Ukraine asks Russia to stop rebel support as ceasefire fails
UKRAINE accused pro-Russian rebels of starting at least seven skirmishes on Saturday in violation of a ceasefire, and urged President Vladimir Putin’s government to “stop hiring and recruiting militants.”
Rebels killed five Ukrainian soldiers in violation of a truce extended by the country’s government after the European Union (EU) gave Russia three days to quell the insurgency or face deeper sanctions. Thirteen soldiers also were wounded in the attacks by pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine’s eastern region while five suffered shell shock, Ukraine National Security Council spokesman Andriy Lysenko told reporters in Kiev yesterday.
“Militants regularly break the ceasefire. Ukraine demands from Russia to immediately stop support of terrorists and to stop hiring and recruiting militants in Ukraine and in Russia’s Rostov and Krasnodar regions.”
Both sides continued to trade accusations. Ukraine’s National Guard said in a statement on its website that militants in the eastern part of the country shot “massively” at a guard road block in the Donetsk region yesterday, without hurting any soldiers. Russia’s RIA Novosti state news wire said Ukraine forces shelled the eastern Ukrainian city of Slovyansk, a rebel stronghold in Donetsk.
Three people, including two women, were killed in the shelling, Russian state TV Rossia 24 said, without saying where it obtained the information.
The violence occurred as EU leaders in Brussels demanded on Friday that the separatists, who Ukraine and its allies say are backed by Mr Putin, abide by a ceasefire that Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko had extended through today, release hostages and start talks to implement a peace plan.
Rebel leaders agreed to the extension, according to news service Interfax. Still, the defence ministry in Kiev said Saturday’s casualties occurred in two separate incidents.
“The situation in the eastern regions continues to escalate,” the ministry said. “Insurgents are ignoring the peace plan to ease the situation in Ukraine’s east and keep attacking troops.”
Rebels in eastern Ukraine released eight monitors from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) who had been held hostage since late last month, according to accounts from the OSCE and Alexander Maltsev, a separatist spokesman for the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic. One group of four was freed on Friday and the second group yesterday, they said. Other people not associated with the OSCE are still being held in the region.
The EU leaders said that failure to meet their demands will result in “further significant restrictive measures” against Russia, according to a statement issued on Friday.
“If no visible progress is made on these points, then we are prepared to take further decisions, including drastic measures,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said after the meeting.
“We expect progress to come really in the hours ahead.”
The US also blames Mr Putin for supporting rebels and stoking violence the United Nations says has killed more than 400 people in the country of more than 40million. The US is preparing sanctions against Russia on technology aimed at exploiting and producing oil and gas products, a major part of that country’s economy, according to three people briefed on the plans.
The US and European allies imposed sanctions about two months ago on a number of people and firms close to Mr Putin.
The US is pushing Ukraine into conflict with Russia, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Saturday, adding that the government in Kiev must consult with those in the country who are seeking more autonomy.
“There are our partners from overseas, our American colleagues who, based on plentiful evidence, still prefer to push the Ukrainian authorities along the confrontational road,” he said on state-run television.
Mr Lavrov also said that while separatists in eastern Ukraine’s self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Luhansk listen to Moscow, they do not respond to all requests from the Kremlin.
Mr Poroshenko signed a free- trade pact on Friday with the 28member EU to bolster solidarity with the richer nations to Ukraine’s west. He said the agreement showed Ukraine’s “sovereign choice in favour of future membership of the EU.”
“We’re just looking to modernise our country,” Mr Poroshenko said in an interview in the French daily Le Figaro published on Saturday. “We introduce freedom, democracy and rule of law, European values, and we’re being attacked because of it.”
About 67% of Ukrainians would vote to join the EU in a referendum, according to a June 6-11 Razumkov Center poll of 2,012 voters, versus 20% who would not.
While the deal does not offer EU membership, it gives Ukraine firms better access to the world’s biggest trading bloc and will boost exports by €1bn a year, according to an EU estimate.
We introduce freedom, democracy and rule of law … and we’re being attacked because of it