Despite Ukraine Truce, a Battle That Continues
ARTEMIVSK, Ukraine — A battle for a railroad town in eastern Ukraine
escalated sharply on Tuesday, with both the Ukrainian Army and
Russian-backed militants saying that their soldiers were engaging in
pitched street battles.
By
midday, the separatists said they had captured the town, Debaltseve, a
separatist news agency reported. The Ukrainian military denied that,
saying it was repelling the attacks.
“An intense fight is underway now on the outskirts of Debaltseve,” Ukraine’s
military spokesman, Andriy Lysenko, said in Kiev, Ukraine’s capital.
“There are engagements near the train station. But our soldiers are
holding their positions, and they have full authority to return fire.”
Either way, the fighting in and around Debaltseve threatened to unravel a cease-fire that took effect on Sunday.
As
many as 8,000 Ukrainian soldiers are holed up in the city, a rail hub
connecting the capitals of the two rebel regions, Donetsk and Luhansk.
Rebels have reportedly sent text messages to phones in the town, telling
the soldiers that they have been abandoned and should surrender.
Ukraine Crisis in Maps
The
Ukrainian government maintains that the town was not surrounded before
the cease-fire took effect, and that European monitors of the truce
should insist that the separatist forces halt their offensive and open a
corridor to evacuate the wounded.
The
main rebel group, the Donetsk People’s Republic, has said it will not
observe the agreement in Debaltseve, saying that it was encircled before
the cease-fire began and that it is therefore now an internal region in
its enclave, not a section of the front.
The
only resupply road into Debaltseve is mined, in range of rebel
artillery and at times held by pro-Russian infantry. On Friday, eight
Ukrainian soldiers reportedly escaped on foot through the fields, and on
Sunday, a dozen or so made it out in a truck.
On
Tuesday, however, Ukrainian rocket-launching trucks and tanks were
barreling down the resupply road toward the fighting, though the
cease-fire required both sides to withdraw heavy weaponry starting at
midnight Monday.
Rebel
shelling was hitting points up and down the resupply road on Tuesday. A
shell struck a gas pipeline beside the highway, and it burned unabated
in a gigantic twirl of orange flame.
An
artillery barrage sent black smoke rising from a checkpoint by a
critical and already damaged bridge, and tank crews scrambling.
“They
are shooting at us,” one soldier at a checkpoint on the route said as
the booms of both outgoing and incoming artillery echoed from miles
around.
“Where’s the help from America?” he asked. “We are poor and cannot fight the Russians alone.”
Another soldier scoffed at the idea that a few American weapons could help. The United States and Europe should force Russia to observe the cease-fire, he said. “We don’t need weapons,” he said, “we need peace.”
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