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Pro-Russian Fighters Routed From Stronghold, Ukraine Says Pro-Russian Fighters Routed From Stronghold, Ukraine Says
(about 1 hour later)
KIEV, Ukraine — The Ukrainian government said Saturday that it had routed pro-Russian fighters from Slovyansk, a long-blockaded rebel stronghold where some of the fiercest fighting has occurred during the more than three-month separatist insurrection. KIEV, Ukraine — With a fierce onslaught of gunfire and mortar shelling, Ukrainian government forces on Saturday chased pro-Russian insurgents from Slovyansk, a long-blockaded rebel stronghold, government officials and separatist leaders said.
Though it was not yet clear if the loss would be decisive blow against the rebels in eastern Ukraine, the recapture of Slovyansk showed that Ukrainian forces were finally gaining traction four days after President Petro O. Poroshenko ended a 10-day cease-fire and ordered the military to resume efforts to crush the rebellion by force. As rebels fled the city, the scene of some of the fiercest fighting in a separatist insurrection that has lasted more than three months, the Ukrainian military destroyed a tank, two combat vehicles and two armored personnel carriers, a spokesman for Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, Andriy Lysenko, said.
On Tuesday, after the resumption of full-scale fighting, the Ukrainian military retook control of an important checkpoint at a border crossing with Russia, one of at least three that had been seized by rebels and that the Ukrainian government and its Western allies said were then used to allow Russian tanks, weapons and fighters to cross into the region. “Run!” the Ukrainian interior minister, Arsen Avakov, wrote in a jubilant Facebook post on the retaking of Solvyansk. “The terrorists are bearing losses, surrendering.”
A spokesman for Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, Andriy Lysenko, said that government forces had ousted the rebels from Slovyansk and that those fleeing on Saturday included the well-known commander, Igor Girkin, who the Ukrainian authorities say worked for the G.R.U., the foreign intelligence directorate of the Russian military. In east Ukraine, he identified himself as Col. Igor Strelkov, which means shooter or gunman. Though it was not yet clear whether the retaking of Slovyansk signaled a decisive blow against the rebels in eastern Ukraine, it showed that Ukrainian forces were finally gaining traction and reasserting state authority, three months after separatists seized control of cities and towns throughout the region, dividing this country of 45 million people.
“Run!” the Ukrainian interior minister, Arsen Avakov, wrote in a Facebook post on the retaking of Solvyansk. “The terrorists are bearing losses, surrendering.” The Ukrainian advance on Saturday came four days after President Petro O. Poroshenko ended a cease-fire and ordered the military to resume efforts to crush the rebellion by force. On Tuesday, the Ukrainian military retook an important checkpoint at a border crossing with Russia, one of several that had been seized by rebels and that the Ukrainian government and its Western allies said were used to allow Russian tanks, weapons and fighters to cross into the region.
Mr. Lysenko said that as the insurgents fled Slovyansk, the Ukrainian military destroyed a tank, two combat vehicles and two armored personnel carriers. Insurgent leaders confirmed that their fighters had fled under heavy attack by the Ukrainian military, but insisted that they were not giving up. “Our resistance has not been crushed,” Andrei Purgin, an insurgent leader, told the Interfax news service.
In an interview with the Ukrainska Pravda news site, the head of the national security council, Andriy Parubiy, said that the government’s goal was to force fighters out of the city to limit the risk to civilians. He said the rebels had abandoned the city because they were overwhelmed militarily.
“The terrorists are fleeing in panic, through fields along the roads,” Mr. Parubiy said. “The fact that the Ukrainian military forced the fighters to flee is positive because it minimizes civilian casualties. We let them go outside the city, and they meet fire at checkpoints.” “What would you do if you were shelled with mortars and artillery guns and pounded from the air and you had only three tanks and assault rifles?” asked Mr. Purgin, deputy prime minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, one of two separatist shadow governments in the east. “The Ukrainian security forces in fact tried to raze Slovyansk to the ground.”
By midday, government troops were sweeping through neighborhoods of Slovyansk in search of any remaining fighters, officials said. The head of Ukraine’s national security council, Andriy Parubiy, said the government’s goal was to force fighters out of the city to limit the risk to civilians.
“The terrorists are fleeing in panic, through fields along the roads,” he said in an interview with the Ukrainska Pravda news site. “The fact that the Ukrainian military forced the fighters to flee is positive because it minimizes civilian casualties. We let them go outside the city, and they meet fire at checkpoints.”
Ukrainian officials said that those fleeing included the well-known commander Igor Girkin, who the Ukrainian authorities say worked for the Russian military’s foreign intelligence directorate. In east Ukraine, he identified himself as Col. Igor Strelkov, which means shooter or gunman.
By midday Saturday, government troops were sweeping through neighborhoods of Slovyansk in search of any remaining fighters, officials said.
Mr. Poroshenko, informed of the retaking of the city by the military chief of staff, Viktor Muzhenko, ordered the Ukrainian flag to be raised over the City Council, according to a statement posted on the presidential administration website.
The separatist rebellion is the latest, and bloodiest, chapter in a crisis that began last November after Viktor F. Yanukovych, then Ukraine’s president, rejected a trade accord with the European Union in favor of closer ties with Russia. Protesters took to the streets of Kiev, and in February Mr. Yanukovych fled from office. A week later, Russia invaded and annexed Crimea.
By early April, pro-Russian separatists were seizing public buildings, then entire towns and cities in the predominantly Russian-speaking East. President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia mobilized troops along the border, warning that he would use force if necessary.
Since then, the government has struggled to contain the insurgency, diplomatic efforts to defuse the situation have largely failed, and the West has been reluctant to levy more sanctions on Moscow. Last week, Mr. Poroshenko declared that he was intent on ending the rebellion once and for all, though fears of a full-scale Russian invasion persist.
As the government reported its victory in Slovyansk, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church on Saturday announced the death of Metropolitan Volodymyr, 78, the leader of the church’s Moscow patriarchate, who struggled, amid illness to be a voice of conciliation in the political turmoil that has divided Ukraine and Russia.
Volodymyr’s death could have broad political implications, setting the stage for a battle between clerics seeking closer ties with the Russian Orthodox Church, which is headquartered in Moscow, and those who want a more independent, distinctly Ukrainian church.
Ukraine is a deeply religious country and the overwhelming majority of the population identifies as Orthodox. The church itself, however, is split, largely between the Moscow patriarchate, which is beholden to Patriarch Kirill I of the Russian Orthodox Church, who is a close ally of Mr. Putin, and the Kiev patriarchate, which Moscow does not recognize.
Kirill has long sought to tighter control over the church in Ukraine but a push to install a pro-Moscow prelate could risk inflaming a large segment of the Ukrainian public, which will probably view the church politics as a parallel to the broader geopolitical conflict in which Mr. Putin has to keep Ukraine within Russia’s sphere of influence.
Religion and traditional values were among the weapons used by Kremlin allies in their effort last fall to scuttle political and trade accords between Ukraine and the European Union. A major publicity campaign portrayed Europe as promoting homosexuality and the deterioration of family values.
In a statement on Saturday expressing condolences, President Poroshenko said that Volodymyr “led the church at the time of its revival after decades of brutal persecution” during the Soviet Union.
Pointedly, Mr. Poroshenko added: “His ministry was full of love for his native Ukraine.” It was not immediately clear if Mr. Poroshenko would order a state funeral for Volodymyr, who died of cancer though he had suffered also from Parkinsons disease and other ailments.
A state funeral would put the government, rather than the church, in charge of arrangements and invitations.
The leader of the Kiev patriarchate, Filaret, won acclaim among protesters in Kiev for sheltering protesters who had been victims of a violent police crackdown. Throughout the political crisis, he issued strong statements condemning Russian aggression
Filaret was excommunicated by the Russian Orthodox Church in 1997.
Slovyansk, once a quiet industrial city, was one of the first cities to come fully under rebel control after the start of the insurrection in April, and then was put under blockade by government forces, which set up checkpoints on approaches outside the city. Since early April, it was the site of numerous battles, with frequent machine gunfire and mortar shelling.
The city’s mayor was quickly ousted and a pro-Russian separatist who appointed himself to replace her, Vyachaslev Ponomaryov, for a while became one of the best-known faces of the insurrection, holding numerous news conferences, granting interviews and taking captives, who at one point included observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
Local news services in eastern Ukraine reported that insurgents were traveling south from Slovyansk toward the regional capital of Donetsk.