Russia lied, invasion on, Ukraine says

French volunteers, supporters of pro-Russia rebels, stand near destroyed Ukrainian military equipment Thursday at Lenin square in Donetsk, Ukraine. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko declared that “Russian forces have entered Ukraine.”
French volunteers, supporters of pro-Russia rebels, stand near destroyed Ukrainian military equipment Thursday at Lenin square in Donetsk, Ukraine. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko declared that “Russian forces have entered Ukraine.”

NOVOAZOVSK, Ukraine -- Ukraine accused Russia on Thursday of entering its territory with tanks, artillery and troops, and Western powers said Moscow had "outright lied" about its role and dangerously escalated the conflict.

Russia dismissed the allegations, describing the fighters in Ukraine as "Russian volunteers." The Kremlin has repeatedly denied arming and supporting the separatists who have been fighting Ukrainian troops for four months in eastern Ukraine.

NATO said at least 1,000 Russian troops are in Ukraine, and later released what it said were satellite photos of Russian self-propelled artillery units inside the country last week.

Two columns of tanks and other equipment entered southeastern Ukraine at midday Thursday, after heavy shelling of the area from Russia that forced overmatched Ukrainian border guards to flee, said Col. Andriy Lysenko, a spokesman for Ukraine's national security council.

"Russian forces have entered Ukraine," President Petro Poroshenko said in Kiev, canceling a foreign trip and calling an emergency meeting of his security council.

photo

AP

A girl waves a Ukrainian flag Thursday during an anti-war meeting in the town of Mariupol, eastern Ukraine.

He urged Ukrainians to remain calm.

"Destabilization of the situation and panic, this is as much of a weapon of the enemy as tanks," Poroshenko told the council.

U.S. President Barack Obama spoke with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and both leaders agreed Russia must face consequences for its actions.

"We agree -- if there was ever any doubt -- that Russia is responsible for the violence in eastern Ukraine," Obama said. "The violence is encouraged by Russia. The separatists are trained by Russia, they are armed by Russia, they are funded by Russia."

He added that Russia "has deliberately and repeatedly violated the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, and the new images of Russian forces inside Ukraine make that plain for the world to see."

But Obama ruled out a military confrontation between the U.S. and Russia. He said Russia's activity in Ukraine would incur "more costs and consequences," though those seemed to be limited to economic pressure that will be discussed when Obama meets with European leaders at a NATO summit in Wales next week.

Obama still held out hope for Russia to change course.

"What we're doing is to mobilize the international community to apply pressure on Russia," he said. "But I think it is very important to recognize that a military solution to this problem is not going to be forthcoming."

Russia's actions have only hurt itself, he said, leaving it more isolated than at any point since the end of the Cold War -- something he hoped would become increasingly apparent to its leaders.

Elsewhere on Thursday, the leader of the main separatist group in southeastern Ukraine said up to 4,000 Russians, including active-duty soldiers currently on leave, have fought in the separatist ranks since the conflict began in the spring.

"There are active soldiers fighting among us who preferred to spend their vacation not on the beach, but with us, among their brothers, who are fighting for their freedom," Alexander Zakharchenko, a rebel commander and the prime minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, told a Russian broadcaster.

At an emergency session of the United Nations Security Council, Western representatives expressed anger at Russia.

"Now we see irrefutable evidence of regular Russian forces operating inside Ukraine," said British Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant.

U.S. Ambassador Samantha Power said Russia "has manipulated. It has obfuscated. It has outright lied."

Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin offered a spirited defense, saying Kiev "is waging war against its own people."

He did not deny a Russian presence, saying "there are Russian volunteers in eastern parts of Ukraine. No one is hiding that."

But Power countered: "A Russian soldier who chooses to fight in Ukraine on summer break is still a Russian soldier."

Churkin questioned the presence of Western advisers and asked where Ukrainian troops were getting weapons. He said he wanted to "send a message to Washington: Stop interfering in the internal affairs of sovereign states."

Russian stock markets fell as Switzerland and the European Union imposed restrictions on Russian state banks and fears grew that the U.S. and EU would impose more sanctions on Russian businesses and individuals in response to the military escalation.

Russian troops

A senior NATO official said the organization's estimate of 1,000 Russian troops in Ukraine was a conservative one, adding that another 20,000 Russian troops were right over the border. The troops who entered Ukraine had sophisticated equipment, he said.

"The hand from behind is becoming more and more overt now," Brig. Gen. Nico Tak said at NATO's military headquarters.

Russia's ultimate aim was to stave off defeat for the separatists and turn eastern Ukraine into a "frozen conflict" that would destabilize the country indefinitely, he said.

Russia's ambassador to the EU, Vladimir Chizhov, told the BBC that "NATO has never produced a single piece of evidence" of Russian troops operating in Ukraine. He said the only active-duty Russian soldiers in Ukraine were the 10 captured this week, who Moscow insists had mistakenly wandered across the border.

Speaking in Casteau, Belgium, Tak said that in the past two weeks, "we have noted a significant escalation in both the level and sophistication of Russia's military interference in Ukraine."

"Russia is reinforcing and resupplying separatist forces in a blatant attempt to change the momentum of the fighting, which is currently favoring the Ukrainian military," he added.

NATO also produced satellite images to provide what it called additional evidence that Russian combat soldiers, equipped with sophisticated heavy weaponry, are operating inside Ukraine's sovereign territory.

One photograph, dated Aug. 21, shows a Russian military convoy with self-propelled artillery moving in the Krasnodon area inside Ukraine.

Another dated Aug. 23 shows Russian self-propelled artillery units in firing positions near Krasnodon. Near the artillery units are logistical vehicles that NATO said were probably carrying ammunition.

"This configuration is exactly how trained military professions would arrange their assets on the ground, indicating that these are not unskilled amateurs, but Russian soldiers," NATO said in a captioned description of the photograph. "Russian artillery systems like these have recently shelled Ukrainian positions outside the city of Luhansk in conjunction with a separatist counteroffensive to attempt to break the Ukrainian siege of the city."

A third photo shows the Russian military buildup, including tanks and armored personnel carriers, near the Russian city of Rostov. Some of the Russian forces are based within a few miles of Ukraine and could attack with little warning, NATO said.

Russia is also supplying the separatists with arms from that location, NATO said.

"For months, Russia has provided separatist fighters with heavy equipment in the form of tanks, armored vehicles, artillery and multiple rocket launchers," NATO said. Even after the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over eastern Ukraine on July 17, an attack that killed all 298 aboard and appeared to have been carried out with a Russian anti-aircraft missile, NATO said, "Air defense systems have also been provided to separatists."

Two other photographs released by NATO show self-propelled guns that are on Russian territory but pointed at Ukraine.

"This is clearly not an exercise," NATO said. "These guns are being used to support separatist forces operating in the territory of Ukraine."

Tak said the satellite images were only "the tip of the iceberg" in terms of the overall scope of Russian troop and weapons movements.

Asked about the NATO images, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said in a statement to Russian news agencies that "to comment on this seriously just makes no sense."

Southeastern Ukraine had previously escaped the fighting that has engulfed areas to the north, and the only way rebels could have reached the southeast was by going through Russia.

The town of Novoazovsk, which has come under shelling for three days, appeared to be in the control of separatists, creating a new, third front in the war. That raised fears the fighters are trying to create a land link between Russia and the Crimean Peninsula, which Moscow annexed from Ukraine in March. The town lies along a road connecting the peninsula to Russia.

If separatists create a land corridor from Russia to Crimea, it could give them or Russia control over the entire Sea of Azov and the gas and mineral riches that energy experts believe it contains. Ukraine already lost roughly half its coastline, several major ports and significant Black Sea mineral rights in Russia's annexation of Crimea.

Lysenko said the missiles from Russia were fired at Ukrainian positions about 11 a.m. About 90 minutes later, two columns, including tanks and other fighting vehicles, began an attack, entering Ukraine from Veselo-Voznesenka and Maximovo in the Rostov region of Russia, he said.

In Mariupol, a city of 450,000 people about 20 miles west of Novoazovsk, a brigade of Ukrainian forces arrived at the airport Wednesday, while deep trenches were dug a day earlier on the city's edge.

National guard spokesman Ruslan Muzychuk said the government has evidence large amounts of weapons have been sent into Novoazovsk from Russia. He added that national guard reinforcements were taking up positions in Mariupol.

"The positions are being strengthened," the spokesman said. "The road from Novoazovsk to Mariupol is under the control of Ukrainian troops."

In Donetsk, the largest rebel-held city, 11 people were killed by shelling overnight, city officials said.

Information for this article was contributed by Dalton Bennett, Jim Heintz, Raf Casert, Peter Leonard, Laura Mills, Lynn Berry, Bradley Klapper, Cara Anna, Trenton Daniel and staff members of The Associated Press; and by Michael R. Gordon, Neil MacFahrquhar and Rick Gladstone of The New York Times.

A Section on 08/29/2014

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