Donetsk, Dec 17 – DAN. Ukrainian army plans to use a 20 thousand troops force concentrated in the Svetlodarsk salient zone outside Gorlovka to launch an offensive against Donbass, said DPR People's Militia deputy chief-of-staff Eduard Basurin.
"Our intelligence reports that the enemy concentrates troops and equipment at the Gorlovka direction and on the Svetlodarsk salient. Our defenders will have to withstand a force of 20,000 troops of six brigades."
Currently the location of the following formations is confirmed: four brigades (72nd mechanized, 58th infantry, 1st tank and 81st air mobile) in the vicinity of Gorlovka; while the 30th and 93rd mechanized brigades, two MLRS 'Uragan' batallions and one 'Smerch' 300 mm battalion are expected to arrive. Over 120 tanks and 250 artillery pieces and mortars, and 110 MLRS systems are concentrated there.
"Poroshenko's plans are absolutely transparent, he needs a pretext to extend the martial law which expires on December 26," Basurin said.
Earlier DPR Intelligence reported Kiev is preparing a large-scale offensive against the DPR and concentrating large force along the contact line. Ukrainian tanks are dispersed in width along the contact line from Mariupol to Volnovakha.
Ukraine declared martial law on November 26 in ten Ukrainian regions adjacent to Russia and Transnistria, or Kiev-controlled Donbass regions, or the Black Sea and Sea of Azov.
Martial law is brought in all over the state or in designated areas in accordance with the bill "On the Legal Regime of Martial Law". Martial law provides military authorities and leadership with greater and unlimited power, while restricting civil liberties such as public gatherings, media freedoms and free movement.*ot