Ukraine Crisis: Deadly Clashes Break Out in Slavyansk

Pro-Russian protesters burn tires as they prepare for battle with Ukrainian special police forces on the outskirts of the eastern Ukrainian city of Slavyansk on Sunday. Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

Interior Minister Arsen Avakov Says Ukrainian Special Forces Officer Is Killed

By James Marson in Donetsk, Ukraine And Lukas I. Alpert in Moscow, WSJ
Updated April 13, 2014 7:07 a.m. ET

A Ukrainian special forces officer was killed and five others wounded Sunday in a gunbattle with heavily armed pro-Russian forces who had commandeered a police station in the eastern city of Slavyansk, Ukraine's top police official said.

The firefight erupted early Sunday as Ukrainian forces moved to clear the building where approximately 20 men dressed in camouflage had seized control the day before. Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said an unspecified number of the pro-Russian activists had been wounded in the exchange.

In addition to the dead and wounded at the police station, Russia's Interfax news agency reported one person was killed and four others wounded in a gunfight at a checkpoint along the road leading from Slavyansk to the regional capital of Donetsk.

The Slavyansk operation, dubbed an "antiterrorist action," involved Ukraine's state security service and military and police units from across the country, Mr. Avakov said.

(More here.)