February 27, 2015 Issue

Kramatorsk, Ukraine - An unexploded rocket landed in a residential area on February 10. A day later, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President François Hollande met with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko in Minsk, Belarus, to broker a peace deal as well as the withdrawal of heavy weapons to create two demilitarized buffer zones between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian forces. Less than two days into the cease-fire, at least 129 violations had occurred, according to Ukrainian defense spokesman Andriy Lysenko. Ukraine also accused Russia of continuing to send troops and tanks, an assertion Moscow denied.