SPIDERS IN A JAR. WHAT IS KNOWN ABOUT THE TERRORISTS' SQUABBLES IN LUHANSK

On the evening of November 21, an emergency meeting of the Military Cabinet was held by the President due to the events in occupied Luhansk. While solemnities on the anniversary of the Maidan events were taking place in Kyiv, in Luhansk, the leaders of local gangs arranged a squabble in the city center using military units and equipment.

The Russian and local media outlets described the situation in the city as a rebellion and a coup in the so-called "Luhansk People's Republic," which was caused by the conflict between Igor Plotnytskyi - the leader of the local separatists - and Igor Kornet, the so-called "Minister of Internal Affairs".

After all, they had all grounds to make such conclusions - local TV and radio stoped broadcasting, mobile communications turned off, and in the evening the situation became even more interesting, when a military equipment column from the neighboring Donetsk entered the city.

What exactly has happened in occupied Luhansk, what were the reasons for the conflict between Plotnitsky and Kornet, what role the Kremlin played in the situation, and what opinions are dwelling in Kyiv on the matter - all this was traced by Ukrainska Pravda.

Around the night of November 21, numerous videos and photos from the center of Luhansk appeared on social networls. The so-called "Internal Ministry of the LNR" building was blocked by armed people in unmarked uniform and an armored personnel carrier.

A similar picture was observed under other administrative structures, and the city center was actually blocked by the military without distinctive signs.

The photos from Luhansk at that moment resembled first footages of the "little green men" appearance in Crimea in 2014. The only thing that unites people in uniform - white tape on the sleeves.

to whom the military have been subordinated - this was unclear even for the locals.

According to one version, they were people of the Luhansk separatists leader Igor Plotnitsky, on the other - to the head of the so-called "LNR Interior Ministry" Igor Cornet, who was dismissed on the eve.

According to local media, the conflict between Cornet and Plotnitsky has been lasting a long time, but it reached the hottest phase only few weeks ago.

Plotnitsky accused Kornet of "appropriation" a house belonging to the family of the former owner of the Zorya Luhanks FC. The terrorist "minister" has been prosecuted and forced to leave the house in which he had lived during the previous three years.

As for Igor Kornet, he in return accused Plotnitsky of murdering the former "LNR's prime minister" Gennady Tsypilakov, who was charged in September 2016 in an attempt of a "coup d'état," and was subsequently found hanged in a cell.

On November 20, Plotnitsky dismissed Cornet from his post, referring to the "court's decision" in connection with the "criminal case" mentioned. However, the "minister" hadn't agree with this and barricaded in the "ministry" building ogether with the former "Berkut" employees. 

According to the Nova Gazeta, the first three Ural-4320 vehicles with armed men in uniform - subordinated to the so-called "DNR leader" Oleksandr Zakharchenko - arrived in Lugansk from Donetsk.

At the same time, according to the Nova Gazeta, the first three Ural-4320 vehicles with armed men in uniform - subordinated to the so-called "DNR leader" Oleksandr Zakharchenko - arrived in Lugansk from Donetsk.

After blocking of administrative buildings in the center of Luhansk a video message from Kornet appeared on the web-resource of the so-called "MIA of LNR," in which he denied his resignation and blamed Plotnitsky's environment in staging of the same "state coup" scenario in September 2016.

He also said that on the night of November 21, he provided to Plotnitsky evidence that the general director of the so-caleed "LNR state television and radio company" Anastasiya Shurkaeva, head of "the LNR chariman administration" Iryna Tejzman, and the head of the "ministry of national security of the MIA LNR" Evgen Seliverstersov participated in this staging, and Shurkaeva cooperated with Ukrainian security services.

In this regard, Plotnicki allegedly ordered the arrest of all of them, and therefore the work of television was blocked.

In parallel, Plotnitsky described his version of events, in which he denied everything Kornet said. 

The leader of the Luhansk separatists said that "in this way the MIA's certain structures are attempting to challenge the court's decision, and they have reached extremes in this that can no longer be tolerated."

At the same time, he assured that the situation in Luhansk in under control and it will be fully resolved in nearest future.

What's noticeable in this chain of bilateral exchanges of claims is that each statement by Igor Kornet was immediately retransmitted by the "DNR" media resources and the Russian TV channels.

At the same time, Plotnitsky's statements begun to appear in the Russian information space only in the afternoon, after the video of a Russian military vehicles column from Donbass entering to Luhansk was published by the OSCE observers.  

For a while, the Russian edition of RBC, referring to its sources, reported that in this conflict the Kremlin is on Kornet's side, although there is no threat for the "LNR" leader to be dismissed.

During the day, official Kyiv did not hurry to comment on the events in Lugansk. The ATO headquarters press-center limited itself to a commentary in which thet described the sytuation as "a banal squabble between terrorists."

In the evening of the same day the President convened an emergency meeting of the Military Cabinet.

The participants of the meeting officially refused to comment on its progress. However, according to sources of the Ukrainska Pravda (UP), at the meeting was discussed not only the situation in general, but also specific versions of events. 

"We can conclude that  it is not only about the conflict between Plotnitsky and Zakharchenko for control ower the financial flows inside Luhansk and the desire to use it to unite Luhansk and Donetsk, but also about inner disputes in the Russian special services." - the commentator notes.

The latest version is sharred by the law enforcement agencies. According to the interlocutor of the UP from the security forces, the conflict between Plotnitsky and Kornet can be viewed through the prism of controversions within Putin's close environment - the FSB supports the "interior minister," yet Plotnitsky is supported by Vladislav Surkov, the assistant to the Russian president.

It is also possible that the "coup" is nothing but a redistribution of control over local business. For a long time, Plotnytskyi had supervised the business of Serhiy Kurchenko - a crooked Ukrainian oligarch, who was forced to flee from Ukraine after the Maidan - in Luhansk. Due to this "patronage", Kurchenko became a monopolist in the supply of all energy resources in the so-called "LNR," which triggered periodical conflicts between different groups of influence.

In early November, several separatist sites reported that the so-called "Ministry of Internal Affairs LNR" leaded by Cornet and the "MGB" of Leonid Pasichnik have "liquidated some of Kurchenko's schemes," this could have caused a conflict between Plotnitsky and the so-called minister.

Two days later, on November 23, the rumours that Igor Plotnitsky fled to Russia have been proven, when he was seen in the Sheremetyevo airport of Moscow.