OSCE SMM Principal Deputy Chief Monitor Alexander Hug 85 has said that 85 people have been killed and 384 injured in Donbas since the beginning of 2017.
"This year so far, the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission has confirmed the death of 85 people and the injury of 384," Hug said at a briefing in Kyiv on December 22.
At the same time, he said that between 16.00 on December 18 and 16.00 on December 19 his week, the OSCE SMM recorded over 7,000 ceasefire violations.
"We are in fact currently witnessing such a pattern - a downward spiral of violence that last week resulted in over 16,000 ceasefire violations recorded by the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission, a 40% increase on the previous week," he said.
According to Hug, observers have recorded almost 400,000 ceasefire violations since the beginning of 2017.
