Behind the Balaclavas Panorama

This is the story of a peaceful nation's descent into armed

conflict. They are going in through every

window of this police station now. It is the story of how people turn

from being law biding citizens into hooded gunmen.

It is the story of how some men seize power overnight and others

lose it in the most brutal of ways. TRANSLATION: I was quickly pushed

into a car. It was over very fast. Tonight, on the eve of the

elections, Panorama has rare access to the separatist's inner circle,

through the lives of two ordinary men who would later become powerful

players. Who is in the background co-ordinating is it people here or

outside the country? TRANSLATION: It is being

co-ordinated by the Queen of England.

Panorama began filming in east Ukraine before a building was taken

over or a shot fired. It is March and we're near the

Russian border with former building contractor, Alexei Mozgovoi. He is

trying to drum up support for anti-Kiev protests. The turnout is

small, no sign of yet of the chaos to come.

The spark for all of this is Ukraine's February revolution in

Kiev. Here they say, it is imposed an illegal pro-European Government

which doesn't serve them. TRANSLATION: I'm into the hungry for

power. I don't want power. I want law and order and for the people to

be heard. Down the road in don't dorntion sk, the crowd are already

growing, parading to the National Anthem, disco-style.

On the stage is local history teacher, Miroslav Rudenko, married

with a new baby, he is ready to fight for his region, the Donbass.

His message, the Kiev Revolution wasn't for him and wasn't for this

region. He wants nothing of it. TRANSLATION: You need to remember

this country has been in a mess for the past four months, a complete

mess and if people want things to calm down.

Alexei and Miroslav with Russian flags flying. It is provocative to

those who support Kiev. This is what happens to another group elsewhere

in the east, a flying hammer from a Ukrainian loyalist. The violence is

just starting. Alexei is undeterred. This derelict armaments factory is

part of why he wants closer links with Russia.

TRANSLATION: We've given away everything from nuclear weapons to

factories like this. Russia understands if you want peace,

prepare for war. Then, Alexei hears there is something happening in his

hometown in Lughansk. We arrive with him to find this. The first seizure

of a building, the regional head quarters of the Security Services.

Panorama is the only team filming. There are weapons stored here. Now,

they are in the hands of the protesters. At this point, Alexei

doesn't approve. TRANSLATION: These are radicals.

They are just interested in seizing a building. They have seized a

building, but where does this take us now?

Buildings are falling elsewhere too. It is the first sign that things are

being co-ordinated. The West thinks by President Putin's Russia. In

Donetsk, our history teacher, Miroslav helps seize the Town Hall.

Inside, local council officials are replaced with masked separatists. 11

floors up, above the gunmen and the monotov a committee is formed. This

is one of the first meetings of what they are calling the people's

Republic of Donetsk. Outside they have the tyres and the barricades,

but there doesn't seem to be a lot of local opposition to this taking

place. They are electing the Republic's three-man Government.

Miroslav is voted in. For him, there is no turning back.

Then, in a single day, more buildings fall in towns running

parallel with the Russian border. This too, has all the signs of being

co-ordinated. As we approach, Slavyansk, we pass the Ukrainian

Army already in retreat. The town is surrounded by road blocks. Here,

there is no way through. We try another route, but we're met with

hostility. Finally, we enter Slavyansk from another direction and

find a town cut off from the rest of the country. Everyone we speak to is

opposed to the rule of Kiev. TRANSLATION:

How many people here want to be part of the People's Republic of Donetsk?

Here, it is not just angry crowds. Paramilitaries with weapons have

taken over the Town Hall. This is significantly different from other

towns that we've filmed in because they don't just control the police

head quarters for a Government building, here they control the

town. Nearby, the elected Mayor of Slavyansk, Nelly Shtepa, is on the

streets. She is sympathetic to their aims, but not their methods.

Recriminations are already starting. The mayor tries to prevent a man

being snatched on the street. Later, she herself goes missing and a new

mayor suddenly takes over. Inside, the seized Town Hall, the

new mayor, Vyacheslav Ponomaryev, seems to have acquired his own army

overnight and he is taking hostages. The former mayor's mother, wants to

ask him, what has happened to her daughter.

TRANSLATION: He was there giving a speech. I ran forward and I asked

for the microphone. I asked to see her as her mother. I asked where my

daughter was and asked them to let me in. He started pushing me away.

Then a tall woman pulled me aside and told me nelly had heart problems

and had been taken to the Lennon Hospital.

Th wasn't true and others are going missing too. This man, Vladymir

Ryback, head of a local pro-European party, his crime simply attempting

to fly the Ukrainian flag. TRANSLATION: It shows in the video,

it was hard to stop him. He was TRANSLATION: It shows in the video,

a strong man. Stubborn too. There was a struggle, he resisted. He was

quickly pushed into a car. It was over very fast. It would be five

days before his wife learned what happened to him.

The next time we meet Alexei he is just back from meetings in Moscow.

He and his followers are in newly acquired uniforms. Now, all they

need is weapons. What kind of help did Moscow offer?

TRANSLATION: Why are you only interested in asking about my trip

to Moscow? We're one people. Who am I to go to? Who should I ask advice

for if not my relatives? Who is in the background co-ordinating? Is it

people in Ukraine or people outside the country?

LAUGHTER I get the hint. It is being

co-ordinated by the Queen of England.

A few hundred yards away, life continues as normal. 23 today, Sonia

and her friends are in a minority, pro-European professionals and they

are all bewildered by this. It don't believe there is people who would

say they want to be, you know, the Soviet Union. Come on, really

people? I was born in Ukraine. I don't want to be Soviet Union

anymore. No way. We can do nothing here. Everything is going to be OK.

I hope they will never get what they want and they will be tired and go

back home. Without the Ukrainian Army, these

are the people taking on the pro-Russians. They are far-right

activists known as the Right Sector. Ukrainian nationalists wanting

closer links with Europe and they're on their way to one of their biggest

rallies. What do you think when you see

pictures of key Government buildings in East Ukraine collapsing, falling

into the hands of the pro-Russians? At the rally a pro-European mob of

right-wingers is gathered. It feels like a football crowd, but many are

carrying weapons. Mingling with families and children, these men are

welcomed as their protectors as they sing the National Anthem. We want

freedom. We don't need some crowd from Russia, from Europe, we want

freedom. We have been told that all the football hooligan groups around

the country have called a truce so they can fight a common enemy

together. But there are no pro-Russians to fight until later

when they emerge to take on the stragglers. Even the injured aren't

spared. Watch the elderly pro-Russian woman. But elsewhere,

other pro-Ukraine forces are gathering and this time, they're

armed. We've been invited to meet them at a secret cam nap remote farm

buildings. But when we arrive, the camps been surrounded by a hostile,

pro-Russian crowd. They believe the paramilitaries have taken local

youths hostage. Let's see if we can go across to the

other side. They seem to have a sort of camp.

These paramilitaries support the Kiev government and the West. Back

on the other side of the fence, a man, claiming they did this to him,

shot him with a rubber bullet as punishment. Then, evidence of how

close this private army is to the Ukrainian Army, they summon air

support. What it's doing is flying in low to

try and give a warning to all these crowds that are gathering outside

this, what appears to be some kind of paramilitary base. I am very

scared. But they're here to protect you, aren't they? We protect our

country. It prompts the crowd to set off on a

new mission in convoy and into town, with the helicopter in pursuit. They

want local police to intervene and get their boys back. We've just

arrived at the police station, and the crowd who are out there where

the helicopter came and now decided to take it over, by the looks of

things. It's just starting. They're going in through every

window of this police station now. Men are just running in there with

ball dlauf yaz and baseball -- balaclavas and baseball bats.

You can see they've successfully taken over this police station in a

matter of about ten minutes. In Donetsk, the self-proclaimed

People's Republic is making plans for the whole region to break away.

A former hit -- our former history teacher, Miroslav, part of the

three-man leadership, is trying to organise a referendum. But he lives

under the constant threat that Kiev will send in forces before he can

sort out a vote. When all this started, you didn't

want to take over the building, did you? You wanted to do it through the

democratic process. TRANSLATION: Yes, it's the

referendum, and for too long the authorities have ignored us. Inside

his seized building, these are rare shots from one of the operations

floors. Men and women, guarding the rooms where Miroslav works. We're

right in the heart of the seized administration building in Donetsk

and we're here at a tense moment, because the government in Kiev has

launched what it calls its antiterrorism operation to take back

buildings like this one. In Miroslav's office they're on the

look out for snipers. TRANSLATION: Essentially this is the

start of a civil conflict, the outbreak of Civil War. We're on our

land. Unfortunately, the so-called Kiev government is unaware. They

intend to resolve this by resorting to violence.

Around the country, it's becoming increasingly dangerous. On the road

to Slavyansk, journalists are being hooded at checkpoints and beaten.

And a group of Ukrainian Special Forces have been captured.

The man showing them to the press is the mayor's military chief, Igor

Strelkov. He's from Moscow and says many of his men are from Russia and

Crimea. We head for the Town Hall, where the

new mayor is being questioned about the international monitors he's

holding. But then, intercepted phone calls

emerge, evidence of what has happened to the missing politician,

pro-European, Vladymir Ryback. Soon after, a grim discovery in a

river just outside Slavyansk. Two bodies showing signs of torture.

At the mortuary, Vladymir Ryback's wife arrives.

TRANSLATION: His skull was fractured. There were signs of

torture. His jaw was broken, no teeth, you understand? It sounds as

though on the day, your husband was abducted and killed for trying to

raise the Ukrainian flag? TRANSLATION: He wasn't abducted so

much because of the flag, but because he was for a united Ukraine,

against the Russian occupation. The flag was just an excuse.

Another call about a disappearance, this time, the voice is that of the

mayor of Slavyansk himself. Vyacheslav Ponomaryev is speaking to

his chief military officer, Igor Strelkov, the man from Moscow.

Despite allegations of brutality, and the hostages, the mayor of

Slavyansk remains a popular figure amongst pro-Russians. Are you a

supporter of the methods of the mayor of Slavyansk?

TRANSLATION: Absolutely and the day after tomorrow I'm meeting him.

APPLAUSE And the mayor had agreed to meet

with Panorama too. But on the way to Slavyansk to see him this... GUNFIRE

The Ukrainian military, advancing towards town.

The Ukrainian helicopter circles nearby.

It's shot down. In town, a pilot's caught and taken

away. The Ukrainian army advance stops

here on the bridge in front of us. We arrive just as locals surround

the armoured vehicles. Look at the anger. There's a lot of

anger here. There are people screaming at the Ukrainian military

and they seem to be reversing. The army says they're here for the

people, to protect them against the mayor and his men, but many of these

people sup port the mayor. The Ukrainian military has

successfully blocked the road into town, cutting off Slavyansk,

trapping the mayor. We can't get to our interview. Over

the next few days, the violence spreads.

More than 40 dead in a fire in Odessa. Attempted assassinations.

Policemen shot on t street. And in the middle of the chaos, a

referendum, organised by Miroslav's separatist government.

TRANSLATION: This is the start of new Russia. It will clear our land

of Nazis. Alexei turns up to vote with his new

body guards toe. The result -- tow, the result, an overwhelming vote for

east Ukraine to break away. Only Putin's Moscow takes it seriously,

but doesn't respond to their formal request to join the Russian

Federation. Even though, that seems to be increasingly what pro-Russian

leaders here are looking for. Under siege in Slavyansk, the mayor

agrees to be interviewed down-the-line, with a local film

crew in his office. I asked what had happened to his predecessor, Nelly

Shtepa. Where's Nelly now? She's under your guard, in the

cellars of the Town Hall, is she there?

How much hostages -- how many hostages have you got in your

cellars at the moment? What about his intercepted phone

call? Now he says his besieged town will

never return to Kiev's control. Five days ago, we met up with Alexei

and his men, in a secret location near the Russian border. By now,

they're armed. He won't say by whom. He blames the conflict on foreign

interference - America and Europe's support of what he calls the illegal

government in Kiev. TRANSLATION: It's already a state of

Civil War. The Civil War began after the first shots in Slavyansk. Now

it's in full swing. The east of Ukraine is moving steadily towards

Russia and that's a fact. Yelena Ryback has fled her town,

fearing the same fate as her murdered husband.

TRANSLATION: Those who share his beliefs and those who don't should

fight for democracy, so we can solve everything through diplomacy and not

through banditry, so we can be like a civilised nation.

Later this week, national elections are planned for Ukraine. Whoever

wins will inherit a divided country with entire towns out of Kiev's

control. It's now clear many of their citizens are ready to fight

for a future in the Russian Federation, whether the West likes

it or not. The consultation on closure

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