03 June 2016•Update: 08 June 2016
KIEV, Ukraine
More than 9,300 people have been killed in eastern Ukraine between mid-April 2014 and May 15, 2016, according to the latest UN report on the human rights situation in Ukraine.
The conflict killed 9,371 people, while injuring 21,532 others among Ukrainian armed forces, civilians and armed group members, said Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights Ivan Simonovic as he presented the findings in Kiev on Friday.
Simonovic said that the situation in the east of Ukraine remained volatile and continued to have a severe impact on the human rights of civilians living in conflict-affected areas controlled by armed groups.
The UN official said that the human rights of an estimated 2.7 million people residing in armed group-controlled areas in self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk republics had been undermined, creating “serious concerns about the ability to hold free and fair elections in these regions unless the situation improves.”
Simonovic also said that 14 civilians were killed in the conflict over the past three months, while 99 others were injured.
Tensions have escalated since Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula in March 2014 and a pro-Russian separatist conflict began in eastern Ukraine.
The UN General Assembly overwhelmingly adopted a resolution the same year to proclaim the annexation illegal.
