ARTEMIVSK, Ukraine -- Ukrainian forces fought their way out of Debaltseve in the early hours of Wednesday, embarking on a risky overnight breakout rather than surrender as they abandoned the town to pro-Russia separatists.
President Petro Poroshenko said in a televised statement that he had ordered the retreat from Debaltseve, a strategic transportation hub where intense fighting has raged in recent days despite a cease-fire agreement signed last week in Minsk, Belarus.
Separatist leaders have insisted that the cease-fire agreement did not apply to Debaltseve, but no exceptions were mentioned when the deal was announced in Minsk.
In a post on Twitter and in his televised statement from an airfield in Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, before leaving to visit the front line, Poroshenko called the withdrawal "planned and organized" and said Ukrainian troops had accomplished their mission.
As many as 8,000 Ukrainian soldiers were said to be in Debaltseve before the withdrawal. It was unclear Wednesday how many survived and avoided capture. Poroshenko said 80 percent of the army's units had left.
By midday Wednesday, limping and exhausted soldiers were showing up on the Ukrainian side of the front lines, describing a harrowing ordeal that began with a surprise 1 a.m. order to retreat.
"Many trucks left, and only a few arrived," said a sergeant who identified himself only as Volodomyr. "A third of us made it, at most."
Others said a majority of the soldiers who set off from Debaltseve in a column of about 100 trucks had managed to escape the encirclement, many of them straggling out on foot after their vehicles were blown up.
The order to retreat was kept secret until the last minute, and soldiers were told to prepare in 10 minutes and pile into the beds of troop transport trucks, said Albert Sardaryen, a 22-year-old medic who made the journey.
The trucks lined up on the edge of town, Sardaryen said, while tanks and tracked vehicles formed lines on either side of the truck convoy to try to shield the soldiers. The column drove through farm fields, rather than use a main road, that had been mined, and the trucks kept their headlights off to make them harder to spot.
The column was attacked almost immediately, he said, and trucks started breaking down and colliding in the dark. By dawn, the column was strung out on the plain and taking fire from all sides.
"They were shooting with tanks, rocket propelled grenades and sniper rifles," and firing at the disintegrating column with rockets, he said. Dead and wounded soldiers were left on the snowy field because there were too many of them to carry after the trucks were hit.
"We stabilized them, applied tourniquets, gave them painkillers and tried to put them in a place with better cover," Sardaryen said of the wounded. Later, a Ukrainian unit from outside the encirclement drove in to try to recover the wounded, he said.
Sardaryen said he ran on foot for the final 4 miles or so. Many of the soldiers who made it out also did so on foot, though some trucks made it all the way through, he said.
Oleksandr Bogunov, an army private, said the order came to carry only what would be useful for the fight on the way out, and leave all other ammunition and weaponry behind.
Poroshenko ordered the retreat after the separatists boasted of controlling the town Tuesday, and after President Vladimir Putin of Russia suggested at a news conference in Hungary that Ukraine should accept its defeat at Debaltseve by the separatist forces, whom he described as "underdogs."
Russia is widely believed to be actively supporting the separatists.
"Life is life; it just goes on," Putin said. "No need to dwell on it."
Andriy Lysenko, a spokesman for the Ukrainian national security and defense council, confirmed the retreat from Debaltseve at a briefing Wednesday in Kiev, the capital. He said the pullout was nearly completed.
"Today the armed forces of Ukraine are conducting the organized, planned retreat of units of forces of the anti-terrorist operation from the city of Debaltseve," Lysenko said. "At the moment, almost 80 percent of the Ukrainian units have retreated from this sector and this operation is to be completed soon."
Though the cease-fire agreement -- which was negotiated by Putin, Poroshenko, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and President Francois Hollande of France -- was reached last Thursday, it did not formally take effect until 12:01 a.m. Sunday.
The leaders provided no real explanation of the decision to delay the deal's implementation for about 60 hours.
Poroshenko has said he was willing to accept an immediate halt in the fighting and that the delay was at Russia's insistence. Experts said that seemed to be a reflection of the advantageous position of separatist fighters on the ground in the battle for Debaltseve.
A Section on 02/19/2015