REUTERS
The Ukrainian military on Tuesday launched a counteroffensive operation near Mariupol aimed at forcing away Russian-backed militants who have been advancing on the city, according to officials in Kyiv.
"Now our military are returning to the positions on the demarcation line that were fixed by the Minsk agreements," the spokesman of the government’s Anti-Terrorist Operation press center, Andriy Lysenko, said at a briefing in the Ukainian capital.
He said the counter-offensive operation is carried out by the Azov volunteer battalion. He said the operation would prevent any further shelling of Mariupol by the Russian-backed militants.
Around 30 civilians were killed and over 100 wounded when Mariupol was attacked with rockets on January 24.
The OSCE said the rockets had been fired from militant-held areas to the north-east and east of the city.