People’s mayor of Sloviansk dismissed and arrested — source

People’s mayor of the east-Ukrainian city of Sloviansk Vyacheslav Ponomaryov (Ponomarev) has been dismissed from his post and arrested, a representative of self-defense forces confirmed to ITAR-TASS on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, head of the presidium of the Supreme Council of self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic leader of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) Denis Pushilin commented that to date, he could neither confirm nor dismiss these reports.

According to sources in DPR’s government, the leadership of the republic had not made such a decision and at present, “communication with Sloviansk is poor, and the reports about the arrest may be a provocation”.

Two children die as Ukrainian National Guard continues shelling

Earlier on Tuesday it has been reported that two children died in a new attack of the Ukrainian army on the city of Sloviansk. 

“We have information that two children were killed — a 12-year-old boy and a six-year-old girl,” Ilya Suzdalev, spokesperson for the Donetsk Regional State Administration, specified, adding that they died from fragmentation wounds.

A militia representative told ITAR-TASS that there had been victims in Monday's shelling of the city and four houses had been damaged.

“People are being killed every day. The death toll keeps growing,” Stella Khorosheva, spokesperson for Sloviansk's people's mayor, said.

“Ukrainian law-enforcers resumed shelling of Sloviansk late on Monday,” she said. “Several shells exploded in the city center.”