Five killed in Ukraine fighting ahead of vote

KARLIVKA, May 23 (AFP): At least five people were killed Friday in fighting near Ukraine's eastern hub of Donetsk two days before a presidential election undermined by an upsurge in attacks by pro-Russian separatists.
The latest bloodshed on the heels of the deaths of 18 soldiers Thursday in the eastern rustbelt near Russia underscores the trouble the interim leaders have in making sure they can pull off a safe and well-attended vote Sunday.
Interim president Oleksandr Turchynov appealed to voters to come out and show their support for a free and democratic Ukraine in the face of an insurgency he and Western leaders accuse Russia of orchestrating.
"We will never again stand being denied freedom and independence or seeing our Ukraine being turned into a part of a post-Soviet empire," he said in a brief nationally-televised address.
Friday's fighting pitted a volunteer force attached to the Ukrainian army against militants armed with heavy machineguns and backed by at least one armoured vehicle.
An AFP photographer saw five bodies near the village of Karlivka northwest of Donetsk. Four of the dead appeared to be rebels and one man with a swastika tattoo seemed to have fought for the so-called Donbass volunteer battalion that has backed government troops since the fighting first broke out more than a month ago.
Battalion commander Semyon Semenchenko described in a rapid-fire series of Facebook posts how his unit was ambushed and then surrounded after taking refuge in a vacant building along the main road.
"Exactly half our unit has been wounded. Many have lost lots of blood," he said.