MOSCOW, June 19 (RIA Novosti) – The OSCE has reestablished contact with its monitors who went missing in eastern Ukraine at the end of May, according to Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine spokesman Michael Bociurkiw.
"We’ve managed to reestablish contact with both Donetsk-based and Luhansk-based teams," the OSCE spokesperson told RIA Novosti by phone from Kiev. “They are fine, they are unharmed,” he added.
Bociurkiw said the monitors are “in the east of Ukraine” but did not clarify their exact location for security reasons. “We don’t know who really the captors are,” he added, underlining that the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission is continuing its work in Ukraine “on a diplomatic level.”
At the end of May the OSCE lost contact with a four-member international team in Donetsk region as well as four European monitors and a local translator who went missing in neighboring Luhansk Region.
Violence in eastern Ukraine has been on the rise since the beginning of a punitive operation launched by Kiev authorities in mid-April and has claimed dozens of civilian lives. Moscow has repeatedly stated that Kiev must stop its military operation in eastern Ukraine and start direct dialogue with independence supporters.
