Situationen i Ukraina just nu, del 3

Poroshenko discusses peace plan with Merkel, Hollande and Putin

DONETSK, December 19. /TASS/. The Contact Group on Ukraine on Friday started a video conference, Viktoria Talakina, spokesperson for the plenipotentiary envoy of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic at the talks in Minsk has said.

But through the smoke and grime, Pavel Rasta sees a sacred city - and he's fighting for it, Kalashnikov in hand, just like the Crusaders fought for the heart of Christendom centuries ago. He may be a financial manager - most recently working in a funeral parlour - who's never held a gun before in his life, but he sees himself as the modern version of a medieval knight, dedicated to chivalrous ideas of Christian purity and defending the defenceless.

And the defenceless, for him, are the citizens of eastern Ukraine, mainly Russian-speaking, who are under attack, as he sees it, by a ruthless Ukrainian government intent on wiping them out culturally, or even physically.