Separatists in eastern Ukraine on Tuesday proclaimed a new state that aspires to include not only the areas they control but also the rest of Ukraine.
The surprise announcement in the rebel stronghold of Donetsk casts further doubt on the 2015 cease-fire deal that was supposed to stop fighting in Ukraine’s industrial heartland and bring those areas back into Kiev’s fold while granting them wide autonomy.
More than 10,000 people have died in fighting after Russia-backed rebels took control of parts of Ukraine’s east in April 2014 after Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula. The rebels originally sought to join Russia but the …read more
Source: Voice of America
