At least 4,317 people in Ukraine have been killed ever since conflict broke out between pro-Russian separatists and the government in April, according to a U.N. report released Thursday.
A ceasefire was established between the rebels and Ukrainian government in early September. But the fighting is still ongoing and 300 more people have been killed since the deal was struck, a team of U.N. investigators in Ukraine said in the report obtained by the Associated Press.
Armed groups operating in eastern Ukraine are also accused of atrocities, including executions, torture, sexual assault and forced labor that are so systematic they "may amount to crimes against humanity," the team wrote.
A total of 466,830 people have been displaced since the crisis began in eastern Urkaine, the report found.
The rebels are currently exercising temporary self-governance in the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, a deal approved by Ukraine's parliament as a condition of the ceasefire. However, that deal and the continual conflict with the rebels has led to a "total breakdown of law and order and the emergence of parallel governance systems" in the rebel-controlled regions, the report found.
"All parties need to make a far more wholehearted effort to resolve this protracted crisis peacefully," said U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Raad al-Hussein, the AP reported.
The U.N. report came the same day Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk requested allies supply military aid for his government forces.
"In any case, we have to overhaul and upgrade the Ukrainian military and defense sector. That's what's feasible, doable and urgently needed, with the support of our Western allies," Yatsenyuk said according to the AP.
In the U.S., members of Congress seem to support supplying weapons to Ukrainian troops. Yet the Obama administration has not expressed as much enthusiasm over the idea.
Officials in Russia, which from the start of the crisis has been accused of supplying the rebels in an attempt to bring down Ukraine's government, are also against the U.S. supplying military aid.
Giving U.S. weapons to Ukraine's troops would be "a highly destabilizing factor that could seriously influence the balance of power," Alexander Lukashevich, a Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman, said according to the AP.
