DPR, LPR heads, 280 supporters come under Ukrainian sanctions

Ukraine’s sanctions list approved Wednesday by President Petro Poroshenko comprises the leaders of the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics (DPR and LPR), Alexander Zakharchenko and Igor Plotnitsky.

The list of individuals, posted on the Ukrainian president’s website, also has DPR Defense Ministry spokesman Eduard Basurin, DPR People’s Council Speaker Denis Pushilin, DPR People’s Council deputy Andrey Purgin.

Besides, the list also includes another 280 plus people – residents of the self-proclaimed republics, activists of Donbass, supporters of the DPR and LPR from over 10 countries (Russia, Ukraine, Serbia, Italy and others).

The persons under sanctions, the document says, are banned from entry to Ukraine and their assets there are blocked.
Ukrainian troops have been engaged in fierce fighting with local militias during Kiev’s punitive operation, underway since mid-April 2014, against the breakaway territories – the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics constituting parts of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions of Ukraine.
Massive shelling of residential neighborhoods, including with the use of aviation, has killed thousands and led to a humanitarian disaster in Donbass.
Kiev has regularly violated the ceasefire regime imposed as part of the Package of Measures on implementation of the September 2014 Minsk Agreements.

The Package (Minsk-2) was signed on February 12, 2015 in the Belarusian capital Minsk by participants of the Contact Group on settlement in Donbass.

The Package, earlier agreed with the leaders of the Normandy Four envisioned an overwhelming cessation of fire and withdrawal of heavy armaments to create a security area in the region at least 50 kilometers wide.