Ukraine’s leader-elect talks of peace, but the fighting goes on in Donetsk

DONETSK, Ukraine — Ukraine’s President-elect Petro Poroshenko extended an apparent olive branch to Russia on Monday, stating a willingness to talk to help end months of violent strife that have brought the country to the edge of civil war.

It was a move welcomed by Moscow. But on the streets of the eastern city of Donetsk, a different message emerged. Fighting between pro-Russian rebels and government troops resumed, including a fierce battle for the city’s airport, and some of the city’s citizens appeared in no mood for compromise.

“If Poroshenko wanted to talk to us about peace, then he should have stopped before he started calling us all bandits and thieves,” said Yuri Berezin, 51, an architect in Donetsk. “How can we talk to him after he’s used such words to describe us in the east? What kind of president of peace is that?”

Such sentiments mean Poroshenko likely has his work cut out for him to make good on his campaign promise to bring peace and security to the region. The continued fighting likewise doesn’t bode well.

At the airport in Donetsk, the Ukrainian military launched an offensive against the armed rebels after giving them an ultimatum, trying to push them back by firing on them from helicopters and fighter jets. The rebels retaliated with heavy fire from rocket launchers and anti-aircraft weapons. By late afternoon, the rebels had begun inching their way into the city of Donetsk, where they were trying to take the train station. At least one civilian was killed in the crossfire.

Poroshenko, a 48-year-old confectionery magnate, won the May 25 special presidential election with 54 percent, enough votes to secure an outright victory, with no need to face a runoff. Many voters said they went to the polls in the hope of electing a legitimate power in the country after six months of civil unrest and violence that has threatened to tear the country of 46 million in half. But as many as 80 percent of voters in the rebel-held areas of the east were unable to vote because of threats and intimidation from armed separatists, who kidnapped election committee workers and destroyed computers containing voter registration lists.

Berezin said he was not exactly a supporter of the armed men who are in control of numerous government buildings across Ukraine’s east and who call themselves the leaders of the Donetsk People’s Republic. But he also did not support the Kiev-organized presidential election to replace the ousted Viktor Yanukovych, who he said was legally elected, although largely at fault for many of the country’s economic woes.

In the meantime, Berezin said he was hoping Russia would annex the east. “If the Russian army showed up on our streets tomorrow, we would cross ourselves and thank God,” he said.

His passionate distrust of Poroshenko and the Kiev government he represents was a common theme in Donetsk on Monday, where gunfire and explosions could be heard in the center of the city.

If in Kiev and other parts of the country there was cautious optimism that a new president was a step toward stabilizing the country, in the east, there remained a lot of skepticism about the possibility of finding common ground with Kiev. Complicating things for Poroshenko will not only be finding common ground between east and west; among eastern Ukrainians the day after the election, there was also broad confusion about the future of the Donbas, the large industrial heartland. Some said they favored an independent republic, free of Kiev and Russia. Others said they wanted to become part of Russia, or to have more autonomy within a Ukrainian state by way of federalization.

“We don’t know who these people are, but we know that they are temporary to help us until the next step,” said Natasha Mironova, 36, referring to the armed men who have taken over government buildings in Donetsk and other cities across the east. “They will step down when we have our real leaders.”

She and her boyfriend were wearing T-shirts with the blue, red and black flag adopted by the Donetsk People’s Republic as they strolled down a boulevard lined with cafes and restaurants in downtown Donetsk. They did not vote in Sunday’s election, which they described as a “farce” organized by the “fascist junta” in Kiev.

Miranova said she would like to see the creation of Novorossiya, a territory that would include Crimea, Odessa and most of eastern Ukraine, including Donetsk. Russian President Vladimir Putin mentioned the territory in a speech last month.

The confusion even among eastern Ukrainians about the future of their region is perhaps the most frustrating for people like Anton Liagusha, an assistant professor of history at Donetsk National University who supports a united Ukraine.

He wasn’t able to vote on Sunday because his polling station had been ordered closed by separatists. However, he believes the presidential election was a step forward for Ukraine.

He would like to see the Ukrainian military take a harder line against the armed rebels terrorizing the city, he said. With a legally elected president, the state now had the authority to do so, he added.

“We are in a state now in which the president must be a leader,” Liagusha said. “Poroshenko shouldn’t negotiate with these separatists and criminals. It’s a joke that they call themselves the People’s Republic. What people are they talking about?”