"Regarding the troop withdrawal in the Bogdanivka-Petrivske area of the front. The process has just begun," Pavlo Zhebrivsky, the head of the Donetsk military and civil administration, said in a Facebook post.
A RIA Novosti correspondent, meanwhile, reported that DPR militia have been given the signal to withdraw.
Zhebrivsky added that troops should be withdrawn by 1 kilometer (0.62 miles) at each side of the line of contact on Sunday.
The sides to the Donbas conflict signed a framework agreement on the withdrawal of forces at three locations along the line of contact, including Petrivske, on September 21. Despite the stated October 1 timetable, mutual accusations of ceasefire violations stalled the pullout until now.
Observers from the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission, Russian representatives at the joint ceasefire control and coordination center, as well as DPR command, are present at the withdrawal process.
