WORLD
April 24, 2014 | By Sergei L. Loiko
HORLIVKA, Ukraine - Yelena Rybak sat quietly next to her husband for an hour under their carport, alone and for the last time. She touched his battered face and stroked his cold hands, as if the warmth of her fingers might still wake him. Then it was time for the young, bearded priest, who arrived with several dozen relatives, friends and sympathizers. They escorted Yelena and 42-year-old Volodymyr from the gray-brick house through a wooden fence and onto a narrow street of buckling pavement.
WORLD
April 23, 2014 | By Sergei L. Loiko, This post has been corrected, as noted below
DONETSK, Ukraine - Ukraine government forces on Wednesday recaptured a southeastern town that had been held by separatist rebels, the Interior Ministry said. There were no casualties in the operation in the town of Svyatogorsk, according to an statement posted on the ministry's website. The ouster of the rebels was a welcome strategic gain by the Kiev government in the troubled Donetsk region, close to Ukraine's eastern border with Russia. “The recapture of Svyatogorsk is an indication that the anti-terrorist operation, which experienced certain problems last week, is now gaining momentum,” said Dmitry Tymchuk, head of Kiev-based Center for Military and Political Research.
WORLD
April 22, 2014 | By Sergei L. Loiko, This post has been updated. See the note below for details.
KIEV, Ukraine -- The United States will stand by Ukrainians against Russian aggression that threatens their nation's sovereignty and territorial integrity, Vice President Joe Biden pledged Tuesday during a visit to Kiev. “No nation has the right to simply grab land from another nation, and we will never recognize Russia's illegal occupation of Crimea, and neither will the world,” Biden said after meeting with Ukraine's acting prime minister, Arseny Yatsenyuk. “No nation should threaten its neighbors by amassing troops along the border.
WORLD
April 20, 2014 | By Sergei L. Loiko
MOSCOW - Separatists appealed to Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday to deploy Russian troops in eastern Ukraine after a shootout Easter night on the outskirts of Slovyansk left at least three people dead and four injured. “Vladimir Vladimirovich, fascists who are killing our brothers are trying to conquer our small provincial town,” Vyacheslav Ponomaryov, a separatist leader and self-proclaimed mayor of Slovyansk, said in his television appeal on Rossiya-24 news network.
WORLD
April 15, 2014 | By Sergei L. Loiko
MOSCOW -- Ukrainian forces launched combat operations against pro-Russian separatists Tuesday and recaptured a military airport in the eastern part of the country, the acting president said. Explosions and gunfire were heard from around the airport, located between the owns of Kramatorsk and Slavyansk. Both towns were seized last week by armed separatists, said the UNIAN news agency. A Ukrainian SU-24 jet flew over the airport firing at separatist positions, and troops using armored vehicles followed with a ground assault, the report said.
WORLD
April 15, 2014 | By Sergei L. Loiko and Carol J. Williams
MOSCOW -- Ukraine's interim government on Tuesday made good on threats to move against pro-Russia separatists occupying eastern cities, prompting Russian President Vladimir Putin to demand U.N. condemnation of the use of force in the neighboring country. In a call to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Putin "emphasized that the Russian side expects the United Nations and the international community to clearly condemn the Kiev authorities' anti-constitutional military operation in Ukraine's southeast," the Itar-Tass news agency reported . Russia-backed militants who have seized government and security facilities in at least 10 towns and cities in eastern Ukraine were under fire in the city of Slavyansk, Russian news media reported, casting the operation to recover Ukrainian government control as a violent strike against civilians.