MINSK, Sept. 20 (Xinhua) -- The OSCE's special representative in the Trilateral Contact Group on Ukraine Martin Sajdik said on Wednesday that thanks to the school truce, the number of ceasefire violations in Donbas in east Ukraine has declined.
Following the Contact Group meeting in Minsk, Sajdik told reporters that the average number of ceasefire violations remains lower than the figure registered before August 25 when the school truce began.
Donbas is located in the eastern part of Ukraine and witnessed a war since 2014 between the government troops and the separatist forces.
Sajdik said that in 2016, 442 civilians suffered from Ukraine's conflict zone, including 88 killed and 354 injured. As of September 17 this year, the number of civilian victims was 383 people, including 68 killed and 315 injured. It is absolutely unacceptable, he said.
The next meeting of the Contact Group on Ukraine will be held in Minsk on October 4.
The trilateral contact group is a group of representatives from Ukraine, Russia and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) that was formed as means to facilitate a diplomatic resolution to the war in the Donbas region.
