TIRANA, Jan. 25 – Albania’s foreign ministry said it strongly denounced the heavy artillery attack on the eastern Ukrainian city of Mariupol, where rebels announced a major new offensive. Missiles are believed to have killed at least 30 people there.
The ministry said it was “deeply concerned that such criminal actions exacerbate the humanitarian situation in eastern Ukraine and contribute to the further escalation of the conflict.”
Albania also called for the immediate halt of such acts and urged the unconditional implementation of the Minsk agreements to restore peace in Ukraine.
Jeffrey Feltman, the U.N. political chief, said that the deadly rocket attacks on Mariupol this weekend violated international humanitarian law and could amount to war crimes. Speaking to an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council, he said that monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe who examined the craters reported that the rockets originated from territory controlled by pro-Russian rebel separatists.
