Two killed in Donetsk as brief Easter ceasefire collapses

Two people were killed and one injured in Ukraine’s Donetsk region before the Orthodox Easter ceasefire ran out, a grim sign that even a 32-hour pause could not spare civilians in one of the war’s most battered front lines.

Vadym Filashkin, the regional governor, said one person died in Kramatorsk and another in Druzhkivka on Sunday. Ukrainian police later said one victim in Druzhkivka was killed by an FPV drone strike, while a separate strike in Kramatorsk at about 01:46 local time killed one person and wounded another. Interfax reported that Filashkin also described damage in Kramatorsk, Druzhkivka and Sloviansk, including damaged cars and private houses.

The deaths landed squarely inside a ceasefire that was meant to last 32 hours, from Saturday afternoon until midnight on Sunday, after Vladimir Putin announced the pause on April 10. Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Ukraine would abide by it, and Ukrainian officials urged Moscow to extend the truce and restart talks. Kyiv had also called for a broader 30-day halt to strikes on civilian targets, trying to turn the holiday window into something more durable.

Instead, both sides quickly accused the other of breaking the truce. The Russian defence ministry said it had recorded 1,971 ceasefire violations by Ukraine overnight into Sunday, while Ukrainian officials said Russian attacks continued. The competing claims reflected a pattern that has defined previous Easter pauses in this war: each side uses the breach count to argue that the other is unserious about peace.

The fighting in Donetsk underscored how little protection symbolic truces offer when command-and-control is weak and trust is thinner still. Kramatorsk, Druzhkivka and Sloviansk sit in a region that remains heavily contested and repeatedly damaged, where artillery, drones and shelling can still reach residential streets, rail lines and private homes even during a supposed humanitarian lull.

The brief Orthodox Easter ceasefire did little to change the basic logic of the war. A similar truce in 2025 was also widely accused of being violated by both sides, and this year’s pause again became a contest over blame rather than a step toward restraint. For civilians in Donetsk, the result was the same: a ceasefire on paper, and lethal danger on the ground.