Ukrainian military helicopter shot down, 14 dead

A Ukrainian military general and 14 soldiers were killed when their helicopter was shot down in eastern Ukraine Thursday, the country’s acting president said.

Oleksandr Turchynov said rebels used a portable air defense missile to down the helicopter over the city of Slovyansk.

Slovyansk, 100 miles (160 kilometers) from the Russian border, has become the epicenter of fighting between pro-Russia insurgents and government forces in recent weeks. Its residential areas have regularly come under mortar shelling from government forces, causing civilian casualties and prompting some residents to flee.

The city of 120,000 is in the Donetsk region, one of the two sprawling provinces in eastern Ukraine that have declared independence from the government in Kiev.