The United Nations in Ukraine is alarmed over the deteriorating humanitarian situation in the eastern part of the country, where heavy fighting has intensified in recent days, and is calling for an immediate cessation of hostilities to allow aid to reach civilians.
The United Nations refugee agency said it has “reacted swiftly” to help people forced to flee their homes when the south-eastern Ukrainian town of Mariupol came under rocket fire over the weekend, providing plastic sheeting for shelter construction.
The continued shelling of Ukraine's urban centres serves as a shocking reminder of the price being paid by the country's children and families, a UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) official said today as she warned that the intensifying violence in the Eastern European country was increasingly putting children's lives in danger.
Briefing the Security Council on recent developments in Ukraine, Jeffrey Feltman, the United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, called today for revival of the Minsk Accords and an immediate end to hostilities.
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has strongly condemned today's rocket attack in the eastern Ukrainian city of Mariupol which reportedly killed dozens of civilians and left another one hundred injured.
More than 5,000 people have now been killed since the beginning of the conflict in Ukraine in mid-April last year, the United Nations human rights office said today as it expressed fear that the real figure may be 'considerably higher.'
The United Nations Security Council has condemned 'in the strongest terms' today's shelling which resulted in the deaths of more than 10 civilians in eastern Ukraine amid intensifying clashes between Government and opposition forces.
After weeks of relative calm, the United Nations political chief said the Security Council was meeting today amid the ‘worst hostilities’ in eastern Ukraine since the Minsk Protocol was agreed on 5 September, with the urgently needed sustainable ceasefire presently existing in name only.
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has today said he is alarmed by the severe escalation of fighting for control of Donetsk airport in eastern Ukraine and implored all sides to make good on their commitments under the Minsk Protocol and Memorandum, with the first step being an immediate and full cessation of hostilities.
