"A medical official collecting information from both rebel and government-controlled areas said that at least 341 people, including 71 women and 6 children, had died in the Donetsk region in January," HRW said. "A significant number of the January casualties were civilians."
Other recent incidents that resulted in civilian deaths include attacks on a checkpoint near the town of Volnovakha, the city of Donetsk, the village of Hranitne and the village of Oleksandrivka.
Violence in eastern Ukraine escalated in the beginning of 2015. On January 31, the latest Contact Group meeting on Ukrainian reconciliation was held in the Belarusian capital of Minsk but yielded no results. The warring sides agreed to a ceasefire in September 2014, but numerous violations have been reported since then.
