have declared their disinterest in laying down arms and are trying to shift responsibility for the ceasefire’s disruption on the Ukrainian side, including methods of sabotage, reported on June 23 Volodymyr Chepoviy, the spokesman for the Information Center of the National Security and Defense Council. The separatists are also replenishing their reserves with Russians volunteers, who are recruited on Internet social networking sites, and forcibly recruited locals, he said. “In the nearest future, an invasion of Russian mercenaries on Ukrainian territory is being planned from the training camps of fighters on Russia’s territory.”
Citing ongoing incidents violating the ceasefire, Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement on the evening of June 23 demanding the Russian government use its influence on the terrorists to have them stop their military actions, lay down their arms, free hostages and government buildings and persuade foreign mercenaries to leave Ukraine. “The settlement process is being undermined by the actions of fighters,” the statement said. “The terrorists are using rifles and using mortar fire against the positions of the anti-terrorist operation.”
The ministry cited 10 incidents of the terrorists violating the ceasefire in the last 24 hours and more than 30 such incidents in the last two days. “These examples demonstrate the real intentions of the fighters: they’re not interest in the lives and safety of people, but fulfilling a single-minded plan of undermining Ukrainian statehood and peace and calm in the region,” the statement said.
Zenon Zawada: Poroshenko’s Plan B in dealing with the terrorists involves killing them, said advisor Yuriy Lutsenko. We expect the Ukrainian president will be forced to take this course of action, which would involve unconventional warfare lasting for months. Another key factor to consider is that a fullscale military operation by the Ukrainian government might prompt the Russian government to dispatch its forces into the Donbas region (on an official basis), which would seal the region’s status as a war zone.