Ukraine Rebels Hold Elections

The rebel Luhansk and Donetsk republics in eastern Ukraine are holding leadership elections on Sunday.

The candidates in the vote, which takes place a week after the official parliamentary elections in Ukraine in which the residents in eastern Ukraine didn't have the chance to vote, are practically unknown and lack opposition.

The elections have been condemned by international community – both the United States and European Union have denounced the vote as illegitimate.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, however, said Moscow would recognize the vote.

According to reports, in some polling stations the voters were queuing up to cast their ballots.

"We are citizens of Donetsk, and we don't want to live under the Kiev government that has turned its back on us," Sergei Kovalenko, 58, a private security guard who came to vote with his wife at a polling station set up at an elementary school in Donetsk, told Reuters.

Meanwhile, the TASS wire agency reports that the fourth Russian convoy with “humanitarian aid” for Donetsk and Luhansk have arrived in the area on Sunday.

Since the summer Russia had sent three “humanitarian aid” convoys, reportedly containing foodstuffs, water and clothes for the the population in the rebel regions.

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