Japan will send a Foreign Ministry employee to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe from Monday to help the entity in its task of monitoring the cease-fire in eastern Ukraine, the ministry said Thursday.
Japan is the first among non-members of the OSCE to send a representative to the organization, the ministry said.
Prime Minister
Shinzo Abe had conveyed Japan’s plan to dispatch a government employee to the organization in June when he met Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko during his visit to Ukraine.
The employee will be tasked with analyzing information from several areas in Ukraine and submitting a report, the ministry said.
Fighting has persisted between Ukrainian government forces and pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine despite a cease-fire agreement struck in February in Minsk, the capital of Belarus.
The OSCE, whose tasks include monitoring local elections and monitoring the withdrawal of weapons, is expanding its size to about 1,000.
==Kyodo
Category: Daily Witness, National
