Radical nationalist group Right Sector has seized an infantry fighting vehicle and a T-64 tank from separatists in the Donetsk region and is forming an armored unit as part of its military corps, Right Sector leader Dmytro Yarosh said in a Facebook post Monday.
The Right Sector set up the Ukrainian Volunteer Corps, headed by Andrei Stempitsky, in July but it has not yet been legalized as an official unit within the armed forces. The Patriot of Ukraine, a nationalist group affiliated with the Right Sector, also set up a military unit and formalized it as the Interior Ministry’s Azov battalion in May.
Yarosh wrote that a subdivision of the Ukrainian Volunteer Corps had participated in battles in the Donetsk region’s Amvrosievka district.
“Dozens of terrorists have been liquidated, one infantry fighting vehicle and a T-64 tank have been acquired,” he said. “Now we’re forming an armored unit!”
Another unit of the corps has taken part in battles for the Savur Mohyla strategic height in the south of the Donetsk region and destroyed dozens of terrorists, Yarosh said, adding that one member of the corps had been killed, and seven had been injured.
A third unit of the Ukrainian Volunteer Corps is fighting in the eastern and southern outskirts of Donetsk, he said. Yarosh wrote on July 21 that the Right Sector had entered the western part of the city.
Artyom Skoropadsky, the Right Sector’s spokesman, said by phone that the corps did not need any formal documents from the authorities to fight against terrorists.
“According to the Constitution, everyone has a right to defend the country’s independence and integrity,” he said.
The Right Sector is in talks on formalizing the corps’ status as a unit subordinate to the Defense Ministry but the negotiations are proceeding slowly, Skoropadsky said.
He said, however, that the Right Sector did not want its corps to become part of the Interior Ministry because the party was at odds with its head Arsen Avakov and had demanded his resignation.
The Right Sector was set up just days before the start of EuroMaidan revolution last fall by a handful of right-wing parties and other organizations. The Russian media have mentioned the party frequently in their reports for months, calling the group one of the most radical and aggressive fighters, despite the fact that the group only joined the Anti-Terrorist Operation in July.
