Eastern Ukraine was the scene this Friday of new bombings of which the Ukrainian army and pro-Russian separatists accuse each other, which increases tension in the region and, in the eyes of the West, the risks of an invasion Russian.
The sound of bombs could be heard from Stanytsia Luganska, a Ukrainian town controlled by government forces near the front line, according to an AFP journalist.
The Ukrainian authorities, who on Thursday reported the bombing of a daycare center in the region without causing any casualties, pointed to 20 violations of the ceasefire by pro-Russian separatists. These, in turn, reported 27 shots fired by the Ukrainian army in the last few hours.
This surge in fighting in the conflict-ridden region since 2014 comes amid escalating tensions between Russia and Western countries, which accuse Moscow of having deployed tens of thousands of troops to the Ukrainian border with a view to invading it.
Russia denies these plans and since Tuesday announced a series of withdrawals of its troops on the border, which according to Kiev, now reach 149,000 troops.
These announcements of a partial withdrawal, with images of tanks loaded onto trains, do not convince Western countries.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Friday that he continues to see “more troops moving” toward the Ukrainian border.
Although Russia has announced that it was withdrawing its troops to the barracks, we have not seen it yet. In fact we see more troops moving in this “border region,” Austin said, after an interview with his Polish counterpart Mariusz Blaszczak.
regular training
With the eyes of the entire world focused on what Vladimir Putin will do, Russia announced that on Saturday it would carry out maneuvers of its “strategic forces”, including firing ballistic and cruise missiles.
According to the Russian Defense Ministry, the exercises are intended to “test the level of readiness” of the forces involved and the “reliability of strategic nuclear and non-nuclear weapons.”
The Kremlin spokesman, Dmitri Peskov, guaranteed that it is “regular training” that has been “notified to various countries by various means.”
Putin, who will supervise the maneuvers, will receive his Belarusian ally Alexander Lukashenko this Friday, with whom he is carrying out joint military exercises.
In this extremely tense context, US President Joe Biden and several Western leaders will hold a videoconference meeting this Friday to discuss the crisis.
The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, the secretary general of NATO, Jens Stoltenberg, and leaders of Germany, Poland, Italy, Romania, the United Kingdom and France will participate in the meeting, according to European sources.
And next Thursday, the leaders of the G7 countries will also meet by videoconference to address the issue.
pretext for an invasion
Ceasefire violations in eight-year-old conflict-torn eastern Ukraine are raising Western fears of an alleged “pretext” for a Russian invasion.
Since 2014, more than 14,000 people have been killed in this conflict and more than 1.5 million have been forced to flee their homes.
The peace agreements signed in 2015 in Minsk made it possible to establish a ceasefire and considerably reduce the clashes.
But with this new military escalation, it is feared that Ukraine will react violently and this will be used by Russia to invade its territory.
For the Kremlin “what is happening in (the region of) Donbas is very worrying and potentially very dangerous,” said the spokesman for the Russian presidency, Dmitri Peskov.
Ukraine, for its part, insisted that it ruled out an offensive in these separatist territories.
“We strengthen our defense. But we do not intend to carry out any offensive,” Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov told parliament.
“Our mission is not to do any of the things that the Russians are trying to get us to do,” he said. “We have to stop them but keep our blood cool.”