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- shadower78
- Super građanin
- Pridružio: 07 Apr 2012
- Poruke: 1482
- Gde živiš: Iznad zvijezda
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O situaciji na liniji razgranicenja. Po svemu sudeci ukropi ce pokusati da presjeku put izmedu donetska i gorlovke da bi sprecili dotok pomoci prilikom moguce ofanzive. Sta mislite gdje ce da napadnu u slucaju proljetne ofanzive donetsk preko peska na aerodrom ilinegdje kod gorlovke.
The Ukrainian army continues advancing in the buffer zone. Yesterday they seized the area near the strategically important road connecting Donetsk and Gorlovka, a city in the north of the DPR. However, this time the Ukrainian military did not limit themselves to occupying another part of no-man’s land. According to the DPR Defense Ministry, the Ukrainian military units shelled a civilian shuttle bus moving from Donetsk to Gorlovka, as well as several civilian cars. So far, no casualties have been reported.
About 1.5km of the road turned out to be within striking distance from the positions of the Ukrainian military. Due to the threat of the safety of its citizens, the DPR authorities were forced to stop traffic on this road.
At the same time the Ukrainian military attacked a nearby checkpoint of the DPR’s road police, using 82mm mortars, anti-aircraft artillery, large-caliber machine guns, and small arms. DONi reporters witnessed the fight and confirmed the use by the Ukrainian military of snipers in the attack. The fight lasted several hours.
Judging by the direction of the attack, Kiev was attempting to prod and test the DPR defenses at the strategic section of the front line. A breakthrough there might cut off the capital of the DPR northern region, leaving the latter without support, thereby leaving it easy to occupy. This attack, therefore, may serve as another indicator of Ukraine’s preparations for an offensive.
The Ukrainian military also continues to intensively shell the DPR territory along the contact line. Over the past two days the DPR Defense Ministry reported 416 incidents of shelling from the Ukrainian military positions, in which 82mm and 120mm mortars, infantry fighting vehicles and anti-tank guided missiles were used. According to the Ministry, one soldier of the DPR Armed Forces was wounded. The Ministry, however, did not specify either civilian casualties or the extent of the damage.
The DPR Army was forced to return fire. Over the past two days, the Ukrainian military press service reported 54 incidents of shelling from the DPR positions from 82mm mortars, grenade launchers, large-caliber machine guns and small arms, as well as six rounds from a tank. It should be noted that the Ukrainian military press service, for the first time this year, mentioned the return fire from its own forces in its report, perhaps because the intensity of Kiev’s shelling has reached a level that can no longer be concealed from international observers.
(Credibility - DONi closely follows the reports of the governments of the DPR and their Ukrainian counterparts and secures independent confirmation when possible. In our experience, the DPR’s claims are correct approximately 95% of the time, whereas official Ukrainian reports are almost never correct, and for all appearances, deliberately so.)
According to the Ukrainian military press service, over the past two days three Ukrainian soldiers were wounded in shelling by the DPR Army. However, volunteers in Kharkov repeatedly inform in social networks of dozens of wounded delivered from the conflict zone, which can only be explained as a sharp increase in non-combat losses in the Ukrainian army. According to the DPR Defense Ministry, the level of these losses has increased by 60% in comparison to the end of 2015. The LPR Defense Ministry specifies that Kiev loses on a daily basis more than 300 soldiers as a result of alcohol abuse, improper handling of weapons and clashes with nationalist battalions.
In particular, the DPR intelligence reported a clash in the Kiev-controlled southern part of the Donetsk region between Ukrainian Marines and mercenaries mostly from Georgia and Poland, which resulted in one Ukrainian soldier wounded. The clash stemmed from the mercenaries expressing displeasure at delays in receiving payment, upon which the Marines were called in to restore order. According to the DPR intelligence sources on the ground, the Marines have been placed on high alert since. It cannot be excluded that they may be used to disarm the mercenaries who have gotten out of control.
In the northern part of the Donetsk region, also controlled by Kiev, a few days ago a Ukrainian military vehicle hit a land mine, resulting in two Ukrainian soldiers being wounded. DPR intelligence sources on the ground believe that the mine had been recently placed by nationalists in order to cause the closure of a nearby checkpoint and further isolate the DPR. The OSCE observers also reported that on the Kiev-controlled territory of the Lugansk region, three Ukrainian soldiers were killed and two wounded in the explosion of a mine planted by the Ukrainian military a year ago.
Heavy drinking remains the main reason for non-combat losses in the Ukrainian army. According to DPR intelligence, over the past days, one intoxicated soldier was killed by his comrades while improperly handling weapons, three Marines were killed while playing with a grenade, and another two soldiers were run over by an armored personnel carrier. In the Kiev-controlled part of the Lugansk region, local residents reported that during the transportation of military equipment, a drunk tank driver crashed into a transmission tower, which left 20 residential houses without energy.
Kiev’s delivering of weapons and equipment to the contact line never stops, with the amount and caliber increasing. According to the DPR Defense Ministry, over the past two days the Ukrainian army received 22 self-propelled artillery systems, 50 tanks, two D-30 howitzers, 18 infantry fighting vehicles, 13 armored personnel carriers, seven “Grad” MLRS, and two Hummers (see below pictures of the weapons mentioned). Such amassing of offensive weapons cannot be explained by either rotation or exercises because, regarding the former, there is no available information of equipment withdrawal, and regarding the latter, the latest Minsk negotiations stipulated a ban on any military exercises within the 30km zone around the contact line.
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