News and press releases

The remains of some of the victims of the Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 crash were flown from Kharkiv to the Netherlands. There were a number of protests against military mobilisation in the west of the country.

VIENNA, 25 July 2014 – OSCE Representative of Freedom of the Media Dunja Mijatović today demanded the immediate release of journalists who were reported missing in eastern Ukraine...

The SMM facilitated access of Malaysian experts to the crash site of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 and attended a mourning ceremony at Kharkiv’s international airport. Fighting in parts of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions continued...

OSCE Secretary General Lamberto Zannier visited Kyiv from 21 to 23 July 2014. He met with the head of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) to Ukraine Ambassador Ertugrul Apakan and his staff to discuss their work in light of recent developments in the east of Ukraine. Zannier, on behalf of the Organization and its participating States, thanked the SMM staff for their hard work and courage displayed in increasingly difficult circumstances...

The remains of many of the Malaysia Airlines MH17 Flight victims arrived in Kharkiv, from where they will be transported to the Netherlands. The Ukrainian army re-took two towns in the north of the Luhansk region. The SMM discovered bodies in a building vacated by irregular armed forces in one of the towns, namely, Severodonetsk.

VIENNA, 23 July 2014 – OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media Dunja Mijatović today condemned the abduction of freelance journalist Anton Skiba in Donetsk and called for his immediate release...

Dutch forensics experts – accompanying the SMM – assessed the storage facilities for bodies on board the train in Torez railway station for victims of the Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 crash as “good”. People continue to leave Luhansk city...