Ukraine Day 1141: LIVE UPDATES BELOW.
Yesterday’s live coverage of the Ukraine conflict can be found here.
- READ OUR SPECIAL REPORT:
An Invasion By Any Other Name: The Kremlin’s Dirty War in Ukraine
Is Russia Getting Ready to Invade Ukraine Again?
The Atlantic Council promotes constructive leadership and engagement in international affairs based on the central role of the Atlantic Community in meeting global challenges. Founded in 1961, the Council provides an essential forum for navigating the dramatic shifts in economic and political influence that are shaping the twenty-first century by educating and galvanizing its uniquely influential, nonpartisan network of international political, business, and intellectual leaders.
Still, the spokesperson for the Ukrainian military’s Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO), Yaroslav Chepurnoy, suggested today that there are promising signs that the ceasefire will indeed take hold. Unian.info reports that Chepurnoy was somewhat confident that a new disengagement protocol supposed to go into effect on April 6 in the village of Stanytsia Luganska may in fact bring about a ceasefire:
“There has been a certain positive trend. There were 37 attacks on April 1 and 32 attacks on April 2. The number and intensity of shelling incidents are decreasing, the frequency of the use of heavy systems is on the decline. Perhaps, on April 6, we will reach a milestone that there will be no shelling at all and the forces will be able to disengage normally,” Chepurnoy said.
ATO HQ reports de-escalation in Donbas, possible disengagement on April 6
Yaroslav Chepurnoy, a spokesman for the Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO) Headquarters, has reported a decrease in the number of incidents of shelling by Russia's hybrid military forces in Donbas in the past few days, according to Channel 112 Ukraine. News 03 April from UNIAN.
32 ceasefire violations is a sharp deescalation from the fighting over the last few weeks that regularly topped 100 incidents per day. Still, 32 ceasefire violations is a lot of ceasefire violations.
The Ukraine Crisis Media Center provides some additional reporting:
Ukraine Says IMF Has Approved $1 Billion Loan
Ukraine President Petro Poroshenko has announced that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has approved the payment of $1 billion of aid to Ukraine. The IMF is supporting Ukraine with a $17.5 billion bailout program in exchange for Kyiv implementing reforms and tackling corruption.