3 killed as clashes rumble on in east Ukraine

Kiev, Mar 22: Two Ukrainian soldiers and one civilian were killed in the country's rebel-held east as clashes rattled an official truce aimed at ending nearly a year of fighting, Kiev and separatists have said.

"Over the last 24 hours we have lost two soldiers and seven were injured," Ukrainian military spokesman Andriy Lysenko told reporters yesterday. Rebel military representative Eduard Basurin also announced that a civilian was killed and one injured after tripping a bomb in Vuglegirsk, a separatist-controlled town 35 kilometres north-east of the rebel stronghold of Donetsk, on Thursday.

Basurin accused Kiev forces of injuring three civilians -- a man, woman and a child -- when they fired on Donetsk's Petrovsky district with a 120mm mortar late Friday.

According to both sides, skirmishes continued to flare around Shyrokyne, a village close to the strategic port of Mariupol, Kiev's largest remaining stronghold in the rebel-held east.

Separatists claim to control around 30 percent of the village, with many Ukrainians fearing Mariupol could become the focus of any new offensive in a conflict that has already claimed more than 6,000 lives in 11 months.

Fighting also broke out around the ruins of Donetsk airport, which rebels took in January following months of fierce fighting. Lysenko reported two clashes close to the airport, near the village of Opytne, and 15 sightings of enemy drones around Mariupol and Lugansk, another separatist bulwark.

Both sides accused each other of violating the Minsk peace accords, which were signed last month. Ukraine President Petro Poroshenko later warned that he would respond with force if there were another offensive, but said that there was no ultimate military solution to the crisis.

"We cannot solve the conflict only with tanks and (multiple rocket launcher) Grads," said the president in an interview with the Ukranian TV channel Inter aired yesterday.

"We will pay the price with tens of thousands of lives if we fight against the occupying Russian troops, and separatists backed by Russia, in urban neighbourhoods. Kiev and the West accuse Russian President Vladimir Putin of supporting the insurgency with troops, tanks and heavy weapons -- accusations he rejects.

"We are at war, but we have a firm hope for peace," stressed Poroshenko. "But we will do everything possible to break the teeth of the enemy if he launches an offensive," he added.

AFP