by James Tweedie

THE Kiev government announced yesterday that one of its troops had been killed in eastern Ukraine, as evidence emerged that it had breached a ceasefire with rebels.

Military spokesman Andriy Lysenko claimed that one soldier had been killed and six injured in attacks by separatist forces in the eastern Donbass region. He said that Kiev’s forces were under attack outside the cities of Donetsk, Lugansk and Mariupol.On Thursday the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) confirmed that the government had used banned heavy artillery on Gorlovka on Tuesday after observers found fragments of heavy 122mm shells in the town.

“Our monitors were able to go there yesterday to report on the shelling that happened on Tuesday. The shells started to strike at about 6pm in several locations in Gorlovka,” said OSCE spokesman Michael Bociurkiw.

“The shrapnel was consistent with 122mm artillery, so this is clearly weaponry banned under the Minsk packages,” he added. The artillery attack killed an 11-year-old girl, her father and another civilian.

“Our monitors were able to go to the mortuary to confirm that there were three people who died in the shelling,” Mr Bociurkiw said.Under the terms of February’s Minsk ceasefire deal both sides agreed to withdraw heavy artillery to 50km behind the front lines.

Fighting in Ukraine has died down since Russia and the EU brokered the ceasefire but both sides in the civil war accuse each other of regular small-scale violations.