London: Intense shelling in eastern Ukraine hit civilian areas for a sixth day, as an intensifying battle between government forces and Russian-backed separatists threatened to trigger a diplomatic crisis.
Locals said at least three more civilians were killed after shells landed in a residential area of the government-held city of Avdiivka early on Friday morning in what was described as the heaviest fighting for two years.
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Deadliest clashes in Ukraine in weeks claim seven
Ukraine's military says the number of its soldiers killed in an offensive by pro-Russian separatists over the past two days has risen to seven in the deadliest outbreak of fighting in the east of the country since mid-December.
At least 20 soldiers and civilians on both sides have been killed over nearly a week of fighting near the city.
A British photographer who was staying in one of the apartment blocks that was hit was among the wounded.
Separatists said Ukrainian shelling of civilian areas of Donetsk had killed at least one other civilian and injured more.
The renewed violence has left thousands of civilians without electricity, water and central heating, and could provoke a humanitarian disaster if it continues, the head of the large factory that dominates the town warned on Friday local time.
"There has been no shelling this bad since the ceasefire was signed in 2015," said Musa Magomedov, director of the Avdiivka Coking Plant.
"The factory will continue to operate and we are doing our best to generate electricity and heat for the town, but without extra capacity we are struggling," he said.
"We have received a lot of help, but if the war continues those efforts will mean nothing. I don't want this town to become another Homs or Aleppo," he said.
Pavel Zhebrivsky, governor of the government-controlled part of Donetsk region, said yesterday that a ceasefire had been arranged via a joint Russian-Ukrainian monitoring centre so repairs could be made to damaged power lines. The arrangement would see both sides of the conflict send crews to fix the damage, he said.
Petro Poroshenko, the president of Ukraine, said that Russia and the separatist forces it supports were "fully responsible" for the deteriorating situation and the deaths of soldiers and civilians.
"I stress that it is completely wrong to say that Russia does not support the militants - every unit has Russian military personnel who perform the orders of the Russian Federation," Mr Poroshenko said.
The Kremlin laid blame for the escalation of "aggressive" Ukrainian actions and expressed hope that the separatist forces had "enough ammunition" to respond.
"The main thing is to persuade Kiev to drop such reckless actions, which are capable of undermining the Minsk peace process," said Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for Vladimir Putin.
Earlier, the Russian foreign ministry accused Ukraine of "breaking the Geneva Convention".
The comments followed heated exchanges at the United Nations Security Council in which Russia said Britain should "clean its conscience" by "giving back" the Falklands and Gibraltar before it passes judgment on the Kremlin's annexation of Crimea.
"I would like to advise: give back the Malvinas [Falkland] Islands, give back Gibraltar, return the Chagos archipelago in the Indian Ocean, which you turned into a huge military base.
"Then perhaps your conscience will be a little cleaner and you can hold forth on other topics," Vitaly Churkin said at the meeting on Thursday evening.
Matthew Rycroft, the British Ambassador to the UN, had said Russia's attempts to blame the Ukrainian government for the crisis were "an inversion of reality"
Nikki Haley, who was appointed US ambassador to the United Nations by Donald Trump last month, warned the violence could scupper the new administration's wish to improve ties with Russia.
In a strongly worded statement, she condemned Russia's "aggressive actions" in eastern Ukraine and said that US sanctions imposed after Russia's annexation of Crimea will remain until the peninsula is returned to Ukraine.
The war in eastern Ukraine has been locked in an uneasy deadlock since Vladimir Putin and Petro Poroshenko, the Ukrainian president, negotiated a ceasefire deal in February 2015.
Telegraph, London