KIEV: Ukrainian forces ceded a strategic eastern airport to pro-Russian insurgents on Monday as the government in Kiev accused Moscow of launching a "great war" that could claim tens of thousands of lives.
The sense of foreboding in Kiev came as European-mediated talks over the fast-escalating crisis opened behind closed doors in the Belarussian capital Minsk, attended by government, separatist and Russian envoys.
The rebels have launched a major counter-offensive in recent days that the Ukrainian government and its Western allies claim is backed by Russian forces -- a charge Moscow denies.
Ukraine's Defence Minister Valeriy Geletey vowed on Monday to "immediately mount defences against Russia, which is trying not only to secure positions held by terrorists before but to advance on other territories of Ukraine".
"A great war arrived at our doorstep, the likes of which Europe has not seen since World War II," he wrote on Facebook, warning of "tens of thousands of deaths".
Russian agencies quoted rebel representatives at the Belarus meeting demanding that Kiev provide the separatist regions of Donetsk and Lugansk with a "unique procedure" that would let them integrate closer with Russia.
The developments come a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin said for the first time that the issue of "statehood" should be discussed in talks on the crisis in the east, where fighting has killed more than 2,600 people since mid-April.
Putin accused Europe of ignoring the Ukrainian military's "direct targeting" of civilians in the conflict and said the offensive by insurgents there was simply an attempt to expel Kiev's forces from residential areas.
Incoming EU chief diplomat Italian Foreign Minister Federica Mogherini will on Tuesday outline to the European parliament's foreign affairs committee her view of the Ukraine crisis along with other international issues.
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