Dhe death of a Ukrainian employee on March 1 in Kharkiv drew attention to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Special Monitoring Mission, which is still in existence. According to the OSCE, the woman was getting food for her family when she was killed by an artillery attack – “in a city that has become a war zone”.
Although there has long been an open war, members of the OSCE Mission SMM are still in the country. According to their original assignment, the civilian observers should determine whether there are security incidents. Their reports since then are a log of the latent war since 2014 on the so-called line of contact in eastern Ukraine. Some participating States, including Germany, had already withdrawn their nationals in the face of increasing tensions prior to the Russian invasion. Since February 24, the SMM has begun to evacuate the remaining foreign personnel – originally up to 1,000 observers, plus local staff such as the slain Maryna Fenina as drivers and translators – out of the country. Mission chief Yaşar Halit Çevik and his staff stayed in the country until the end of the evacuation, it is said. They withdrew from Kyiv to the western part of Ukraine.
For the time being, the OSCE is not providing information on exactly how many observers are still in Ukraine because of the “dynamic situation”. A team in the Russian-held city of Kherson is in a protected shelter awaiting an opportunity for safe evacuation. Meanwhile, in accordance with their mandate, they continued to report what they could perceive: “numerous explosions” from rocket launchers, “bursts of fire from heavy machine guns,” armored vehicles bearing Russian insignia headed toward the city center.
OSCE Secretary General Helga Schmid visited the SMM members who had been brought to Moldova on Wednesday and Thursday and praised their “great work in Ukraine”. The deduction is only temporary, she stressed. As soon as it is safe, work in the country should be resumed.
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