Putin and Poroshenko May Speak the Same Language, and It's not Russian

The city of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine was in turmoil on Tuesday, a day after government forces stopped pro-Russia separatists from taking over the airport. Dozens were reported killed and the mayor went on television to urge residents to stay indoors. On Monday, the separatists were repelled by government forces using combat jets and helicopter gunships. AP journalists reported that they witnessed intensive gun fire throughout the day and into the night. As rising black smoke marked the fighting, officials shut down Donetsk airport and nearby streets to traffic. The Donetsk mayor said 40 people, including two civilians, were killed in Monday's fighting. Rebel leaders said the deaths could reach 100 in Monday's fighting, adding that many bodies had not been recovered because they were in areas under government control. He said the morgue at Kalinin was too small to hold all the bodies and authorities were searching for refrigerator trucks pending identification of the dead. The separatists also asserted that up to half of the dead could be civilians, the Russian ITAR-Tass news agency reported. Vladislav Seleznyov, a spokesman for Kiev's anti-terrorist operation, wrote on his Facebook account that the military presented an ultimatum early on Monday afternoon to unknown armed men who had occupied the airport to lay down their arms. The airstrikes began when the insurgents did not comply. The battles in Donetsk came just as billionaire candy magnate Petro Poroshenko claimed victory in Sunday's presidential election, and there was speculation that the separatists were attempting to seize the Donetsk airport to prevent the new president ftom visiting eastern Ukraine as he promised to do. ~~~~~ In related news, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said Tuesday it had lost contact with a four-person monitoring team last heard from outside Donetsk, the site of fierce battles between Ukrainian troops and insurgents. In April, pro-Russia separatists took a similar OSCE team hostage and held them for a week. And, separatist attacks continued early Tuesday when a group of unidentified men, said to be Russian, stormed Donetsk's main ice-hockey arena - which had been set to host the 2015 world championships - and set it ablaze, according to the mayor's office. In the neighboring Luhansk region, the Ukrainian Border Guards Service said that its officers engaged in a gunbattle with a group of gunmen who were trying to break through the border from Russia. It said one intruder was wounded and the border guards seized several vehicles loaded with Kalashnikov assault rifles, rocket grenade launchers and explosives. The Border Guard also reported that as many as 40 trucks filled with troops were lined up on the Russian side of the Russia-Ukraine border, ready to enter eastern Ukraine. Speaking at a televised government session on Tuesday, Vitaly Yarema, a deputy prime minister in the interim Ukraine cabinet said the "anti-terrorist operation" in eastern Ukraine will go on "until all the militants are annihilated." ~~~~~ Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov warned the newly elected Ukraine President Poroshenko against trying to win a quick military victory before his inauguration, saying that it would be "unlikely to create favorable conditions for a hospitable welcome in the Donetsk region." Lavrov promised that Russia will be Poroshenko's "serious and reliable partner" if he moved to negotiate an end to hostilities. Poroshenko, known for his pragmatism, supports building strong ties with Europe but also has stressed the importance of mending relations with Moscow. Upon claiming victory, he said his first step as president would be to visit the troubled east. He said he hoped Russia would support his efforts to establish stability and that he wanted to hold talks with Moscow. Lavrov welcomed Poroshenko's promise to negotiate with people in the east and said Moscow was ready for direct talks with Poroshenko - without the United States or the European Union as mediators. But Ukraine's acting Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk said Ukraine has no intention of talking to Russia directly : "Bilateral talks without the presence of the United States and the European Union do not seem possible under current conditions," he said. Moscow has denied accusations by the authorities in Kiev and the West that it has fomented the insurgency in eastern Ukraine. While Russian President Vladimir Putin annexed the Ukrainian Black Sea peninsula of Crimea in March, he has stonewalled the eastern separatists' appeal to join Russia. Russia, however, has kept pushing Ukraine to decentralize its government, which would give more power to the regions and allow Moscow to keep eastern Ukraine in its sphere of influence. Putin said before Sunday's presidential election that Moscow would accept the election results and engage in dialogue with the winner. But Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday: "The question of a visit to Russia by Poroshenko is not being considered and is not being discussed through diplomatic or any other channels." He again called on Poroshenko to stop military operations in eastern Ukraine mmediately and implement the roadmap for peace negotiated in Geneva on 17 April. Speaking at a news conference in Moscow, he said a "real war" was under way in the eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions. The regions declared independence after Russia annexed the Crimean peninsula in the wake of the removal of Ukraine's pro-Moscow President Viktor Yanukovich. ~~~~~ Dear readers, Vladimir Putin has wasted no time after Sunday's election in calling for the Ukrainian army to immediately end its operation against pro-Russian separatists, after dozens were killed in bloody clashes Monday on the order of the new Ukraine president. Since Sunday's presidential election, the Russian President also has increased pressure on Kiev to start a dialogue with separatist leaders as fighting continues. The Kremlin said President Putin had spoken to Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi (Renzi will assume the 6-month rotating presidency of the EU in June) by telephone and “underscored the need for an immediate halt to the punitive military operation in the southeastern regions and the establishment of peaceful dialogue between Kiev and representatives of the regions." Russia said it started to withdraw troops stationed along its border with Ukraine since the start of the crisis but Nato and Ukraine Border Guard units say many remain. The only 'given' in the Ukraine crisis is that it will not be settled without the agreement of Vladimir Putin. Even the Swedish foreign minister told CNN on Monday that there is no way to take Crimea back from Putin. So, we are faced with a new Ukraine president who is able to be more aggressive than the interim government. But he is saddled with an army much too small to successfully take on Russia's. And he has as allies a Europe and America whose only agreed tactic is economic sanctions against Russia. Putin has already turned this into a new long-term gas supply contract with China. So, not only has Vladimir Putin frozen the West into inaction in Ukraine, he has parried his position into a lucrative deal with China, and perhaps he has thus opened the door for a new Russia-China strategic alliance. But, it may be that the election of Petro Poroshenko as Ukraine's president will have an unintended positive effect - Vladimir Putin is used to dealing with billionaires - he created some when he turned loose the Russian oligarchs to strip Russian industry bare and re-form it for their and his benefit. Petro Poroshenko is a billionaire. Perhaps he and Putin speak a common language - money.