Igor Gulyai, a senior fellow from the U.S. Agency for International Development, told the Guardian in a statement: “For now, the U.S. may want to give these people more freedom, however little that freedom may be, to use this money to help their people.”

On Tuesday, a human rights group in Moscow called on the International Criminal Court to investigate the allegations, calling them “particularly grave in light of the recent escalation of violence from both the regime and separatists.”

Ukrainian government forces were reported to have killed at least 100 rebels and hundreds of civilians, including dozens of women and children, by Wednesday night, the Ukrainian news service Ukrinform had reported.

More than 3,300 military and police have been killed in Ukraine’s civil war since the conflict began in April 2014, according to the World Health Organization.

Russia and the West have been trying to find a negotiated settlement to the conflict in Ukraine since April, when the government of President Petro Poroshenko collapsed, citing a lack of support from rebels.

The crisis began when Yanukovych said Sunday that he would not sign an agreement with the EU on a trade pact and move closer to Russia in order to protect ethnic Russians in the Crimean peninsula, an annexation that the West has condemned.