Two civilians injured, Ukrainian soldier killed in Donbas last week amid escalating tensions with Moscow

Between November 28 and December 4, the Joint Forces Operation reported 29 ceasefire violations of the part of Russian-backed forces in eastern Ukraine. As a result, four Ukrainian soldiers were injured, and one killed. Additionally, two Ukrainian civilians in Luhansk and Donetsk were injured.

On November 29, Russian-backed forces shelled the Luhanskaya Station, and a civilian monitor of the railway track was wounded, receiving an open-head injury and a concussion. Two days later, occupation forces carried out remote mining in the territory of the Mariyinka settlement, and the explosion of one of the mines injured a civilian.

Last week, Ukraine Crisis Media Center published a tribute to the six Ukrainian soldiers killed in the war in eastern Ukraine during the month of November: Serhii Yelysieiev, Vitalii Pavlysko, Vadym Fedosieiev, Ruslan Prusov, Ubert Mrachkovskyi, and Ali Alkhasli.

Concerns about the buildup of Russian troops on the Ukrainian border for the second time this year continue to escalate, with Ukrainian, Russian, and Western leaders all issuing strong warnings. NATO’s Ministers of Foreign Affairs met in Riga on November 30 and December 1, during which NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that if Russia invades Ukraine, “there will be a high price to pay,” including sanctions. US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken warned that “when it comes to Ukraine, we’ve made clear that we will respond resolutely, including with a range of high impact economic measures that we have refrained from pursuing in the past.”

On December 2, Blinken met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Stockholm during the OSCE Ministerial Council, warning in person of the “severe costs” Russia would pay if it invaded Ukraine. Putin, on the other hand, insisted on “concrete agreements that would rule out further eastward expansion of NATO and the deployment of weapons systems posing a threat to us in close proximity to Russia’s territory.”

On December 3, AP reported that US intelligence officials are estimating Moscow is planning to deploy around 175,000 troops as soon as early 2022, with almost half already deployed along various points of Ukraine’s border. The Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s Main Intelligence Directorate announced last week that “another group of Russian military personnel arrived in the temporarily occupied territory in Donetsk and Luhansk regions last week to strengthen reconnaissance, sabotage, and sapper units.”