UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday denounced Russia’s clean offensive in eastern Ukraine and referred to it as a four-day truce to mark Orthodox Holy Week.

Russia released dozens of airstrikes throughout eastern Ukraine overnight, as a new phase of the bloody battle opened with preventing raging inside the Donbas area.

“Instead of a party of recent existence, this Easter coincides with a Russian offensive in eastern Ukraine,” Guterres said to the media.

“The intense concentration of forces and firepower makes this battle inevitably more violent, bloody, and destructive,” he said, calling for a “humanitarian pause” from Holy Thursday until Easter Sunday on April 24.

“Easter is a season for renewal, resurrection, and hope… But this year, Holy Week is being observed under the cloud of war.

“Hundreds of thousands of lives hang in the balance,” the United Nations chief said.

Ukraine’s armed forces confirmed fighting had increased throughout the east after President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia had kicked off the widely anticipated offensive in the Donbas, Ukraine’s industrial heartland.

Russia’s military campaign refocused on Donbas, which seasoned-Moscow separatists have partially managed due to the fact 2014, after its efforts to seize the capital Kyiv were thwarted.

Guterres stated a truce might permit secure passage for civilians to flee the jap war sector, and for a humanitarian useful resource to be introduced to the toughest-hit regions.