KYIV. Aug 1 (Interfax) - Mine disposal experts from the Ukrainian State Emergency Situations Service have started demining territory adjacent to the destroyed bridge near the Stanytsia Luhanska checkpoint in the Luhansk region, the district administration reported on Facebook on Thursday.
"Since morning, mine disposal experts from the State Emergency Situations Service have started demining the territory adjacent to the destroyed bridge near the Stanytsia Luhanska checkpoint. This is our next step for repairing the bridge," the administration said.
The Emergency Situations Ministry of the self-proclaimed Luhansk People's Republic (LPR) has begun inspecting areas around the bridge at the Stanytsia Luhanska checkpoint, searching for unexploded bombs, LPR representatives to the Joint Control and Coordination Center (JCCC) said.
In order to ensure the security of civilians in areas adjacent to the checkpoint, the latter may from time to time close to allow bomb disposal experts to extract or defuse explosive objects on site. "Proposals on the checkpoint's opening hours during the period of the abovementioned works have been sent to the Ukrainian side," the LPR representatives said in a statement.
"LPR representatives to the JCCC will timely notify civilians, including through mass media, of times when the checkpoint is to suspend work," the LPR said.
The parties to the Trilateral Contact Group on settling the conflict in Donbas agreed in Minsk on Wednesday to start demining the areas surrounding the bridge in Stanytsia Luhanska on August 1.
Darka Olifer, the spokesperson for former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma representing Kyiv in the group, wrote on Facebook on Wednesday evening that, before the bridge repairs are started, the checkpoint and symbols of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk people's republics must be removed from the bridge, and "the following dismantlement of the fortifications in the Stanytsia Luhanska area must be simultaneous and symmetrical."
It was reported earlier that, while visiting Stanytsia Luhanska during a trip to the Luhansk region on July 7, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had declared the intention to restore the destroyed bridge that people use to cross the line of contact, provided that the parties observe ceasefire agreements.