Last week pro-Russian protesters under the leadership of Pavel Gubarev, the self-proclamied governor seized several buildings in Donetsk Regional State Administration and raised the Russian flag. During one of the seizures Gubarev put forward a number of demands to the local authorities, including the holding of a referendum on the status of the region.
Russia’s Moscow Times warned that the Russia would not stand by passively “while Russophobic and neo-Nazi gangs hold the people of Crimea, Kharkiv and Donetsk at their mercy.”
So it must have come as a surprise when they found out their puppet leader in Donetsk was himself a Nazi.
** Pavel Gubarev was arrested by Ukrainian forces last week.
Today pro-Russian goons stormed the Donetsk prosecutor’s office and demanded that the “people’s governor” be released.
Donetsk prosecutor's office is officially occupied. Say they won't leave until "people's gov" Pavel Gubarev released pic.twitter.com/CjcTYzLmqL
— Mike Giglio (@mike_giglio) March 16, 2014
Reuters reported:
Ukraine flew its flag over the government headquarters in the eastern city of Donetsk on Thursday and ejected pro-Moscow demonstrators that occupied it, ending a siege that Kiev had seen as part of a Russian plan to create a pretext to invade.
Police said they had taken more than 70 people into custody for questioning after clearing out the regional administration headquarters and another government building.
“The people who were removed from the building did not resist,” Donetsk city police chief Maksim Kirindyasov said. “The building was cleared in a matter of a few minutes.”
Later on Thursday, security service agents arrested the protest leader. Pavel Gubarev was led away from his apartment without a fight. The local businessman who called himself the “people’s governor” had demanded control over the police and tried to persuade lawmakers to install him as regional boss while his men occupied their hall.
He was charged with seeking to damage “the territorial integrity and independence of the state”.
The pro-Moscow protesters who had been occupying the building since Monday were first lured out on Wednesday by police who said there was a bomb scare, but fought their way back in after battling police throughout Wednesday.
The building had flown the Russian flag since Saturday, when President Vladimir Putin declared Russia’s right to invade Ukraine.
