Sound The Trumpet : Ukraine Crisis: NATO Releases Satellite Images Which Show Russian Troops Operating in Ukraine

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“Ukraine Crisis: NATO Releases Satellite Images Which Show Russian Troops Operating in Ukraine”
by abc.net.au
August 31st, 2014

Satellite image allegedly shows Russian military units moving in a convoy with self-propelled artillery in the area of Krasnodon, Ukraine.

Photo: A satellite image allegedly shows Russian military units moving in a convoy with self-propelled artillery in the area of Krasnodon, Ukraine. (AFP/HO/Digital Globe)

NATO has released satellite images which it says show Russian combat forces, armed with heavy weapons, engaged in military operations in Ukraine.

Well over 1,000 Russian troops are operating inside Ukraine, marking a significant escalation of Moscow's military involvement in the country, NATO said.

"Over the past two weeks we have noted a significant escalation in both the level and sophistication of Russia's military interference in Ukraine," Dutch Brigadier-General Nico Tak, head of NATO's crisis management centre, told reporters at NATO's military headquarters near Mons, Belgium.

"We assess well over 1,000 Russian troops are now operating inside Ukraine," he said, referring to Russia's actions as "incursions" rather than an invasion.

"They are supporting separatists (and) fighting with them."

NATO estimates Russia also has about 20,000 troops close to the Ukrainian border, Brigadier-General Tak said.

"We have also detected large quantities of advanced weapons, including air defence systems, artillery, tanks and armoured personnel carriers being transferred to separatist forces in eastern Ukraine," he said.

But the Russian ambassador to the European Union, Vladimir Chizhov, has rejected the allegations.

"NATO has never produced a single piece of evidence, neither have the United States, nor the European Union, nor anybody else. Not a single piece of evidence. That is not the first time this is happening," Mr Chizhov said.

Ukraine accused Russia on Thursday of bringing troops into the south-east of the country in support of pro-Moscow separatist rebels.

NATO ambassadors will hold an emergency meeting with their Ukrainian counterpart in Brussels on Friday at Kiev's request to discuss the situation, a NATO official said. NATO ambassadors will also meet separately on Friday.

UN Security Council holds emergency meeting

US president Barack Obama said the images released by NATO make it "plain for the world to see" that Russian forces are destabilising the situation in eastern Ukraine.

"The violence is encouraged by Russia, the separatists are trained by Russia, they are armed by Russia, they are funded by Russia," he told a press conference at the White House.

"This comes as Ukrainian forces are making progress against the separatists. As a result of the actions, Russia has already taken, and the major sanctions we have imposed with our European and international partners, Russia is already more isolated than at any time since the end of the cold war."

The US leader nevertheless said that Washington was "not taking military action to solve the Ukrainian problem".

"It is not on the cards for us to see a military confrontation between Russia and the United States in this region," he said.

The UN Security Council has held an emergency meeting to discuss the deteriorating situation in Ukraine and NATO's revelations.

The US ambassador to the UN, Samantha Power, said it was clear Russia had joined the separatists in fighting Ukrainian government forces.

"Serious negotiations are needed, urgently needed, but Russia has to stop lying and has to stop fuelling this conflict. The mask is coming off," she said.

"In these acts, these recent acts, we see Russia's actions for what they are, a deliberate effort to support and now fight alongside illegal separatists in another sovereign country."

Vitaly Churkin, Russia's ambassador to the UN, told the meeting the Kiev's policies in eastern Ukraine had inflamed tensions and questioned its cooperation with an investigation into the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17.

Australia's acting ambassador to the UN, Michael Bliss, told the meeting Moscow must "immediately withdraw its military equipment and personnel from Ukrainian territory".

"These latest developments indicate a new and even more dangerous escalation of the crisis which appears to be moving to a wider area of Ukraine and drawing in the southern land route to Crimea," Mr Bliss told the meeting.

"Russia must control its border. This is the only effective way to prevent troops and equipment entering Ukraine and key to a ceasefire."

A United Nations report this week said more than 2,200 people have been killed, not including the 298 who died when a Malaysian airliner was shot down over rebel-held territory in July.

Images show Russian units moving self-propelled artillery

One satellite picture released by NATO, taken on August 21, showed Russian military units moving in convoy with self-propelled artillery in the area of Krasnodon, inside territory controlled by Russian separatists.

A second image, taken on August 23, showed Russian self-propelled artillery units set up in firing positions near Krasnodon, supported by logistical vehicles likely to have been carrying extra ammunition and supplies, NATO said.

"This is highly sophisticated equipment which requires a well-trained crew. It takes months to train crews like that. It's extremely unlikely these sorts of units are manned by separatists," Brigadier-General Tak said.

Ukraine crisis reaches 'new level'

Europe correspondent Philip Williams spoke with ABC News 24 about the situation in Ukraine.

Allegedly there is a column of about 100 vehicles, including tanks, armoured personnel carriers and other military vehicles.

They allegedly opened a new front and there has certainly been rebel activity at the very least in areas that we haven't seen before and this is down south in the south-eastern corner of Ukraine and near the Sea of Azov.

The alleged possible goal in the immediate term is Mariupol, a strategically important port town.

It is confronting for the Ukrainians because they had the rebels bottled up in Luhansk and Donetsk and other places in between.

If this report does turn out to be true, that there are direct Russian troops involving Russian vehicles, it is a huge escalation.

That is what the Ukrainians are saying, there is no equivocation about that in their minds and the president has said, and I will quote him, he said, "There is an invasion of Russian forces has taken place".

There are calls by the Ukrainian Government for the UN Security Council to meet.

This is a new level, a sense of crisis but I must say it is limited in one sense that this is not a full scale invasion by Russian troops. This is a limited invasion by Russian troops if it is what it is said to be.

If the Russians were seriously invading the whole of Ukraine, then given the might of their army, they could do it very quickly indeed.

He said the escalation of Russian military operations in recent weeks was directly linked to the success of Ukrainian government operations against pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine, including "the loss of territory by the separatists, the loss of weapons and the loss of manpower".

Since Monday, Russia had carried out a new incursion near Novoazovsk in south-eastern Ukraine, he said.

"This effectively creates a second front for the Ukrainian forces. This is an extremely effective way to take pressure off the separatists," he said.

The Russian move put Ukrainian armed forces in a dire situation because from south-eastern Ukraine Russian forces could either move to link up with Donetsk area or move further west towards Crimea, which Russia annexed in March, he said.

"From a strategic perspective it is clear that Russia is not willing to accept a defeat of the separatists. So it will most likely do anything that it takes to prevent such a defeat," Brigadier-General Tak said.

"I suspect they (Russian forces) will do no more than absolutely necessary at this point to show their hand," he said.

"The next thing we will see is Russia is going to try and freeze this conflict. It is going to try and prolong the conflict, making it difficult for Ukraine to sustain that operation, making sure that they don't have to sell a defeat at home and trying to broker some kind of deal with Kiev, something that will allow them enduring influence in eastern Ukraine."

Asked about the likelihood of Russian troops creating a "land bridge" from Russia to Crimea via Mariupol, Brigadier-General Tak said: "It is obviously something that we are watching quite closely."

Creating a land bridge to Crimea would require a lot more Russian resources but it was not impossible, he said.

He said there was clear evidence that there had been military contact between Ukrainian and Russian forces.

Pictures of graves in north-western Russia that had appeared in the media suggested Russia had taken casualties, he said.

Despite NATO's concern over the situation in Ukraine, the 28-nation, US dominated alliance has said repeatedly it has no intention of intervening militarily in Ukraine, which is not a NATO member.

It has reinforced the security of NATO allies in the region and will discuss further steps at a summit in Wales next week.

NATO satellite image Russian trucks in Ukraine

Photo: NATO released images allegedly showing Russian self-propelled artillery units set up in firing positions. (AFP / HO / Digital Globe)

Poroshenko convenes urgent meeting of security advisers

Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko has condemned Russia for what he says are Russian troop movements into the south-east of Ukraine.

Mr Poroshenko cancelled an official trip to Turkey and convened an urgent meeting of his security advisers to deal with what he called the rapidly deteriorating situation in the embattled Donetsk region.

"I have made a decision to cancel my working visit to the Republic of Turkey due to sharp aggravation of the situation in Donetsk region, particularly in Amvrosiivka and Starobeshevo, as Russian troops were actually brought into Ukraine," Mr Poroshenko said in a statement.

Photo: The offensive by Ukrainian forces has reduced the rebels' stronghold on the region. (Reuters/Gleb Garanich)

Earlier this week, Mr Poroshenko promised to work on an urgent ceasefire plan to defuse his country's separatist conflict following late-night talks with Russian president Vladimir Putin.

The first negotiations between the two leaders since June were described by Mr Putin as positive, but he said it was not for Russia to get into the details of truce terms between the Kiev government and rebels.

"We didn't substantively discuss that, and we, Russia, can't substantively discuss conditions of a ceasefire, of agreements between Kiev, Donetsk and Luhansk," Mr Putin said.

"That's not our business. It's up to Ukraine itself.

"We can only contribute to create a situation of trust for a possible, and in my view, extremely necessary negotiation process."

The United States also warned it was considering new sanctions against Russia over its involvement in the latest fighting in Ukraine.

"We have additional tools and sanctions that we can certainly choose to put in place," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said.

"A military solution is not what we think is the appropriate approach so we are taking every tool that we can to see if we can reach a solution here through diplomatic means," she added.

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