A Ukrainian military transport aircraft has been shot down in the east, amid fighting with separatist rebels, Ukrainian officials say.<\/p>\n
The An-26 plane was hit at an altitude of 6,500m (21,325ft), a statement on the presidential website said.<\/p>\n
It said the plane had been targeted with “a more powerful missile weapon” than a shoulder-carried missile, probably fired from Russia.<\/p>\n
Russia has not commented on the claim. The crew survived.<\/p>\n
It was not immediately known if there were any other people on board the aircraft. Rebel forces earlier said they had targeted the aircraft.<\/p>\n
The crew members of the downed plane had already contacted the Ukrainian military, and a search-and-rescue operation was now under way, the statement said.<\/p>\n
Direct talks plea<\/p>\n
This comes as the Ukrainian air force said it had delivered “five powerful air strikes” on targets in the eastern Luhansk region in a bid to end a rebel blockade of a strategic airport there.<\/p>\n
Several targets were hit near the airport in the rebel-held city of Luhansk, a military spokesman said.<\/p>\n
Ukraine’s military later said the airport had been “unblocked” and the army had retaken several villages.<\/p>\n
A resident in Luhansk has told the BBC that some air strikes hit Luhansk on Monday.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the rebels claimed they had destroyed a Ukrainian armed convoy near the airport.<\/p>\n
Fighting in the area has intensified since a rebel rocket attack near the Russian border on Friday, in which at least 19 government soldiers were killed.<\/p>\n
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has vowed tough retaliation for that attack.<\/p>\n
Tensions rose further over the weekend when Russia accused Ukrainian forces of shelling across the border, killing one person and wounding two others.<\/p>\n
At least 15 civilians were killed in Luhansk and the neighbouring Donetsk region on Sunday, reports say.<\/p>\n
Germany and Russia have urged direct talks between Kiev and the rebels.<\/p>\n
And the UK and US have renewed calls for Russia to de-escalate the situation in eastern Ukraine where it is accused of backing the rebels.<\/p>\n
In a telephone conversation, Prime Minister David Cameron and President Barack Obama stressed the need for Moscow to take further steps towards peace or face further sanctions.<\/p>\n
Separatist rebels have been fighting the government in Kiev since declaring independence in Luhansk and the neighbouring region of Donetsk in April.<\/p>\n
The government began an “anti-terrorist operation” in April to crush the rebellion in the eastern regions.<\/p>\n
More than 1,000 civilians and combatants are believed to have died in the fighting, which followed Russia’s annexation of Crimea in March.<\/p>\n
–<\/p>\n
Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A Ukrainian military transport aircraft has been shot down in the east, amid fighting with separatist rebels, Ukrainian officials say. The An-26 plane was hit at an altitude of 6,500m (21,325ft), a statement on the presidential website said. It said the plane had been targeted with “a more powerful missile weapon” than a shoulder-carried missile, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":31736,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[14,1028],"class_list":["post-31735","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-papa-owusu-ankomah","tag-the-independent"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31735","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=31735"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31735\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/31736"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=31735"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=31735"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=31735"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}