Separatists shoot down Ukrainian warplane as fighting intensifies in Donetsk

Pro-Russian separatists shot down a Ukrainian warplane in eastern Ukraine early yesterday while at least 10 civilians were killed in fighting involving artillery and mortars in the rebel-held city of Donetsk, local authorities said.

The renewed fighting, which followed a claim by rebels that they were receiving fresh stocks of heavy military equipment from Russia and 1,200 fighters, cast a shadow over a high-level international meeting in Berlin involving Russia and Ukraine.

The four-month conflict in Ukraine's Russian-speaking east has reached a critical phase, with Kiev and Western governments watching nervously to see if Russia will intervene in support of the increasingly besieged rebels - something denied by Moscow.

A Ukrainian military spokesman said the rebels had hit a MiG-29 fighter jet over the Luhansk region, one of two regions where entrenched separatists were fighting a rearguard action to hold off government forces advancing on their positions.

The pilot ejected and was located and recovered after a search, spokesman Oleksiy Dmytrashkivsky said.

Donetsk, the region's biggest city where rebels are also still dug in despite an encroaching government offensive, was rocked by heavy weapons throughout the night. At least 10 civilians had been killed, local authorities said.

The Ukrainian National Guard said its forces had seized a rebel field commander from Luhansk region as well as 13 others suspected of "terrorist activity".