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| Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia |
| Top Ukrainian Rebel Official Killed in Car Bomb |
| 2017-02-05 |
| [An Nahar] The top military official of a self-proclaimed separatist republic in eastern Ukraine was killed by boom-mobile Saturday, the latest victim of a string of similar attacks, local media reported. Oleg Anashchenko, head of the military department of the Lugansk People's Republic, died in a car kaboom, the pro-Russian rebels' news agency said. The blast, which took place in the rebels' de facto capital of Lugansk, was "a terrorist act" that also took the life of another one person, the report said. It accused Ukrainian forces of killing Anashchenko in a claim denied by Kiev. The latest incident echoed a similar one in August when the same republic's leader Igor Plotnitsky was injured in a suspected boom-mobileing. Lugansk is the smaller of two breakaway pro-Russian provinces that have been fighting Ukrainian government forces for 33 months. Senior Donetsk rebel officials have also been killed in an apparent power struggle. The latest blast coincided with a surge in fighting between Ukrainian troops and those from the neighbouring self-proclaimed People's Republic of Donetsk which has killed 35 people since Sunday. |
| Posted by:Fred |