Ukraine Implicates Ousted President in Shootings at Protests
By ANDREW ROTH
Officials on Thursday accused former President Viktor F. Yanukovych had
been involved in plans that led to the deaths of more than 100 people.
In Crimea, Russia Showcases Rebooted Army
KIEV,
Ukraine — The Ukrainian authorities said on Thursday that former
President Viktor F. Yanukovych had been involved in plans for elite
police units to open fire on antigovernment protesters in February,
killing more than 100 people in the days immediately before the downfall
of Mr. Yanukovych’s government.
The
police have already arrested several members of one elite riot police
unit responsible for the killings, said Arsen Avakov, the country’s
interim interior minister, but some others under investigation have fled
to Crimea, which was annexed by Russia last month.
The
findings of the inquiry, which were presented by Mr. Avakov as well as
by the country’s new general prosecutor and the head of the security
services, are the first attempt by the government in Kiev to give a
comprehensive answer to the shootings that caused the overwhelming
majority of deaths that took place on the Ukrainian capital’s main
square, the Maidan, in mid-February.
“An enormous number of people were harmed in this meat grinder,” said Mr. Avakov.
Ukraine Crisis in Maps
Valentyn
Nalivaichenko, the new head of the Ukrainian Security Service, the
country’s successor to the Soviet-era K.G.B., also said that Russia had
supplied the Ukrainian special services with training, explosives,
weapons and equipment during the street protests, which lasted for
several months before Mr. Yanukovych fled to Russia in February. He did
not immediately provide evidence to support the charge.
Mr.
Nalivaichenko said Mr. Yanukovich was actively and personally involved
in suppressing the demonstrations. “Presented as a counterterrorist
operation, the actual organization of the mass murder of people took
place under the direct leadership of former president Yanukovych,” Mr.
Nalivaichenko said.
Russia’s
security services, known as the F.S.B., said that it had not been
involved in the Ukrainian crackdown, according to RIA Novosti, the
Russian state news agency. “Let those statements remain on the
conscience of the Ukrainian Security Services,” the security agency
said, according to the news agency.
The
Ukrainian authorities have charged Mr. Yanukovych with mass murder in
connection with the deaths of demonstrators and declared him wanted as a
fugitive on those charges.
In
an interview on Thursday with The Associated Press and the Russian
state television channel NTV, Mr. Yanukovych said that he had “never
given any kinds of order for any shooting.”
Yet
the police authorities, which include the country’s new prosecutor, the
security services head and Mr. Avakov, said that the order to open fire
on protesters had been disseminated through the police chain of
command, including by the former interior minister, Vitaly Zakharchenko.
The officials did not give more information on how Mr. Yanukovych was
involved, but again called for his arrest.
Sergey
V. Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, has suggested that the
killings may have been carried out by Right Sector, an armed
ultranationalist group that took part in the protests against Mr.
Yanukovych.
At
a press conference with the Kazakh foreign minister on Thursday, Mr.
Lavrov lashed out at both Ukraine and the West for “exaggerating the
issue” of the presence of Russian military troops training near the
Ukrainian border, which Western officials have warned may be a guise for
mobilizing an invasion force.
Mr.
Lavrov also demanded more information about possible plans by NATO to
strengthen the defenses of member countries in Eastern Europe NATO
foreign ministers, meeting in Brussels earlier this week, ordered the
alliance's military commanders to draw up such plans.
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