Car bomb kills two soldiers in Ukraine

KIEV, Ukraine

At least two Ukrainian soldiers were killed and one wounded in a car bomb attack at a checkpoint in the southeast of city Mariupol Sunday, Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council said.

Andrey Lisenko, the spokesperson for the council, confirmed that two soldiers lost their lives when a car exploded at the checkpoint near the entrance of the city.

“We believe the car bombs were detonated by remote control. We have launched an investigation into the incident,” he said.

Meanwhile, pro-Russian separatists have begun voting in eastern Ukraine in a controversial election process that attempts to install separate regional leaderships in defiance of the Kiev government Sunday.

The elections organized by the separatists in eastern Ukraine come only a week after the Ukrainian government in Kiev organized its own official general elections on October 26. Millions of Ukrainian voters had chosen from 6,627 candidates and 29 parties for the 450-seated Parliament, known as the Verkhovna Rada in Ukraine.

The stalemate in Ukraine between the government and the separatists has left more than 4,000 dead and over 9,000 others wounded since April, a month before Russia annexed Crimea in March following a referendum vote held in the peninsula that was not recognized by Ukraine or the West.

The crisis was triggered in November 2013 when ousted former president Viktor Yanukovych announced the abandonment of a trade agreement with the EU and chose to pursue closer ties with Russia.

www.aa.com.tr/en