Igor Strelkov

Igor Girkin, also known by the alias Igor Strelkov ("Shooter") is one of the main pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine. He was convicted a few months ago for shooting down flight MH17 in 2014.

Russia on Monday said more than 60 soldiers were killed in a Ukrainian strike on Russian-controlled territory in a New Year assault, the biggest loss of life reported by Moscow so far.

Kiev took responsibility for the strike, which it said took place in the occupied city of Makiivka in eastern Ukraine on New Year's Eve.

The Novorossiya Movement, an organisation run by notorious Russian army veteran Igor Strelkov, has given Serbian citizen Stevan Milosevic its 'Protector of Novorossiya' award for fighting on the pro-Russian separatist side in the conflict in eastern Ukraine.

Relatives of MH17 crash victims have filed a nearly $900 million suit against a one-time leader of Ukranian insurgents over the shooting down of the jet over the rebel-held east of the country last year.
 

“So far we have raised around 800 euro, which will be given to wounded defenders of the Donbas region [of eastern Ukraine]. We will also buy uniforms and equipment for the Slavic-Serbian ‘Jovan Sevic’ unit,” Zeljko Djurovic, a representative of Kosovo Front in Serbia, told BIRN on Tuesday.

The Prime Minister of the breakaway pro-Russian enclave in eastern Ukraine, the Republic of Donetsk, on Monday said 14 Serbian volunteers had joined his embattled forces.

Aleksandr Zakharchenko said his troops were drawing volunteers from all over the world, Russia's NTV reported.

Serbia plans to penalise locals who go off to fighting in foreign conflicts, jailing those who organise volunteers by up to 12 years, while the fighters themseslves could get from one to five years.

Pro-Russian rebels shot down two Ukrainian fighter jets on July 23, not far from where a Malaysian airliner was brought down last week in eastern Ukraine, killing all 298 passengers on board.

Ukraine’s interior minister said on July 5 that most pro-Russian rebels and their top commander had fled their main eastern stronghold in what would be Kiev’s biggest success of the nearly three-month campaign.