NEW YORK TIMES: The Ukrainian military landed airborne troops at an airport about 25 miles south of here on Tuesday, raising tensions with Russia in the opening phase of what the government in Kiev called a wider military operation to confront pro-Russian militants in the eastern part of the country.
Later in the day, a column of armored personnel carriers flying Ukrainian flags approached Slovyansk from the north, parking for a time beside a highway and setting up a checkpoint. Of all the cities in the east, Slovyansk seemed to have fallen most completely under the control of pro-Russian separatists, who have erected massive defensive barricades outside the buildings they occupy…
At the small military air base in the town of Kramatorsk, Ukrainian soldiers quickly took control, holding at bay separatists who had surrounded the field’s perimeter, which is guarded by a barbed wire fence. At some point the commander of the operation, Gen. Vasily Krutov, left the base to speak to a crowd of protesters numbering about 500 to urge them to disperse. But the crowd remained hostile, and when he turned to head back to the base he was roughed up, people in the crowd said, shoved hard enough that his hat fell off.… (more)
