Live Blog: Ukraine In Crisis (Archive)

Residents tell some hungover guy passed out in their frontyard who appears to have lost his pistol to scram and get back to "liberating Donbas" from the "fascists."

"Five grenades and a kilogram of metal nuts...It was a really powerful device." A piece of paper on a fence nearby read: "If you don't stop the war - the war will come to you."

A spokeswoman for the self-proclaimed "Luhansk People's Republic" has told RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service that the separatist group is responsible for today's downing of a Ukrainian military transport plane that killed all 49 people aboard.

"Our militia shot down the plane," said Oksana Chigrina. "The plane violated the order by [LNR governor, Valeriy] Bolotov to close the airspace over Luhansk. The order stated that if there was a violation, appropriate measures would be taken."

The Luhansk People's Republic is listed by the Ukrainian government as a terrorist organization.
Borys Filatov, the deputy speaker of the Dnipropetrovsk regional administration, said on Facebook that passengers on the IL-76 transport plane included a nine-member flight crew from Zaporozhets oblast and 40 soldiers -- 32 from Dnipropetrovsk region, two from Donetsk, and the remaining six from Kherson, Odesa, Kharkiv, Luhansk, and Kirovograd. The soldiers were believed to be paratroopers from the 25th division of the Dnipropetrovsk air transport brigade.

Still no confirmation of separatists' claim that they shot down a Ukrainian bomber after it hit a target in the rebel-held town of Horlivka, in the Donetsk region.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has declared a day of mourning for those killed in the deadliest attack on national troops since the pro-Russian uprising began in the country's south and east.

Unofficial reports suggest 49 people -- 40 troops and nine crew members -- perished when a Ukrainian army transport aircraft was struck by a surface-to-air missile overnight as it approached Luhansk airport, where heavily armed separatists control much of the area.

Poroshenko says in his statement that the day of mourning, June 15, marks "a great loss not only for the families of the victims but also for the whole country. Ukraine is in sorrow, but we strongly continue the struggle for peace."

The apparent escalation in fighting comes after weeks of images of Russian gunmen crossing the border and amid fresh allegations by the United States that "separatists in eastern Ukraine have acquired heavy weapons and military equipment from Russia, including Russian tanks and multiple rocket launchers."

"All those involved in the cynical terrorist attack of such magnitude must be punished," says the statement by Poroshenko, who vowed after his election in May and again at his June 7 inauguration that talks in the separatist east and with Moscow were a priority. "Ukraine needs peace. Counterterrorism receives an adequate response."

Reuters and Russian agencies are quoting Russian gas giant Gazprom as saying it is preparing for talks in Kyiv on its gas-pricing dispute with Ukraine. "We are ready to seek compromise, but it is useless to put pressure on us," Gazprom spokesman Sergei Kupriyanov said.

Ukraine has said it is ready to start settling its gas bills if Russia agrees to charge $326 per 1,000 cubic meters of gas for 18 months.

Russia has said its "final price" is $385 per 1,000 cubic meters and threatened to cut off gas supplies to Ukraine if Kyiv does not pay state-controlled Gazprom $1.95 billion by June 16.