No ceasefire violations were recorded along the contact line in Donbas on Dec 31, 2017, according to the press service of the Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO) Headquarter.
Former Ukrainian President and Ukrainian representative to the Trilateral Contact Group on Donbas in Minsk Leonid Kuchma says Russia actually wants to create a new border along the contact line in Donbas, according to Ukrayinska Pravda.
Following confirmed reports on the approval of U.S. lethal aid to Ukraine, the Russian Federation has once again changed its stance on the issue of introducing a UN mission into Donbas, steering back to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s initial argument that peacekeepers should only be deployed along the line of contact.
At the "Stanytsia Luhanska checkpoint crossing, pro-Russian militants abducted a 22-year-old Mykola Petukhov, who had been making a living off of carrying heavy bags for those moving across the line from government-controlled area to the occupied territory, as reported by Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group (KHPG).