En delegasjon fra Organisasjonen for sikkerhet og samarbeid i Europa (OSSE, engelsk: OSCE) bekrefter i en pressemelding at dens ubevæpnede observatører er blitt beskutt mens den utførte sitt oppdrag i Øst-Ukraina. Delegasjonen kom under ild da den bafant seg sammen med folk fra den sjøloppnevnte «Folkerepublikken Luhansk». Ildgivningen kom fra ukrainsk side.
OSSE skriver i pressemeldinga:
At approximately 12:40hrs on 26 July, an SMM patrol comprised of two vehicles was caught in mortar and automatic grenade launcher fire while trying to cross the contact line from the “Lugansk People’s Republic” (“LPR”)-controlled side of Shchastia (20km north of Luhansk) to the government-controlled side. This crossing had been agreed and co-ordinated beforehand with both the Ukrainian Armed Forces and the “LPR”.
The SMM had arrived at 12:00hrs at the last “LPR” checkpoint (2km south of the line of contact) before the Shchastia bridge and had been told by the “LPR” to park their vehicles in cover; according to the “LPR”, “LPR” members who had been removing mine obstacles to allow the SMM through had come under machine-gun and sniper fire at 11:30hrs. At approximately 12:40hrs, the checkpoint and surrounding area came under sustained mortar (assessed to be 82mm) and automatic grenade launcher fire from the north.
I en Twittermelding skriver OSSE:
«The Special Monitoring Mission confirms that mortar fire struck near two cars belonging to the OSCE today on the south side of the bridge leading to Lugansk. The Special Monitoring Mission condemns the incident.»
Delegasjonen ble ledet av Toni Frisch, som er koordinator for humanitære saker i OSCE. Under episoden prøvde delegasjonen forgjeves å ringe noen for å få stoppet beskytninga.
