Ukraine Faces Struggle to Gain Control of Militias, Including Those on Its Side

By ANDREW ROTH, NYT, MAY 23, 2014

KARLOVKA, Ukraine — In a secluded wood in eastern Ukraine, a group of 120 men who call themselves the Donbass Battalion had commandeered a children’s summer camp to prepare for war.

The goal was to transform a motley collection of machinists, stockbrokers and students into armed fighters who could go toe-to-toe with the anti-Kiev militants that have swept through Ukraine’s east over the past two months.

“Isn’t it clear by now that the only way to lead is to have a weapon?” said Sergey, a gangly 25-year-old who awkwardly gripped an AK-47 assault rifle for the first time on Monday.

Last week, he left his job as a journalist for the pro-revolution information center in Kiev, the capital, to come east and train under a coterie of army veterans, some of whom had served in the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

(More here.)