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A pro-Russian soldier stands guard at the military base in Perevalsk
Ukraine said separatists shelled its troops 13 times yesterday
The most intense shelling took place near the city of Avdiyivka in the Donetsk region
the peninsula it annexed from Ukraine a year ago
The young Cossack fighter gripped his automatic rifle as he swore he would defend the town of Perevalsk in war-torn east Ukraine that he and his comrades now control
no one can enter the town," the man in his twenties said
The frontline separating these pro-Russian rebel fighters from Ukrainian army troops in this troubled region lies only 30 kilometres (20 miles) away
But the enemy the Cossacks fear most is the enemy within -- the separatist leaders of the self-declared Lugansk People's Republic (LNR) who they refuse to obey
"We're under the orders of our Russian brothers of the Great Army of the Don Cossacks
We don't recognise the authority of the LNR," said the soldier
In this small town some 30 kilometres of the separatist bastion of Lugansk
a handful of well-armed and somewhat nervy Cossacks man a roadblock adorned with their blue
yellow and red flag inscribed with the words "For faith
Elite horsemen in the Tsarist army in the old days
frontier Cossack communities were set up over the centuries across the former Russian empire
with the Don Cossacks primarily claiming lands stretching from southwest Russia to Ukraine's eastern Donbass region
Now they claim to be defending the interests of Russia abroad while fighting for their fierce brand of reactionary nationalism
head of the Lugansk rebels battling the Kiev government
set an April 4 deadline for the Cossacks to either join the LNR's military wing
the Lugansk rebels have hit back hard against the militiamen in recent weeks
Cossacks were attacked and disarmed in the neighboring town of Petrovsk in an operation in which several people died
A month earlier a leading local Cossack Ataman
In January the Cossack mayor of Pervomaisk
was shot dead by unknown gunman while a local warlord allied to another group of Cossacks
died along with six bodyguards when his armored car was hit by an anti-tank missile in an ambush
"LNR special services liquidated the head of a criminal group," the Lugansk authorities said at the time
Agence France Presse reporters noted that some 20 kilometers north of Perevalsk
is on a state of alert with foreigners unable to enter or leave without a pass and a military escort
an apparently unique security situation in the area
The deputy mayor of the town -- that now houses sone 70,000 people -- does not hide the fact that relations with the Lugansk rebels are tense
"Plotnitsky said that there is no question of autonomous Cossack territories," Vasily Kiselyov
Sitting in his office under the portrait of a local Cossack leader
Kiselyov called for Plotnitsky to be ditched after accusing him and his cronies of pilfering aid deliveries coming from Russia and siphoning off coal supplies
"We didn't get rid of the Ukrainian oligarchs just to replace them with a new bunch," he said
More than just the allegations of corruption -- accusations that the Lugansk rebels fling right back at them -- the Cossacks lambast the separatist leaders for signing a Russian-backed ceasefire deal with the Ukraine government that they say they do not recognize
The problem of the renegade Cossacks is a major headache for the rebel chiefs in the Lugansk region -- the smaller of two separatist enclaves -- and shows the splintered loyalties of some of the rebel groups in the east
Now as the fighting has died down along the frontline with Ukrainian forces since the February truce deal
the insurgent leadership has had more opportunity to refocus its attention on bringing the unruly Cossacks into line
But that does not seem to be worrying the Cossack deputy mayor
as he sits under an icon of the Virgin Mary and Stalin
"That was a wise man," he said of the Soviet tyrant
"Maybe even if he was sometimes a bit too tough."