Checkered ceasefire violations

(B2) To gauge the intensity of the conflict in Eastern Ukraine, we can have several 'objective' indicators: the number of ceasefire violations, counted by OSCE observers, the capacity of these observers to deploy means and the criterion of human losses

A relative increase in ceasefire violations

Reports from the OSCE Monitoring Mission (SMM) have rather coldly noted an increase in tension in recent days.

In the Donetsk region, between April 9 and 11, 367 ceasefire violations were recorded, compared to 20 violations in the previous period. Ditto in the Luhansk region, 224 ceasefire violations compared to six ceasefire violations. Only the southeastern region of Kherson remains rather calm.

April 14 is pretty quiet

On April 16, it starts again. In the Donetsk region, the SMM recorded 1591 ceasefire violations. But of that number, 1528 were assessed as a probable live-fire exercise. Compare to 118 violations in the previous period. And in the Luhansk region, the Mission recorded 51 ceasefire violations. During the previous period, it recorded 13 ceasefire violations in the region.

Between the evenings of April 16 and 18, we fell back to an average level. In the Donetsk region, the mission recorded 267 ceasefire violations (199 violations in the previous period). In the Luhansk region, 65 ceasefire violations were reported (compared to 0 in the previous period).

[Comment] This increase is not surprising when we observe the Ukrainian conflict over several years, with ups and downs. If it may appear brutal, after a period of relative calm which followed the July 2020 agreement, it remains rather moderate if we take a step back. As of April 14, on an average of the last 30 days, we had an average of around 200 ceasefire violations, whereas over the whole of 2020, we had a daily average of nearly 400 violations.

Drone flights interrupted

The freedom of movement of observers remains “ restraint ". Drone flights had to be halted due to jamming caused by GPS interference signals. Classic technique to cut off any effect from drones. It's not the first time. On several occasions already, OSCE drones had been grounded. This was the case in 2014, in the wake of the Russian intervention (read: OSCE drones grounded in eastern Ukraine). But also in the following years in 2015 and 2016 (read: Hard, the life of a drone in eastern Ukraine). In 2018, one of them was shot dead (read: An OSCE drone destroyed in eastern Ukraine. Paris and Berlin point the finger at Russia).

Number of deaths / day

This seems very cold. But in the chancelleries, the intensity of the Ukrainian conflict is measured with a precise indicator of the number of deaths/days. In a period of calm, this figure varies between 0 and 1 or 2. In a more tense period, we go from 4 to 10 deaths. Using this indicator, we can see that, apart from a peak over a few days, the situation is rather calm, compared to other periods. Since the start of the year, Ukrainian forces have lost 28 soldiers, while 68 have been injured. That's a lot in times of peace. This is moderate in times of war. However, the conflict in Ukraine, it must be remembered, is not a frozen conflict. It is an armed conflict, certainly of low intensity, in terms of casualties, but a conflict all the same.

(Nicolas Gros-Verheyde)