Shelling killed six people and wounded 15 others in rebel-held Donetsk, the city council reported today, the worst violation yet of the cease-fire between Russian-backed rebels and Ukrainian troops that took effect September 5.
Two northern neighborhoods were heavily shelled yesterday, leading to the casualties and damaging both residential and administrative buildings, the council said.
Fighting centered on Donetsk's government-held airport has left many northern neighborhoods in the crossfire. Over the weekend, Ukraine said its troops repelled an attack of 200 rebel fighters, but suffered no military casualties.
Observers from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe say they were 200 meters away from four shells bursting yesterday in Donetsk. The team saw one woman lying on the ground, and said a rebel fighter on the scene told them four people had been killed that day. The government has not confirmed the number of casualties.
The fighting began a month after Russia annexed the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea in March. It has claimed at least 3,000 civilian lives and forced hundreds of thousands to flee, according to the UN.
