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Amid the ongoing military offensive of Russian troops and PMCs on Donbass front lines, many people wonder: Why is the city of Donetsk still suffering from artillery shelling? Speculations of Ukrainian propaganda go so far as to blame Russia for the shelling, allegedly aimed to justify Russian further advance on this front.
Since the beginning of the Ukrainian anti-terrorist operation against the population of Donbass, stores, squares, and civilian homes have been constantly hit by the Ukrainian military in dozens of settlements, including the capital of the DPR Donetsk. Thousands of innocent civilians have been wounded and killed.
Since the beginning of the Russian military operations in February, Ukrainian attacks on civilians did not stop. Ukrainian attacks are still claiming lives of innocent people almost on a daily basis.
The deaths of civilians in Donbass are not the result of accidents. The Kiev regime has been intentionally shelling civilian targets. Some of the Ukrainian attacks hit crowded places and claimed lives of dozens of civilians at once. For example, in March 2022 a Ukrainian “Tochka-U” missile was shot down over the very center of the city of Donetsk and the wreckage killed more than 20 people and wounded 23 others. There are numerous evidences of the absence of military facilities in many areas of the city that are constantly shelled by Ukrainian military, such as Kievsky, Kirovsky and other districts.
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The shelling on civilians is carried out both from Ukrainian positions located on the Donetsk outskirts with heavy artillery, including with the NATO weapons, but also by the so-called “roving” artillery of the AFU.
Ukrainian forces have been actively using the tactics of “roving” mortars for chaotic shelling of cities not controlled by the Kiev regime in the DPR and LPR since 2014. The high mobility makes it difficult to timely identify and destroy the mortars which are quickly placed on the armored vehicles. Due to the long-range capabilities of modern MLRS such as the Soviet-made “Grad” makes it possible to conduct unimpeded shelling at ranges exceeding 40 kilometers. LINK
Soviet-made Grad BM-21 used for shelling on civilians in Donbass
Apparently, the main goal of the so-called “roving” mortars and MLRS systems has always been to destabilize the situation in the war-torn regions, terrorize the population, disrupt the peaceful life of ordinary people, create panic and hatred.
In addition to the psychological and physical impact, there was another, very specific goal of the shelling of civilians. Roving mortars played an important role in Kiev’s attempts to disrupt the negotiation process between Western countries, Russia, and then unrecognized republics, which was completely undesirable to Kiev. The objective was to provoke the armed forces of the LPR and DPR to return fire and then accuse them of escalating the conflict.
Nine months of the Russian military operation have shown that shelling of civilian settlements can only be stopped by the complete destruction of Ukrainian military positions on the outskirts on the city of Donetsk and implementation of full Russian control of the territories of the Donetsk and Luhansk Republics, since all attempts of a peaceful settlement of the conflict are thwarted by Kiev, as it has been the case since 2014.
