u*******g 发帖数: 3300 | 1 Ukrainian government troops have taken over a large part of the rebel-held
city of Luhansk, an official said Wednesday, after days of street battles.
Andriy Lysenko, a spokesman for Ukraine's National Security Council, told
reporters Wednesday in Kiev that government forces are now controlling "
significant parts" of the eastern city.
Hard-hit Luhansk has been without electricity, running water or phone
connections for 18 days due to the fighting. Russia has sent a massive aid
convoy to help the residents there but it has not yet received Kiev's
approval, because the proposed route lies through rebel-held territory.
Residents are reported to be standing in lines to buy bread baked on
portable generators as food grows scarce.
Government troops Wednesday also fought to gain control of the rebel-held
city of Donetsk and a key highway in eastern Ukraine in battles that left 34
residents and nine troops dead in just 24 hours, authorities said.
Several neighborhoods in Donetsk -- the largest city still in rebel hands --
have been hit with artillery fire in the last few days and fighting on the
outskirts has become more intense.
The Kiev-backed administration in Donetsk quoted the death toll of 34 local
residents killed and 29 wounded as of noon Wednesday, a figure it said did
not include any government troop deaths.
Earlier, a Ukrainian official said nine troops were killed and 22 wounded in
overnight fighting in Ilovaysk, a town near Donetsk, as the government
sought to retake a major railroad and a highway that leads to Russia.
Lysenko said fighting continued in Ilovaysk on Wednesday even though
government forces have gained overall control over it.
Among those killed in Ilovaysk was a Ukrainian-American known by the nom de
guerre of "Franko," said Anton Herashchenko, an adviser to the interior
minister. He said Franko was an American citizen with a military background
who had been living in eastern Ukraine for the past 10 years and obtained
Ukrainian citizenship before joining the battalion.
For several weeks running, Donetsk has come under sustained shelling attacks
from all sides. The imprecision of the shelling is creating much animosity
while seemingly taking a limited toll on rebel forces.
On Wednesday morning, rockets slammed into residential areas, including the
suburb of Makiivka.
"I was with my grandmother in the bathroom, because there is a bearing wall
in there," said Anna Zyukova, 22. "And then all of sudden, bam-bam."
Many residents have been taking refuge in improvised bomb shelters in
apartment building basements. Residents in Makiivka huddled in groups near
one such shelter Wednesday, chatting and listening as rockets flew in and
out several miles away.
At a rebel camp by a checkpoint closer to the fighting, a rebel commander
who identified himself only as "Chaika" -- Russian for seagull -- said he
was at a loss to explain why army shells were hitting apartments.
"We purposely don't take up positions where people live," he said -- a claim
that Ukrainian officials have repeatedly dismissed.
The Kiev government has pursued diplomatic efforts to resolve the conflict,
which the United Nations says has killed more than 2,000 people and
displaced over 340,000 since fighting began in mid-April.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko will host German Chancellor Angela
Merkel this weekend in Kiev before meeting next week with Russian President
Vladimir Putin in Minsk, the capital of Belarus.
Ukraine has accused Russia of arming and supporting the rebels, a charge
that Russia denies. The fighting began a month after Russia annexed Ukraine
's Black Sea peninsula of Crimea.
In Moscow on Wednesday, protesters scaled one of the city's famed Stalin-era
skyscrapers and painted the Soviet star on its spire in the national colors
of Ukraine. They also attached a yellow-and-blue Ukrainian flag to the top
of the 580-foot building.
While Moscow police detained four suspects and charged them with vandalism,
a crime punishable with up to three years in prison, Poroshenko, the
Ukrainian president, welcomed the flag-hoisting over the skyscraper in a
video message, calling it a "symbolic" gesture. |
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