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Ukraine‘s parliament passed a law on Thursday to increase the size of the armed forces by a third as fighting with pro-Russian separatists continues in the east.
The bill passed easily, with 270 votes in favor, well above the 226 required, and now goes to President Petro Poroshenko, who proposed the measure, to be signed into law.
Poroshenko has called the ceasefire the last chance for peace with the pro-Russian rebels.
One Ukrainian serviceman was killed and another wounded yesterday a military spokesman said, as Kiev accused rebels of increasing violations of a ceasefire deal.
Accusations of continued violence on both sides show the fragility of the peace accord, agreed in Minsk last month, which calls for the withdrawal of heavy weapons from the frontline.
Some 6,000 people have been killed since separatists took up arms last year in Ukraine‘s eastern industrial heartland – the ‘Donbass’ – in response to the overthrow of the Moscow-backed president, Viktor Yanukovich, in Kiev.
(Reuters)
