largest tank battle, eastern front collapses

The self-proclaimed ‘Donetsk People’s Republic’ says local volunteer groups have sprung up there too, providing hot meals for those in need and repairing infrastructure damaged by shelling. On the other side of enemy lines, fighting has left many without sufficient supplies to get through the winter. Up to 12 volunteers gather daily in a cramped room inside a refugee center in Kiev to rip old cocoa bean sacks into threads and knot them one by one onto fishing nets to make the suits.Ĭalled ‘kikimora’ after a hairy bog-dwelling spirit of Slavic mythology, each takes seven days to complete, but costs around 150 hryvnia ($10) compared with the 2,000 hryvnia the army would have to pay for a regular suit, Lytvynenko said.Ī September ceasefire has been repeatedly flouted by both sides and although violence has lessened in recent weeks, fuelling hopes of de-escalation, Kiev has said it will not withdraw its troops from their positions in the near future. “Our army doesn’t have enough of anything, from socks to heavy weapons,” said Yuliana Lytvynenko, a full-time volunteer who runs a group that makes camouflage suits for snipers and army scouts. Ukrainian citizens have stepped in, donating time or money to help the soldiers in a conflict that has so far killed more than 4,700 soldiers, rebels and civilians. Since separatism erupted in Ukraine’s east in April, the struggle to equip the army adequately has grown ever more acute as the country teeters on the edge of bankruptcy.

KIEV (Reuters) - Ukrainians are knitting socks, donating scrap metal and even crowd-funding a tank to keep their woefully underfunded army going as its standoff with pro-Russian rebels in the east drags on toward the new year.

Largest tank battle, eastern front collapses