RUSSIA dismissed Ukraine’s claims of a new offensive by Donbass forces yesterday, accusing Kiev of crying foul in the run-up to international summits.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko accused separatist forces in the eastern Donetsk and Lugansk regions of launching an offensive after shellfire, mainly falling in areas outside Kiev’s control, left 17 people dead and almost 400 miners trapped underground on Wednesday.

It was the latest breach in the fragile ceasefire brokered by Russia and the European Union (EU) in February.

In his annual address to parliament yesterday, Mr Poroshenko spoke of a “colossal threat of the resumption of large-scale hostilities by Russian and terrorist forces,” claiming that there were 9,000 Russian troops in Ukraine.

But Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov accused Kiev of breaking the ceasefire in an attempt to win foreign support before this weekend’s G7 meeting and the EU summit in Brussels on June 25 and 26.

“Donbass is being shelled. Self-defence forces can’t shell their own territory,” he said.

“These provocative actions are organised by Ukraine’s military forces and we are concerned with that.”

Mr Peskov added that ­Moscow expected a report by observers from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe to identify the culprits.

Referring to the EU summit, which will discuss extending sanctions against Russia until 2016, Mr Peskov said: “In the past Kiev had already heated up tensions amid some large international events.”

“This is the case and now we are seriously concerned about the next repetition of such activity.”

Kiev is also expected to plead for more sanctions against Russia at the G7 meeting at Elmau castle in Bavaria on Sunday and Monday.

“The international community must come up with a correct and appropriate response to Russian aggression,” said US-nominated Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk.

The prime ministers of Canada and Japan intend to visit Ukraine on their way to the meeting as a show of support to the faltering regime.

Russia was expelled from the then G8 group of developed nations last year for opposing the far-right instigated coup in Ukraine that led to the current civil war.