Latest from the Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) in Ukraine based on information received until 4 July 2014, 18:00 (Kyiv time)

This update is provided for the media and the public.

The military campaign of the Ukrainian army in the east of the country continued. The situation was stable elsewhere across the country.

In Kharkiv, the situation remained calm.

The military campaign of the Ukrainian army in the east of the country continued. There were clashes in parts of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions. Media reported several human casualties. The UN stated that there were numerous reports of death of people due to the intensified security operations in Donetsk and Luhansk, including about a killing of a five-year-old girl.

In Donetsk, the SMM monitored the situation at the railway station. The SMM noticed at the parking lot a small bus with the inscription “VOSTOK” and four men in camouflage with assault rifles. The atmosphere was calm.

The SMM observed the building of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and noticed barricades around it and the entrance doors blocked with sandbags. The road to the main entrance to the SBU building was barricaded by concrete blocks.

The SMM met with the ’prosecutor general’ of the 'Donetsk People’s Republic’ (DPR) who said that fighters answering to Igor Bezler (commander Bes) attacked the Regional Headquarters in Donetsk on 1 July. The interlocutor also said that the shooting of four policemen in Donetsk on 3 July, in a separate incident involving two unknown assailants, was unacceptable and would be investigated.

The situation in Dnipropetrovsk, Kherson, Odessa, Chernivtsi, Ivano-Frankivsk and Lviv was calm.

In Dnipropetrovsk, the SMM met with the head of the Muslim community, who estimated that there were around 70,000 Muslims from different ethnicities in the city, with 48,000 Azeris constituting the biggest group. The interlocutor said he hoped a mosque – currently being used as a sports gym – would be restored to the Muslim community.

In Kherson, the SMM observed some 300 people participating in a rally supporting Ukraine’s unity. The SMM noticed activists of ‘Auto-Maidan’, ‘self-defence’ and the ‘Right Sector’. Seventeen cars displaying Ukrainian, and European Union flags followed the marching demonstrators. Apart from a handful of uniformed ‘self-defence’ activists, the demonstrators were in civilian clothes. The SMM noted about 35 traffic police officers, armed with batons. The rally was conducted peacefully and dispersed after about two and a half hours.

The SMM monitored the Administrative Boundary Line (ABL) at the gateway to the Crimean Peninsula. At the Stavki/Kalanchak checkpoint, one of three road checkpoints on the ABL, the SMM observed some 30 trucks and 30 passenger vehicles and vans awaiting clearance procedures to enter the Crimea. The infrastructure at the checkpoint and inspection area was limited.

In Lviv, the SMM met with representative of the Regional Department for Social Protection (RDSP) in order to obtain data about the IDPs in the region. According to RDSP’s data, on 4 July, the total number of registered IDPs was 3,053, out of which 1,947 are from Crimea and 1,106 from eastern parts of Ukraine (i.e. Donetsk and Luhansk). In the course of this week, 123 IDPs arrived to Lviv, out of which 97 came from the eastern parts of Ukraine. Most of these IDPs came as families (male members included). According to the interlocutor, most of the IDPs registered by the RDSP came with personal documents and arrived to Lviv by train.

The situation in Kyiv was calm.