Ukraine: Dozens Killed in Attack on Refugee Convoy

Ukraine accused pro-Russia separatists of killing dozens of civilians in an attack yesterday on a convoy fleeing a besieged rebel-held city. The rebels denied any attack took place, while the US confirmed the shelling of the convoy but said it did not know who was responsible. The refugees were attacked with Grad rockets and other weapons imported from Russia as their convoy traveled on the main road leading from Russia to the city of Luhansk, a spokesman for Ukraine's National Security Council told reporters.

"Many people were killed, among them women and children," the spokesman said of the attack. A military spokesman later said 15 bodies had been recovered from the smoldering vehicles and servicemen were collecting the body parts of at least 10 more people. A deputy rebel commander in Donetsk said he had no information about an attack and insisted it was not by his forces."If someone was killed, it wasn't us but the Ukrainian military," he said. Fighting between government troops and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine has forced nearly 344,000 people to flee their homes, according to the United Nations. (More Ukraine stories.)