Moscow, Jan 28 (IANS/EFE): Ukrainian shelling and rocket barrages have killed 16 civilians and wounded more than 100 others over the past 24 hours in the eastern district of Lugansk, an official of the breakaway eastern region said Wednesday.

The health minister of the self-proclaimed People's Republic of Lugansk, Larisa Airapetian, provided the figures at a press conference and were reported by Russian news agencies.

According to preliminary data, 13 people were killed in Stakhanov, two more in Krasny Luch and another in Lugansk city, the minister said.

Earlier, the pro-Russian separatist militias which are fighting the Kiev government claimed Wednesday that the Ukrainian forces had withdrawn with heavy casualties from the embattled region of Debaltseve.

According to comments by militia spokesman Eduard Basurin cited by a Russian news agency, over the past 24 hours, the 170 Ukrainians were killed or wounded.

Basurin said the militias of the self-proclaimed breakaway republics of Donetsk and Lugansk attempted to encircle the Ukrainian forces near the town of Debaltseve, located almost halfway between Donetsk and Lugansk, the capital of the homonymous regions controlled by the separatists.

The spokesman added that the militias took control of the town of Ozerianovka, located near Debaltseve.

The fighting escalated in eastern Ukraine after the offensive launched Friday by the separatists which was denounced by Kiev as a flagrant violation of a peace accord signed in September.

The Ukrainian government declared Tuesday a high state of alert across the country and an emergency in the regions of Donetsk and Lugansk.