Fighting in Ukraine intensifies as 6 killed

Airport assault reportedly thwarted

Residents wave to Pro-Russian rebels atop an armored personal carrier during a parade in the town of Luhansk, eastern Ukraine, Sunday, Sept. 14, 2014. Some semblance of normality is returning to parts of eastern Ukraine after a cease-fire agreement sealed between Ukrainian government forces and separatist rebels earlier this month, although exchanges of rocket fire remain a constant in some areas. (AP Photo/Darko Vojinovic)
Residents wave to Pro-Russian rebels atop an armored personal carrier during a parade in the town of Luhansk, eastern Ukraine, Sunday, Sept. 14, 2014. Some semblance of normality is returning to parts of eastern Ukraine after a cease-fire agreement sealed between Ukrainian government forces and separatist rebels earlier this month, although exchanges of rocket fire remain a constant in some areas. (AP Photo/Darko Vojinovic)

DONETSK, Ukraine -- Heavy fighting broke out Sunday between Ukrainian and rebel forces on the north side of Donetsk, killing at least six people in one of the most serious clashes since the 10-day-old cease-fire went into effect.

"It's not a cease-fire; it's full-on fighting," a rebel fighter said.

Tanks were on the streets in midafternoon, and pro-Russia rebels raced reinforcements along the main boulevard in civilian cars toward their positions on the approaches to the airport, where Ukrainian troops are almost surrounded.

Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council spokesman Volodymyr Polyovyi told journalists that government troops had repelled the airport attack by about 200 fighters.

In a residential area just off the main boulevard, hospital workers collected bodies from the sidewalks and homes hit hours earlier. They took at least six, most of them elderly people who appeared to have been walking home from the market, and a rebel policeman who had been trying to guide people to cover when he was hit.

Artillery fire resounded for hours through Saturday night and much of the day Sunday as Ukrainian forces at the airport and areas northwest of the city traded fire with the separatist forces that control the city and most of the surrounding territory. It was unclear who instigated the fighting or why, but the sound of rifle fire at the airport midafternoon indicated the two sides were engaged in close combat.

The two sides have shelled each other almost daily since the cease-fire was signed Sept. 5, each blaming the other for violations, but the intense, large-scale battles of recent months largely had stopped. But Sunday's action was an escalation.

Rebel fighters who took one of their wounded to the city hospital said more fighting was underway in the contested village of Pesky, on the outskirts of the city, where both sides have a foothold. Ukrainian troops had been strengthening their positions in the village in recent days and were firing on rebel positions, they said.

Representatives of the Ukrainian military could not be reached for comment. Agence France-Presse, an international news agency headquartered in Paris, quoted one official as blaming the fighting on the rebels, who he said had launched a broad offensive at the airport.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke by phone late Sunday and "expressed concern about violations of the cease-fire regime," according to a statement published on the Ukrainian leader's website.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov today about concerns of renewed fighting and the lack of details about the content of a Russian convoy that entered and left Ukraine over the weekend, a State Department official said.

Kerry will meet with Lavrov at a conference concerning Iraq that will take place in Paris today. Artillery attacks on Ukrainian army positions occur in three to five spots per day, Ukrainian Defense Minister Valeriy Geletey said at a news conference in Kiev on Sunday.

The Russian convoy of 220 trucks entered and left Ukraine over the weekend, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said. All vehicles crossed into Ukraine without being inspected by Ukrainian border guards, customs officers or the International Committee of the Red Cross, according to the organization. The group cited Russian officials as saying the convoy carried only food products.

In Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula that Russia annexed from Ukraine in March, residents voted for regional parliamentary elections dominated by Russian President Vladimir Putin's backers, although the results weren't yet available.

Polyovyi told reporters Sunday that Ukraine considers the election illegal and that those responsible for holding it could be charged with seizing state power, which carries a prison sentence of up to 10 years.

Crimean news reports said pre-election opinion polls indicate the United Russia Party, Putin's main supporter in the Russian national parliament, was likely to get the largest share of the 100 seats in the regional parliament. The Just Russia and Liberal Democrat parties, which support Putin, also were likely to win seats, as was the Communist Party.

Meanwhile, in the rebel-held city of Luhansk, residents observed "city day" Sunday, which opened on a somber note as priests led hundreds of residents in prayer to remember those killed during a government-mounted siege of the city.

Damage to basic infrastructure has left much of the city without power and running water since early August. Across Luhansk, smashed windows, burned-out buildings and craters in the road are testimony to an imprecise shelling campaign.

Across the road from the regional military enlistment office, now transformed into the headquarters of a rebel battalion, the roof of a multistory apartment building was caved in from a direct strike. Many civilian facilities such as restaurants, gas stations and car showrooms have been reduced to shattered shells.

After a garbage recycling plant was damaged, trash began piling up on the streets. While the damage remains, the streets have begun to be cleared and electricity has returned to some parts of the city.

Speaking at the open-air service outside the Lady of Sorrows Church, local separatist leader Igor Plotnitsky mourned those who had been killed, and in an unusually conciliatory public statement, he called for forgiveness for those responsible.

A Russian aid convoy carrying mainly food arrived in Luhansk on Saturday, and men in camouflage standing under a scratched-out sign reading "Strong Ukraine" on Sunday were handing out chocolate, drinking water, soap, toilet paper, diapers and other supplies to a large crowd of residents waiting in line. At a nearby table, war veterans were poured complimentary shots of vodka.

A rebel official -- a Muscovite who gave his name only as Makhra -- said the aid was from Russia.

"People have gone hungry here for almost two months. We decided to celebrate city day," he said. "In a few days, power and water should be turned back on. So people are being given hygiene products so they can properly feed themselves."

Lilya Miroschenkovo, a 73-year-old retiree waiting in line, said she hasn't received her pension since May and has had to make do since then with her last monthly payment of $85.

"It is a good thing that vegetables were more or less affordable this year," she said. "Meat, sausages, oil -- I have bought nothing like that. It is just vegetables in one soup after another."

Information for this article was contributed by Carlotta Gall of The New York Times; by Peter Leonard and Laura Mills of The Associated Press; and by Terry Atlas, Volodymyr Verbyany and David Lerman of Bloomberg News.

A Section on 09/15/2014

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