![]() We will put an end to these horrors - a real war is being waged against our country," said Poroshenko, who is expected to be inaugurated within two weeks. ![]() "We will no longer permit these terrorists to kidnap and shoot people, occupy buildings or suspend the law. We must react," he told Germany's Bild newspaper. Crimea is occupied by Russia and there is great instability. Poroshenko, 48, a billionaire confectionary magnate who became the first Ukrainian since 1991 to win the presidency outright in a single round of voting, repeated his promise to restore government control rapidly over secessionist-held areas. The government said it suffered no losses in the operation, when its aircraft strafed the airport and paratroops landed to reclaim it. The separatist authorities say as many as 50 died, including a truckload of wounded fighters blasted apart as they were driven away from the battlefield. Morgues were filled on Tuesday with bodies of rebel gunmen, some missing limbs. The assault was the first time Kiev has unleashed its full military force against the fighters after weeks of restraint. Rebel fighters were strengthening their barricades with sandbags on the road to the airport near the hulk of a truck where many of them were killed by government fire on Monday. The rebels' plight puts pressure on President Vladimir Putin to act, even though he has reduced the number of forces he has massed on Ukraine's eastern border and has said he would recognise the outcome of Sunday's election in Ukraine. His ministry urged Kiev to let it send humanitarian aid to civilians trapped by the fighting in eastern Ukraine. In Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov accused the West of pushing Ukraine into "the abyss of fratricidal war", and reiterated his call for an end to Kiev's military offensive. "We are Russians and this is precisely why they are killing us. "The residents of the Donetsk People's Republic are on the verge of a humanitarian catastrophe," he said. ![]() On Wednesday their leader Denis Pushilin appealed again for Russia's help. Pro- Moscow gunmen have declared the city of a million people capital of an independent Donetsk People's Republic. However, this appeared minor compared with on Monday and Tuesday when government forces killed dozens of rebel fighters in an assault to retake Donetsk International Airport, which the rebels had seized the morning after Ukrainians overwhelmingly elected Petro Poroshenko as president. Reuters reporters heard sounds of distant gunfire coming from the south of the city and local media reported brief outbreaks of fighting on the outskirts, although this could not be independently confirmed. Relative calm returned to the streets of Donetsk on Wednesday after the biggest battle of the pro-Russian separatist uprising in eastern Ukraine, a conflict transformed by the landslide election of a pro-European leader who vowed to crush the revolt. ![]()
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