East Ukraine situation worsening: UN

By Maxime Zech on August 6, 2014 - 08:04
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The UN's director of Humanitarian Operations, John Ging, said that the situation in eastern Ukraine is worrying, and will certainly deteriorate. In an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council Tuesday, Ging called on action to prevent more victims, the NOS reports. 

According to the director, the situation is poignant because many places have lost electricity and a steady water supply. He says that medical staff have fled because of the hostilities between the pro-Russian separatists and the Ukrainian government. He warned that violence, especially in urban areas, will lead to "an increase in the numbers killed" if a political solution is not found soon, the Daily Mail writes.

So far, Ging says, 1367 people have been killed in the fighting. At least 285,000 people have managed to flee, and are being joined by 100 more people every day.

In Donetsk, in the east of the country, the rebel stronghold's defenses are under threat from the Ukrainian army. Russia, who called the meeting at the Security Council, claims that Ukraine is foregoing its citizens' safety by marching on Donetsk. According to the Daily Mail, the clashing groups exchanged rocket fire on Tuesday.

Great Britain's UN Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant called it "deeply ironic that Russia would call for an emergency meeting of the council to discuss a humanitarian crisis largely of its own creation."

The UN's Ukrainian representative, Oleksandr Pavlichenko, refuses the term 'humanitarian crisis', as he believes that the government still has control in the governance of the country.

The violence is also still affecting investigations into the Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 crash. After days of being unable to reach the site due to rebel blockades, it is now shelling and gunfire that prevent the team from uninterrupted work. According to the International Business Times, the Organization for the Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) tweeted Monday that experts and monitors were "remaining stationary pending further security assessments". The team of Dutch and Australian, among other, experts had to wait for the all-clear to resume the search for victims' remains and possessions still in the field where the plane crashed.

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