News and press releases

The seventh OSCE Dialogue Academy for Young Women concluded on 16 October 2021 in Mavrovo, North Macedonia. Eighteen participants from Prishtinë/Priština and Belgrade attended the Academy...

SKOPJE, 18 October 2021 – Candidates could campaign freely and fundamental freedoms were widely respected in North Macedonia’s local elections, but numerous gaps in the law and legislative changes close to election day undermined legal stability and the largest parliamentary parties enjoy systemic advantages in the distribution of public resources for campaigning, international observers from the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) said in a statement today...

The OSCE’s Strategic Police Matters Unit, in co-operation with six OSCE field operations in South-Eastern Europe and the Shortest Path Training Company from the United Kingdom, held on 4 to 6 October 2021 the advanced round of a series of online training courses focused on utilizing IBM’s i2 software packages Analyst’s Notebook and iBase for criminal intelligence analysis.

On 17 October, an SMM patrol consisting of three vehicles and nine people arrived at a checkpoint of the armed formations on road H-15 near the Kargil plant in Kreminets (non-government-controlled, 16km south-west of Donetsk) at 12:01, intending to travel to non-government-controlled areas. Another SMM patrol, consisting of two vehicles and six people, intending to cross to government-controlled areas, arrived at the same checkpoint ten minutes later. At the checkpoint, two members of the armed formations denied both patrols passage, referring to instructions of their superiors “not to let the SMM pass through the checkpoint in either direction”.

On 17 October, at 16:03, the SMM observed that the vehicle gates of its Forward Patrol Base (FPB) in Horlivka (non-government-controlled, 39km north-east of Donetsk) was being locked with a chain and a padlock, and that a vehicle with blue “DPR” plates was parked south of its gates, blocking the exit. It also saw two members of the armed formations standing next to the vehicle.

Summary In Donetsk region, the SMM recorded 236 ceasefire violations, including 72 explosions. In the previous reporting period, it recorded 32 ceasefire violations in the region. In Luhansk region, the Mission recorded 273 ceasefire violations, including 214 explosions. In the previous reporting

The OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine (SMM) is closely following the recent developments related to the incident in the disengagement area near Zolote on 13 October. On that day, the SMM patrols were present on both sides of the contact line near the disengagement area where they were monitoring adherence to a localized ceasefire to enable vegetation clearance along the road that traverses the area. All relevant observations concerning this activity were duly reflected in SMM Daily Report of 14 October 2021.