News and press releases

The SMM recorded more ceasefire violations in Donetsk and Luhansk regions compared with the previous reporting period. The Mission followed up on reports that vehicles carrying Voda Donbassa employees had been damaged by gunfire near the Donetsk Filtration Station on 12 and 13 March. The SMM continued monitoring the disengagement areas near Stanytsia Luhanska, Zolote and Petrivske and spotted previously seen military hardware and mines inside the Petrivske disengagement area. Its access remained restricted in all three areas and elsewhere, including near Sosnivske, Kreminets and at a border crossing point near Izvaryne in Luhansk region, near the border with the Russian Federation.* The SMM continued to facilitate and monitor repairs to the Petrivske water pumping station in Artema and a water pipeline near Horlivka. It monitored a religious procession of 15,000 to 20,000 people in Lviv. At the administrative boundary line between Kherson region and Crimea, the SMM noted a calm situation.

The OSCE Project Co-ordinator in Ukraine jointly with the project Support to Anti-Corruption Champion Institutions (SACCI) funded by USAID, conducted dialogue focus groups on anti-corruption reform in 10 regions across Ukraine in 2017. The results of these dialogues were assembled in publication of survey on perceptions of the success of the anti-corruption reform presented at an event held on 13 March 2018 in Kyiv.

VIENNA, 14 March 2018 – Concluding Slovakia’s Chairmanship of the OSCE Forum for Security Co-operation (FSC) in Vienna today, the country’s Permanent Representative to the OSCE and Chairperson of the Forum Ambassador Radomír Boháč said Slovakia strived to be an impartial facilitator of the discussions amid growing polarization and diverging views among participating States...

Four student teams from Universities of Sarajevo, Banja Luka, and the Sarajevo School of Science and Technology were on stage on 13 March 2018 in Sarajevo to perform the winning plays of the OSCE Mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH)’s drama contest on countering violent extremism...

A one-day roundtable discussion on how to support women’s increased participation in decision making in Tajikistan and how men can play a role in that concluded in Dushanbe on 6 March 2018. The event was organized on the eve of International Women’s Day.

NEW YORK, 13 March 2018 – The robust collection of data documenting violence against women and girls and the adoption of policies using the findings can help countries successfully tackle this global scourge, said speakers during a side event held today at the United Nations Headquarters in New York.

The SMM recorded more ceasefire violations in Donetsk region and fewer in Luhansk region compared with the previous 24 hours. The Mission continued monitoring the disengagement areas near Stanytsia Luhanska, Zolote and Petrivske and observed a ceasefire violation near the Stanytsia Luhanska disengagement area. Its access remained restricted in all three areas and elsewhere, including again in Kozatske, at the Chervona Mohyla railway station and a border crossing point near Voznesenivka in Luhansk region – near the border with the Russian Federation – and to a compound in Kremenivka. The SMM observed weapons in violation near Lobacheve. The Mission observed anti-tank mines in Verkhnotoretske and Betmanove. The SMM continued to facilitate and monitor repairs to the Petrivske water pumping station in Artema. In Kyiv, the Mission followed up on reports of a fire at a chapel of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church...