Free Republic

(Reuters) - Armored personal carriers driven into the eastern Ukrainian city of Slaviansk had been under the control of Ukrainian armed forces earlier on Wednesday, pictures taken by Reuters photographers showed. A soldier guarding one of six troop carriers now under the control of pro-Russian separatists told Reuters he was a member of Ukraine's 25th paratrooper division from Dnipropetrovsk. "All the soldiers and the officers are here. We are all boys who won't shoot our own people," said the soldier, whose uniform did not have any identifying markings on it. "They haven't fed us for three days on our base....

KRAMATORSK, Ukraine, April 15 (Reuters) - Ukrainian airborne troops landed in a town in the east of the country on Tuesday apparently at the start of a crackdown to root out pro-Russian separatists - but they pulled back into base after meeting a hostile reception from local civilians. The town of Kramatorsk is one of 10 localities in Ukraine's Russian-speaking east where separatist rebellions have broken out. The move suggested Ukraine's authorities were going ahead with a plan for a broad military crackdown to end the unrest which began 10 days ago. Separately, the state security service announced a similar...