European volunteers are streaming into Ukraine to join the fighting on both sides. While Kiev’s forces are beefed up with mercenaries from private military companies, Europeans have also come to defend the rebel Donbass region of their own free will.

One of the latest reinforcements of anti-Kiev troops in Eastern Ukraine are four French ex-serviceman who have come to fight this war, thousands of kilometers from home.

“It’s our war. It’s everybody’s war, it’s every European’s war,” Guillaume, a French fighter in Ukraine defending the Donbass region, told RT’s Paula Slier.

French fighter Guillaume. Screenshot from RT video

Another volunteer, 25-year-old Nikola, used to be a professional soldier with the elite French mountain troops for five years. Now he’s putting his skills to good use in Ukraine. Alongside a contingent of other foreign volunteers, he’s training anti-Kiev forces in urban guerilla warfare.

“These are people’s militias, these are not mercenaries or professional soldiers, so they need instruction,” Nikola told RT.

“They really have the motivation, whereas the Kiev army, which is a kind of puppet of NATO, they don’t have any motivation whatsoever,” Nikola said. “We have seen them before. They are very much unmotivated and they do not really know why they are fighting, and against whom they are fighting, so that is our main strength.”

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French fighter Nikola. Screenshot from RT video

The French volunteer explained that the presence of European volunteers among Ukraine’s rebels carrying out what they call “a military operation for protecting civilians” in the country’s east is symbolic.

“For many of these people from the west, it's their first time to come and defend what is considered by western governments a bad cause, or the bad guys’ cause. So it’s very important to show that people from the west are distinct from their governments and they are ready to come and fight and risk their lives to defend another world,” Nikola said.

And more and more overseas fighters are signing up and joining the anti-Kiev troops.

RT’s Paula Slier found out that volunteers are coming to the Donetsk frontline not just from France, but also from Spain, Poland, Israel and the United Kingdom.

Aleksey Mozgovoy, the commander of ‘Prizrak’ (Ghost) brigade from the Lugansk Region said in an interview to the MK.ru news outlet that in his 1,000-strong battalion there are fighters from Bulgaria, Slovakia and Germany.

One of the largest international forces fighting against Kiev’s troops is a unit of volunteers from Serbia, according to the interview. The ‘Jovan Shevich’ squadron allegedly consists of 250 fighters and is actively operating in the Lugansk Region.

Milutin Malisic, a member of a Serbian Chetnik paramilitary group. (Reuters / Thomas Peter)

Earlier this week, the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Donetsk People’s Republic, Aleksandr Zakharchenko, revealed in an interview to Russian media that up to 4,000 Russian citizens, many of them ex-servicemen, have joined anti-government fighters during Kiev’s crackdown in Ukraine’s east.

“Without them, it would hard for us to go on with our fighting,” Zakharchenko said, stressing that at the moment many of Russian citizens have already returned back home.

The latest developments in the warfare in Eastern Ukraine, where up to 7,000 Ukrainian troops and National Guards units have been entrapped in three separate encirclements, give hope to the rebel forces.

“We believe that the Ukrainian army will not be able to last until winter or even fall, because each day that goes by they lose money, they lose motivation, they lose manpower, they lose ammo. So each day that goes by, they grow weaker, while we grow stronger,” French fighter Guillaume told RT.

Europe now finds itself between a rock and a hard place: What to do as more of its young men sign up to fight against its ally?

“Legally, we do not see what the French government can do to us because first of all, we are not paid, so we’re not mercenaries, we’re not terrorists, we’re not jihadists, and of course it’s a mission of information, it’s a political mission, it’s a mission of soft power,” Victor Lenfa, Commander of the French team in Ukraine, told RT.

Commander of the French team in Ukraine Victor Lenfa. Screenshot from RT video

And this mission is growing stronger as a brigade of Western volunteers is now being put together under the name “United Continent.”

Two Spanish volunteers have joined the fight against Kiev’s offensive on eastern Ukraine, speaking out against the actions of the nation's military. They say their main objective is to spread the truth about the conflict.

Anhel Davilla-Rivas, 29, and Rafa Munez, 28, arrived in Donetsk two weeks ago to offer their assistance to the residents of eastern Ukraine.

“What we see in these weeks that we are here is only bombing of the people and the assault of all the fronts from Kiev. They are trying to separate the cities, they are sending mercenaries to kill the journalists and to demoralize any person that can tell the truth about what’s happening here,” Davilla-Rivas told RT’s Ruptly agency on Saturday.

The pair has not engaged in the fighting just yet, stressing that their main goal is to reveal the truth about what is happening on the ground.

Davilla-Rivas noted that Russia has no presence in the area and could do more in terms of humanitarian aid.

“I never see a Russian soldier...volunteers like us, but Russia is not really doing anything. And I think that Russia should do more for these people – not with guns, but helping people with medicine,” the Spanish volunteer said.

Davilla-Rivas also called on others around the world to come to eastern Ukraine and help in any way they can.

“More people have to come here. If they don’t want not to take the guns but...all people can help in something: in the kitchen, cleaning, telling the truth to countries from here, and watching the situation with their own eyes. It is more important that a lot of people come here and help in what they can, not necessarily only soldiers.”

Foreign mercenaries in Kiev’s service
After the UN Security Council on Thursday blocked Russia’s statement calling for a ceasefire in Eastern Ukraine under a completely frivolous pretext, Russia's envoy to the UN Vitaly Churkin had a heated debate with colleagues from the US and Ukraine, who again accused Russia of a full-scale invasion as a large number of Russian volunteers are fighting in Ukraine.

Vitaly Churkin fired back, saying that nobody ever tried to hide the presence of Russian volunteers, urging Washington to acknowledge the presence of US advisers in Kiev and why mercenaries from private military companies are waging war in Ukraine.

“Maybe our American colleagues can tell us what tens of American advisers are busy with in the headquarters of National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine [in Kiev]? Let them tell us how many American mercenaries from the so-called “security provider” companies are fighting [in Ukraine], thousands of kilometers from their home ground?” demanded Churkin, not forgetting to mention first-rate US-made armaments observed in Ukrainian units.

Exactly one month ago, Russia’s Rossyiskaya Gazeta daily quoted Igor Strelkov, the former Defense Minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, who claimed that as of the end of July, self-defense militia had eliminated up to 330 mercenaries representing a number of foreign private military companies.

Strelkov specified the casualties from each of them, saying that Polish private military company ASBS (Analizy Systemowe Bartlomiej Sienkiewicz) Othago lost 139 mercenaries, American Greystone Ltd, a subsidiary of Vehicle Services Company LLC belonging to Blackwater/XE/Academi, lost 40 fighters, while Academi itself lost 125 personnel.

The only American known to have joined a volunteer unit within the Ukrainian military, fighting the anti-government forces in the country’s east, has been killed in action, authorities confirm.

The killed fighter is Mark Paslawsky, a New York-born 55-year-old investment banker and US army veteran who took Ukrainian citizenship just before joining the Donbas battalion - a volunteer unit fighting alongside Kiev troops - in April. He adopted codename ‘Franko’ there.

News of his death came in an August 20 Facebook post by Ukrainian Interior Ministry adviser Anton Gerashchenko, who said four fighters of the Donbas battalion died in a battle near the town of Ilovaysk, 35km from Donetsk, eastern Ukraine.

“Among those dead is a Ukrainian citizen of American origin, codename ‘Franko’,” Gerashchenko wrote.

The official says the military managed to take under their control half of Ilovaysk, which has seen some fierce fighting over the last two weeks.

Maksim Dondyuk, a Ukrainian photographer working with the Donbas battalion, witnessed Paslawsky’s last minutes.

"He had three wounds in his back," Dondyuk told VICE News. "He was saying that he was in pain and that he didn't want to die. People were telling him he was going to be OK. I think it might have been possible to save him if we had medevac helicopters or ambulances, but all there was on hand were the battalion medics."

Paslawsky’s family learnt of his death via the internet, according to his brother Nestor, who said that Mark had informed his relatives of his intention to volunteer for the Ukrainian military.

"We were concerned about the situation he was going into, understanding what the theater of operations look like, of course,” Nestor Paslawsky told Radio Free Europe. “We were concerned about this, but I think we were also proud of his decision."

Franko was not the only pseudonym Paslawsky used. He was active on Twitter writing under the moniker ‘Bruce Springnote’. Many of his postings were highly critical of the way the military operation in east Ukraine, which Kiev calls Anti-Terrorist Operation or ATO, was organized.

Simon Ostrovsky of Vice News conducted a lengthy interview with Paslawsky two weeks before he died.

It appears Paslawsky was a 1981 graduate of the US Military Academy at West Point, and served in the US Army until the age of 32. He had lived in Kiev and Kharkov, Ukraine, and also in Moscow for many years, working in the financial sector. His latest job was one of independent investment advisor. He joined the Maidan protesters, rallying against then-President Viktor Yanukovich, and for integration with the EU, at the end of 2013.

Franko explained it was his Ukrainian background plus his dissatisfaction with the way the military operation was organized in eastern Ukraine which made him eventually volunteer for the Donbass battalion.

Source - RT

События независимой России

‘United Continent’: European volunteers fighting Kyev troops in Eastern Ukraine while Mercenaries back Kyev junta