Small but seemingly substantial bone to pick with this Interfax lead, which becomes clear with the second sentence. Neither the Ukrainian border service nor the Red Cross was given a chance to inspect all of these trucks, so they don't presume to know what all 145 of them are carrying. Such a detail is clearly unimportant to the Kremlin, but shouldn't Interfax and its journalists know better?
The Ukrainian State Border Service reports that 145 trucks carrying Russian humanitarian aid have crossed the Ukrainian border.
"One hundred and forty-five trucks have already crossed the border," the Border Service said, adding that Ukrainian border guards and customs officers were not admitted to clear the cargo.
Tweets regarding official statements from the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry:
And:
Ukraine's foreign minister says the ministry's website is under a denial-of-service attack and he points the finger, unsuprisingly, at Moscow: "Uninvited guests from Russia not only vehicles, but computers. There is a DDoS-attack on our website mfa.gov.uk Follow our tweets and FB"
Liveuamap doing an excellent job of covering the route of the 145 or so Russian trucks that have crossed the border:
From Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko's statement in English on the "flagrant violation of international law" when "a column of more than 100 vehicles" crossed illegally from Russia onto Ukrainian territory today:
The President informed that pursuant to his instruction, Foreign Minister Klimkin and Head of the Presidential Administration Borys Lozhkin had contacted their Russian counterparts, "expressed our concern and offered to return the situation in the framework of the international law".
He vows that "we will do everything possible to prevent more serious consequences." He also highlights that the International Committee of the Red Cross still had not gotten security guarantees from separatists: "The only factor that prevented the Red Cross from fulfilling the humanitarian mission was the shelling of the roads by terrorists on the way of the humanitarian assistance to Luhansk."
Human Rights Watch's director for Germany says ahead of tomorrow's trip to Ukraine by Angela Merkel:
Merkel’s visit is an opportunity for her to denounce violations of international humanitarian law by the Ukrainian military....
Neither side in this conflict has behaved towards civilians as they should. Merkel should not lose the opportunity to drive the point home to Kiev.
via @GKates
First Russian trucks have arrived in Luhansk:
This seems too short-sighted, but then again...