Daily Ukraine Crisis Updates – August 21, 2014
News | August 21, 2014
- Parts of eastern Ukraine were wracked by fierce fighting as government troops sought to snatch back territory from separatist rebels, while a Russian aid convoy to the hard-hit city of Luhansk began to make tentative steps toward its destination.
- Pro-Russian separatists struck two helicopters as well as a jet with portable air defense systems in the Luhansk region of Ukraine.
- Most part of the town of Ilovaisk in the Donetsk oblast was under the control of Ukrainian troops.
- (ITAR-TASS) Russian Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov denied rumors and speculation about Russian plans to intrude into southeast Ukraine under the pretext of delivering relief aid.
- (RIA Novosti) Four French volunteers joined fighters from the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic this week.
- An NSDC spokesman said that the peace plan of Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko for de-escalating situation in eastern part of the country remains in effect and could start to work even before negotiations in Minsk take place.
- The initiators of the establishment of an international battalion for participation in the military actions on the east of Ukraine addressed Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko asking that he assist in the settlement of this issue.
- (Interfax Ukraine) Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko could make a decision to disband the Verkhovna Rada on August 24, Independence Day.
- (Interfax Ukraine) About 70 trucks of the Russian humanitarian convoy were waiting for a permission to cross into Ukraine near the Donetsk border checkpoint in the Rostov region, but the ICRC was not yet decided on how to deliver the cargo.
- (Interfax Ukraine) An NSDC spokesman said that Ukrainian forces seized two BMD-2 airborne fighting vehicles of the Russian Pskov Airborne Division in a battle near Luhansk.