Fighting eases in east Ukraine as Russia backs off support for separatists

Oren Dorell | USA TODAY

A long-sought cease-fire appears to be holding in eastern Ukraine, raising hopes that a truce negotiated in February may finally bring peace between Ukrainian national forces and Russian-backed separatists.

No Ukrainian troops died in combat so far this week, the Ukrainian military said, and international monitors report that fighting has fallen to the lowest levels in more than a year, according to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

Ukrainian government and separatist forces continue to maintain large forces close to each other, but the current calm “is quite unprecedented,” Michael Bociurkiw, an OSCE spokesman in Kiev, told USA TODAY. “Since the signing of first Minsk accord (cease-fire) in September of last year, I can’t recall a period like this.”

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said after meeting in Moscow with his French, Russian and Ukrainian counterparts on Saturday that the ministers agreed to start removing land mines, according to the Associated Press. He said he hoped the warring parties will pull back heavy weapons from the front.

Fighting broke out in April 2014 after Russia seized Ukraine's Crimea province and annexed it. Since then, about 8,000 people have died in the fighting, according to U.N. estimates.

The new calm comes as Russia appears to be ramping down its support of separatist forces in Ukraine’s breakaway provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk, according to analysts who follow the conflict closely.

Russia has denied sending weapons or troops into eastern Ukraine, although numerous journalists and officials from the U.S. State Department, NATO and European nations have documented Russian support to the separatists and participation in the fighting.

John Herbst, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, said there’s no sign that Russian President Vladimir Putin has begun to implement the terms of the cease-fire. “There’s been no movement of Russian equipment or soldiers out of Ukraine, so he could raise the temperature back up very quickly,” Herbst said.

A former NATO commander, retired Gen. Wesley Clark, said the easing of tensions could be durable or “a head fake.” Russia still has 50,000 troops in Ukraine and until they pull out, “we don’t know,” Clark said.

The Ukrainian government sought to ease tensions in August, when its parliament approved a draft constitutional amendment to grant greater autonomy to regions now held by separatists.

In Russia, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov added his voice to extending the calm last week, when he said separatists in Donetsk and Luhansk, two rebel strongholds in eastern Ukraine, are ready to hold elections according to Ukrainian law, but doing so requires direct talks between the separatists and Kiev government. Currently, separatists plan to hold municipal elections on Oct. 18, a week earlier than national elections.

The separatists also are showing signs of seeking a peaceful resolution, possibly because a separatist-sponsored poll conducted in August found that only 29% of Donetsk residents support the rebel government. Several separatist leaders who have balked at working with Ukrainian authorities have been ousted or arrested by rebel authorities.

Herbst cited reports from Ukrainian officials that Russia is recruiting fighters in eastern Ukraine to deploy to Syria, where Russia says it has sent armored vehicles and aircraft to support Syrian President Bashar Assad in a civil war against Islamic State militants and other rebel groups.

The change in direction comes after Russian-backed forces ran into unexpectedly stout resistance in Ukraine, Clark said.

At the time of Russia’s takeover of Ukraine’s Crimea province in February 2014, many in the West believed Ukrainians would not put up an effective fight because of a weakened military and government in disarray, he said. Since then, Ukraine's new European-oriented leadership has reorganized and strengthened its military “and it’s shown it can stand and fight,” Clark said. Putin's project in Ukraine "has not been successful," he added.

Herbst described the fighting as "a stalemate that favors Ukraine.”

Putin “is in a rough spot,” Herbst said. “And he’s seen no movement by Ukrainian authorities to move their policies in his direction.”