12 Ukrainians die in downed copter

General among rebel strike’s victims

Smoke rises from a Ukrainian army helicopter shot down by pro-Russia rebels Thursday outside Slovyansk.
Smoke rises from a Ukrainian army helicopter shot down by pro-Russia rebels Thursday outside Slovyansk.

SLOVYANSK, Ukraine -- In another blow to Ukraine's armed forces, rebels shot down a troop helicopter Thursday, killing at least 12 soldiers, including a general who had served in the Soviet army and was in charge of combat training.

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Ukraine, meanwhile, announced that President-elect Petro Poroshenko will be sworn in June 7, less than two weeks after his overwhelming victory in special balloting that was hoped would ease tensions in the deeply divided country. Poroshenko has promised to negotiate with representatives in rebellious eastern Ukraine but also has vowed to uproot the pro-Moscow rebels who want the region to join Russia.

U.S. President Barack Obama plans to meet with Poroshenko during a trip to Europe next week, the U.S. leader told NPR News in an interview that was scheduled to air Thursday. Obama told the radio network he expects to discuss Crimea with Poroshenko during their meeting.

The Mi-8 helicopter was downed on the outskirts of Slovyansk by rebels using a portable air-defense missile, according to Oleksandr Turchynov, Ukraine's acting president, in remarks to parliament in Kiev. Slovyansk, a city of 120,000 people, has become a focal point for the insurgency and has for weeks been encircled by Ukrainian troops.

photo

AP

A Ukrainian soldier guards a checkpoint Thursday outside Slovyansk near where at least a dozen soldiers died when a helicopter was shot down by rebels.

Turchynov said the helicopter was rotating troops into a checkpoint when it came under rebel fire. Among the dead was Gen. Serhiy Kulchytskiy, who the Interfax news agency said had once served in the Soviet army and was in charge of training Ukraine's national guard.

The insurgents also attacked a military base near Luhansk, according to the national guard.

White House spokesman Jay Carney said the U.S. hasn't verified what happened in the helicopter attack, but he added that Washington is concerned because it indicates the separatists still have access to advanced weapons and are getting help from outside Ukraine, alluding to Russia.

On Thursday, Secretary of State John Kerry raised concerns with Russia's foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, about reports of foreign fighters, including Chechens, crossing into Ukraine from Russia, the State Department said.

Additionally, the White House and State Department both said a de-escalation of the crisis was imperative and called on Russia to exert pressure on the separatists to get them to end the fighting and release a group of international monitors who have been detained in eastern Ukraine since earlier this week.

Also on Thursday, U.S. defense officials said Russia had pulled most of its forces away from the Ukraine border, with only about a couple of thousand troops remaining out of an original 40,000. The U.S. had been demanding the withdrawal for weeks. The defense officials spoke only on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the precise numbers.

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said that the departure was "promising," but he added, "They are not where they need to be and won't be until all of their troops that they positioned along that border a couple of months ago are gone."

Hagel said he has not spoken to his Russian counterpart about the withdrawal.

"We do know that thousands of Russian troops have been pulled back and are moving away. But we also know that there are still thousands of Russian troops still there that have not yet moved," Hagel said.

'Cannot destroy them'

While Ukrainian forces may be better-equipped than their opponents, fears that fighting could degenerate into urban warfare have so far held authorities back from ordering an all-out assault.

"It is extremely difficult to fight against guerrillas. You just cannot destroy them. They are not regular troops," said Igor Sutyagin, a research fellow at the London-based Royal United Services Institute. "It's the classic problem which Russia had in Chechnya and the United States had in Vietnam."

The Ukrainian government has been waging a military campaign in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions to try to put down the uprising by gunmen who have taken over public buildings and set up checkpoints. Dozens have been killed on both sides, including on Monday, when Ukrainian forces used fighter jets and helicopter gunships to dislodge rebels from the airport outside the city of Donetsk, the regional capital.

In recent days, Ukrainian troops have been using mortars to try to retake Slovyansk, causing civilian casualties and prompting some residents to flee.

"They are shooting at us from grenade launchers. We hear explosions. The windows of our house are shaking," said Olga Mikhailova, who said she was leaving Slovyansk for the safety of her family. "I have four children. It is terrifying being here, because I am afraid for their lives."

Russia's Foreign Ministry denounced the use of aircraft and artillery against the rebels and demanded that Kiev end a "fratricidal war and launch a real political dialogue with all political forces and representatives of the regions."

It would be impossible to restore peace without Kiev halting the military operation against the rebels and withdrawing its troops, the ministry said. It urged the West to use its influence with Kiev to "stop Ukraine from sliding into a national catastrophe."

In an apparent bid to de-escalate tensions and avoid a new round of Western sanctions -- imposed after Moscow annexed the Crimean Peninsula in southern Ukraine -- Russian President Vladimir Putin has ignored the appeal by the separatists to join with Russia. His spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said Moscow has agreed to send "humanitarian aid" to eastern Ukraine.

Kiev condemns the insurgents as "terrorists" bent on destroying Ukraine and accuses Russia of fomenting the unrest, which Russia denies.

In other action Thursday, dozens of fighters from the insurgents' Vostok Battalion briefly surrounded the separatists' headquarters in Donetsk in the most serious instance of infighting seen among the militants.

The standoff apparently was provoked by anger in the battalion, which is thought to be made up mostly of men from Russia's North Caucasus, at reports of their allies looting a supermarket near the Donetsk airport after Monday's deadly battle.

The confrontation ended with the militiamen seizing the apparently looted goods and bulldozing away the barricades that have stood outside the administration building since early April, when the self-styled Donetsk People's Republic announced its formation.

Morale among Ukrainian forces also seems to be slipping: In one episode reported this week by NTV, a pro-Kremlin Russian broadcaster, the parents of conscripts descended upon a Ukrainian Interior Ministry base in the Luhansk region to take their sons home.

An announcement Thursday by acting Defense Minister Mykhailo Koval that no troops involved in eastern Ukraine would be rotated out of the region is seen as likely further souring moods. Koval blamed a lack of personnel.

Information for this article was contributed by Peter Leonard, Alexander Zemlianichenko, Laura Mills, Vladimir Isachenkov, Matthew Lee and Josh Lederman of The Associated Press; by Andrew Roth and Sabrina Tavernise of The New York Times; and by Volodymyr Verbyany, Daryna Krasnolutska, Ilya Arkhipov, Kateryna Choursina, Ryan Chilcote, Elizabeth Konstantinova, Olga Tanas, Scott Rose, Elena Mazneva, Terry Atlas, Angela Greiling Keane, Ewa Krukowska, James G. Neuger, Ott Ummelas, Leon Mangasarian, Brian Parkin and Jake Rudnitsky of Bloomberg News.

A Section on 05/30/2014

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