The comments came on April 23 after the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said a member of its monitoring staff was killed and two more were injured after their vehicle hit a mine in eastern Ukraine in an area controlled by Russia-backed separatists. The statement said two other OSCE monitors injured by the blast -- a German woman and a man from the Czech Republic -- were released from a Luhansk hospital on April 24 and transferred to Kyiv. The Ukrainian military said the incident took place at 10:17am local time (07:17 GMT) near the small village of Pryshyb, which is controlled by Russia-backed separatists. Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz, who holds the rotating chairmanship of the OSCE in Europe, called for an investigation into he incident and, in a tweet, said he had spoken to the mission's ambassador, Ertugrul Apakan. “Need thorough investigation; those responsible will be held accountable,” Kurz said on social media. “It is a terrible tragedy,” German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said in a statement, calling for “an immediate end to the violence and unjustified accusations, especially on the part of separatists in eastern Ukraine.”

“It is in the interest of everyone involved, especially the conflict parties on the line of engagement, that OSCE observers are able to carry out their important, indispensable, and at once difficult and dangerous work,” Gabriel said. The unarmed, civilian OSCE mission, with more than 700 international observers, seeks to reduce tensions and report on the situation on the ground in Ukraine. In March, the 57 member states of the OSCE, which include Ukraine, Russia, and the United States, decided by consensus to extend the mandate of the mission for another year, its third extension since it was first deployed in Ukraine in 2014.
A U.S. member of the OSCE monitoring mission is killed and two others injured after their vehicle drives over a land mine near Luhansk.