Alternatively euphemized in the press as “separatists,” “activists,” “armed men,” “militants,” and “commandos,” Russian paramilitary forces with heavy assault rifles and armor bearing no insignia stormed municipal buildings in Eastern Ukraine this weekend.
At least one Ukrainian officer was killed on Sunday and several were injured, according to the Times. This morning, paramilitaries defied the deadline ordered by the Ukrainian government to vacate under threat of a “full-scale” military response. Among the photojournalists on the ground this weekend was AFP’s Dimitar Dilkoff, who has been filing great work from the region over the past months. Thanks to Getty Images’ new embed function, here are some the strongest pictures on the wires from April 11 – April 14.
Something about those Kalashnikovs looks a bit different from the homemade Borjomi water bottle Molotovs during Euromaidan, no? Check out AFP photographer Genya Savilov’s feed for more.
(Lead Image: Dimitar Dilkoff/AFP/Getty Images; Caption: Armed pro-Russian supporters carry an Eastern Orthodox icon of Mary Magdalene outside the secret service building in the eastern Ukrainian city of Lugansk on April 13, 2014. Ukraine’s interior minister said on April 13 that both sides had suffered casualties during a raid launched by Ukrainian special forces on a police station in the eastern city of Slavyansk that was seized by pro-Russian gunmen.)
