Ukraine: In Eastern Ukraine, Rebel Mockery Amid Independence Celebration - by Andrew E. Kramer

On a day when Ukrainians celebrated their independence from the Soviet Union with parades and speeches, pro-Russian separatists in the eastern part of the country staged a grim counter-spectacle: a parade that mocked the national army and celebrated the death and imprisonment of its soldiers.

Leading the procession was an attractive young blond woman carrying an assault rifle, followed by several dozen captured Ukrainian soldiers: filthy, bruised and unkempt. Their heads were shaved, they wore fetid camouflage uniforms, and they looked down at their feet as they walked.

Onlookers shouted that the men should be shot, and they pelted the prisoners with empty water bottles and rolls of toilet paper as they stumbled down Artyomovsk Street, Donetsk’s main thoroughfare. A loudspeaker played Tchaikovsky’s “Slavonic March,” a familiar Russian patriotic piece.

Behind the prisoners came two tank trucks spraying soapy water, demonstratively cleaning the pavement where the Ukrainian soldiers had passed.

People in the crowd shouted, “Fascists!” and “Perverts!” And separatist fighters held back a man who tried to punch a prisoner.

The public parading and abuse of the wounded, disheveled soldiers seemed to offend few of those watching the parade. “Shoot them!” one woman yelled.

“They are attacking our city,” said Tonya Koralova, 46, a nurse who watched the men pass. “They are fascists. I am in favor of this parade.”

The anti-independence day parade staged by the main rebel group in eastern Ukraine, the Donetsk People’s Republic, was one of its most provocative public affronts to the Ukrainian government to date. It contrasted sharply with the traditional military parade in Kiev, the national capital, where soldiers from the national army crisply saluted the president and crowds of cheering citizens on Sunday.

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