Ukraine fighting falls to lowest lever since conflict started: Minister

PanARMENIAN.Net - Fighting in eastern Ukraine has fallen to its lowest level since the conflict started, Ukrainian Defence Minister Stepan Poltorak has said, according to BBC News.

Poltorak said Ukrainian forces were coming under attack just two to four times a day - the lowest rate in the past year and a half.

The reduction in violence comes a week after the latest ceasefire agreement came into force on 1 September. Last week's truce aimed to reinforce an agreement struck in Minsk in February.

However, the UN said that civilian casualties more than doubled in the three months to mid-August, largely due to shelling by heavy weapons.

The UN's human rights agency said there were at least 105 deaths and 308 injuries among civilians from mid-May to mid-August, compared with 60 deaths and 102 injuries from mid-February to mid-May.

Almost 8,000 people had been killed and nearly 18,000 injured since the conflict began in April 2014, the UN added, although it warned the true number could be much higher.

In a separate development on Tuesday, September 8, Ukraine's government accepted the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC) over any war crimes that may have been committed on its territory since February 2014.

Violence erupted last week in the Ukrainian capital Kiev over the granting of greater powers to the rebel-held regions - a key part of the Minsk agreement. Three members of Ukraine's national guard were killed when nationalists protested against the deal.

Fighting escalated over the summer between the rebels and Ukrainian army forces, but the two sides agreed in late August to halt the violence on 1 September, the day children in the region return to school.

Pro-Russian rebels seized large swathes of Donetsk and Luhansk in mid-April 2014.