Ukraine in Arabic | German aid trucks cross Ukrainian border
KYIV/Ukraine in Arabic/ Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has thanked German Chancellor Angela Merkel for sending humanitarian assistance to Ukraine.
"He said that 112 trucks of humanitarian aid for those affected in Donbass had already crossed the Ukrainian border and were traveling to Kyiv," the statement says.
Humanitarian trucks from 17 German cities set off for Ukraine on October 4. Germany’s Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development said “the government initiated the dispatch of assistance worth some 10 million euros”. The cargo includes heaters, blankets, construction materials, folding beds, generators and warm clothes.
Russia earlier sent to Ukraine three convoys with humanitarian aid for residents of Donbass (Donetsk and Luhansk regions in southeastern Ukraine seeking independence from Kiev). The last Russian convoy returned on September 21.
Overall, the three convoys brought to embattled southeast Ukraine some 6,000 metric tons of humanitarian cargoes, including food (grain, canned goods), medications, warm clothes and water. A regular convoy from Russia is supposed to deliver to Luhansk foodstuffs and construction materials to rebuild destroyed infrastructure.
Clashes between Kiev-sent troops and local militias in the southeast Ukrainian Donetsk and Lugansk regions during Kiev’s military operation to regain control over the breakaway territories, which call themselves the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s republics (DPR and LPR), have killed hundreds of civilians, brought destruction and forced hundreds of thousands to flee the area.
The parties to the Ukrainian conflict agreed on cessation of fire during OSCE-mediated talks in Minsk on September 5. The long hoped-for ceasefire took effect the same day.