Rebel commander gunned down in Donetsk
2015-03-27
Posted by: badanov
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A rebel commander was shot to death in his personal vehicle near downtown Donetsk late Thursday night, according to a blog post by reserve FSB Colonel Igor Girkin and a news account which appeared in tsnesor.net.
The commander of the "Mirage" Battalion, Roman Vozkik, was shot in his Daewoo Lacetti sedan near the intersection of Ulitsa Chelyewskitsev and Prospekt Vatutin between 2300 and 2315 hrs.
Voznik's unidentified wife and child were in the car when Voznik was killed, but were not harmed. Two of his security team were present in the car as well, but apparently one was killed by gunfire. The member of the security detail killed was identified only by his callsign, "Greek".
Voznik is the third top Donetsk combat formation commander to be targeted for assassination this month, and the first to die. Colonel Mikhail Tolstykh, known by his callsign "Givi" came under a small arms attack last week as he traveled in his SUV from Makeevka. Another popular combat formation commander identified as Arsen Pavlov and known by his callsign "Motorolla" has been repeatedly targeted by Ukrainian snipers and mortar teams, by his own count 15 times.
Three other top Lugansk combat formation commanders have been targeted using directional mines since the start of the year. One of them, Sergey Bondareko -- commander of the rebel's Lugansk "Rus" battalion -- died in an attack March 6th.
It has been suggested by Lugansk commanders that part of the reason they are being targeted is politics. A few top formation commanders have expressed dismay at the attack on a combat formation chief of staff, Aleksandr Bednov on January 1st by Lugansk interior ministry police agents near Grigorievka, south of Lugansk city
In that attack Bednov, his wife and four of his security detail were killed in an ambush by police using fuel-air explosive RPG rounds. It wasn't until 12 hours later that Lugansk officials announced that Bednov was wanted for a July murder of four individuals in Lugansk.
It appears that the attack on Bednov may have sparked ill feelings between Lugansk combat formation commanders and Lugansk president Igor Plotnitsky.
At the moment in Donetsk, it appears that officials are dealing with what can be termed a severe organized crime problem.
Only two days before a Donetsk restaurant was robbed by an armed group, said to be Chechen. In that attack two unidentified individuals died and several vehicles were burned. Some Donetsk media outlets have blamed Ukrainian infiltration groups for that attack.
On Monday in the Ukrainian controlled part of Donetsk, a Ukrainian officer for the Security service was killed trying to stop three trucks attempting to smuggle alcohol and tobacco into rebel controlled Donetsk. That truck was operated by members of the Right Sector political group and members of the Dnepr-1 volunteer battalion,. Both groups are strongly hated by the rebels.
Chris Covert writes about foreign military issues for Rantburg.com. He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com. You can read past articles about the 2014 war in southeastern Ukraina by clicking here.
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