DONETSK. April 20 (Interfax) - Over 900 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed in an encirclement around Ilovaisk, sais Liliya Rodinova, a spokeswoman for the commission for prisoners-of-war of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic (DPR).
"Ukraine's chief military prosecutor Anatolii Matios has said that investigators had confirmed the death of 459 Ukrainian army servicemen near Ilovaisk. These data, however, should be multiplied by two," Rodionova said, according to the Donetsk News Agency.
"According to preliminary estimates, over 900 Ukrainian soldiers were killed near Ilovaisk," she said.
Prosecutors base their death toll on the numbers of Ukrainian soldiers whose bodies were identified, Rodionova said.
"However, DNA tests on the remains of the Ukrainian soldiers killed near Ilovaisk have yet to be completed. There were also instances when the results of a DNA test did not match the remains," Rodionova said, according to the Donetsk news agency.
On April 17 Matios, who is also Ukraine's Deputy Prosecutor General, said that investigators had confirmed that 459 soldiers were killed and 478 servicemen and other combatants injured in fighting near Ilovaisk in August-September 2014.
Military hardware losses cost over 70 million hryvni, he added.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian field commanders Semyon Semenchenko and Andriy Biletsky claimed that army losses near Ilovaisk had exceeded 1,000 personnel.