Interfax: Donbas reports renewed shelling in Avdiivka, Debaltseve

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DONETSK. Sept 9 (Interfax) – Residents of the Ukrainian town of Avdiivka claim that the explosion of a shell launched from Ukrainian army positions destroyed a stretch of railway on Tuesday.

“The Ukrainian troops ruined a stretch of railway. There was a commuter train going from our station, from Avdiidka to Krasnoarmeisk. Now there is no service on the stretch. All signs indicate that it looked like a shot from a howitzer,” an eyewitness told Interfax.

Local residents said that the rail station already came under fire from the Ukrainian army positions about a week ago. They said that one of the explosions occurred within a few meters from a railcar. At the time, several passengers sustained fragment injuries, eyewitnesses said.

Also, a spokesperson for the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic reporting a shelling of railcar-repairing workshops in the town of Debaltseve. “As a result of the shelling by the Ukrainian army, an artillery shell hit the building of railcar workshops, resulting in roof damage. A maintenance man, a cleaner and a crane driver sustained fragment injuries,” the DPR spokesperson said.

Ukrainian officials were not immediately available to confirm this information.

Meanwhile, speaking at a briefing in Kyiv earlier on Tuesday Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council spokesman Andriy Lysenko blamed militia for ceasefire violations. “The situation at the Donetsk airport, and in Debaltseve, Severodonetsk, Schastya, Fashchevka and Avdiivka remains particularly serious,” Lysenko said.

For their part, militias in the self-proclaimed Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) claimed that the Ukrainian army continues building up a grouping of its troops northwest of Luhansk. “Two fighters from the 51st Mechanized Brigade surrendered weapons near the village of Stepnoye and went over to militia’s side, they told us how the adversary is pulling its forces towards the town of Schastya, namely: armor and artillery weapons, so as to continue the military operation,” the LPR militia headquarters told Interfax on Tuesday.

 

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