DONETSK (Rostov Region), August 17 (RIA Novosti) — The first 16 trucks of Russia’s humanitarian aid convoy have arrived at the customs checkpoint at the Ukrainian border, and about the same number is expected to come later in the day, a representative of the contractor transport company told RIA Novosti Sunday.
"We expect about the same number of cars to arrive here today," the company's representative Sergei Sorokin told RIA Novosti.
The trucks parked in a line on the territory of an automobile company on the border. They will not cross the border or undergo customs checks on Sunday, he said.
The rest of the 280-truck convoy remains at the town of Kamensk-Shakhtinsky in the Rostov Region.
The representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) are inspecting the Russian trucks still parked at the site, where they have remained for several days awaiting the permission of the Ukrainian authorities to cross the border.
In early August, in the light of a worsening humanitarian situation in the Ukrainian east, Russia came up with a proposal at the UN Security Council to send an international humanitarian mission with Russian humanitarian aid under the auspices of the ICRC to the troubled regions.
On August 12, the convoy carrying about 2,000 tons of humanitarian aid, with 400 tons of grain, 100 tons of sugar, 62 tons of baby food, 54 tons of medication, 12,000 sleeping bags and 69 mobile electrical generators set off from the Moscow region heading towards conflict areas in crisis-torn Ukraine.
