News and press releases

KYIV, 1 September 2016 – All sides should heed the ceasefire appeal ahead of the start of the new school year, the Chief Monitor of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine (SMM) Ertugrul Apakan said today...

In Donetsk region, the SMM noted an increase in the number of explosions recorded (approximately 520) compared with the previous reporting period (nearly 400). In Luhansk region, the SMM heard ten explosions and approximately 500 bursts of small-arms fire, an increase compared with the previous day when not a single ceasefire violation was recorded. On the night of 30 August, the SMM was forced to leave its forward patrol base in Shchastia due to the close proximity of shelling. It followed up on reports of civilian casualties and analysed craters in Donetsk city, Dokuchaievsk, Pikuzy (formerly Kominternove), Pervomaisk, Troitske, and Krasnohorivka. The SMM continued to monitor the withdrawal of weapons and observed weapons in violation of the withdrawal lines in government-controlled Vodiane. The Mission faced two restrictions to its freedom of movement, both in areas not controlled by the Government.* It observed a calm situation along the administrative boundary line with Crimea...

People in eastern Ukraine deserve peace and the sides should do their utmost to ease the people’s suffering, said Chief Monitor of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) to Ukraine Ertugrul Apakan while visiting Donetsk and Luhansk regions on 28-30 August 2016...

Between 20:55 and 21:00 on 30 August, whilst at the SMM forward patrol base in government-controlled Shchastia (20km north of Luhansk), an SMM patrol comprising five SMM staff members and a paramedic heard four shots of under-barrel-grenade-launcher (GP-25) fire approximately 1km south of their position...

ERGNETI, 31 August 2016- The 69th meeting under the Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism (IPRM) took place today in Ergneti. The meeting was co-facilitated by Kęstutis Jankauskas, the Head of the European Union Monitoring Mission in Georgia (EUMM), and Ambassador Guenther Baechler, the Special Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office for the South Caucasus...

COPENHAGEN, 31 August 2016 – OSCE PA Vice-President Kent Harstedt (MP, Sweden), who is serving as Special Co-ordinator to lead the OSCE’s short-term observer mission for the 11 September parliamentary elections in Belarus, continued his pre-electoral work this week by meeting with President Alexander Lukashenko, Chairman of the Council of the Republic of the National Assembly of Belarus Mikhail Myasnikovich, and Minister of Foreign Affairs Vladimir Makei...

International human rights standards, the key principles of assembly policing, the planning and decision making model, communication and accountability were the focus of a three-day training event organized by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) in co-operation with the European Union Advisory Mission to Uraine (EUAM) between 29 and 31 August 2016 in Kyiv.