Protesters Call On Putin to Send Troops to Eastern Ukraine
By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN and ANDREW ROTH
The demands from pro-Russian demonstrators occupying a government
building in Donetsk came hours after a Ukrainian officer was killed in
Crimea.
MOSCOW
— Several hundred pro-Russian demonstrators who have seized government
buildings in the city of Donetsk, in eastern Ukraine, urged President
Vladimir V. Putin on Monday to send troops to the region as a
peacekeeping force, and they demanded a referendum on seceding from
Ukraine and joining Russia.
The
renewed unrest in eastern Ukraine, which flared on Sunday with
coordinated demonstrations by thousands of pro-Russian protesters in
Donetsk, Kharkiv and Luhansk, reignited fears in Kiev and the West about
Russian military action a little more than a month after Russian forces
occupied Crimea. The Kremlin annexed Crimea after a referendum there last month.
The
events in the east were unfolding just hours after a Ukrainian military
officer was shot and killed in Crimea in a confrontation with Russian
troops.
A
spokesman for the Ukrainian Defense Ministry, Vladislav Seleznev, said
the officer, Maj. Stanislav Karchevskiy, was killed in a military
dormitory where he lived with his wife and two children, next to the
Novofedorivka air base in western Crimea.
By
about noon, the police in Donetsk said they were negotiating with
representatives of about 150 protesters who had been occupying the
regional administration building after breaking through a police cordon
on Sunday.
The
demonstrators said that they had formed a new legislature and would
move ahead with plans to hold a referendum on May 11, two weeks before
the provisional Ukrainian government in Kiev is set to hold a national
presidential election.
Several
organizers of the protest in Donetsk spoke inside the regional
administration building, where Russian television channels were
broadcasting the events live.
In
Germany, a spokesman for Chancellor Angela Merkel said Monday that the
government was extremely concerned about the events in eastern Ukraine
and called for calm.
“The
latest developments in Donetsk and in Kharkiv are something which we
are all very worried about in the German government,” the spokesman,
Steffen Seibert, said at a news conference.
“We
must urgently renew our appeal to all those in positions of
responsibility to help stabilize the region and avoid such escalation,”
he said.
The
death of the Ukrainian officer was a rare instance of deadly violence
as Ukrainian forces continue their withdrawal from the peninsula after
its annexation by Russia.
Mr.
Seleznev, the Defense Ministry spokesman, said that the Ukrainian
soldier had been collecting his belongings in preparation to leave
Crimea when an argument broke out with Russian service members, Reuters
reported Monday.
Mr.
Seleznev said that the altercation involved several Ukrainian and
Russian soldiers and that there were no other injuries. He said a
Russian soldier armed with an automatic weapon entered the dormitory and
shot Major Karchevskiy, who was unarmed.
Ukraine’s
provisional government in Kiev has ordered its forces to withdraw from
Crimea, but an unknown number of military personnel remain on the
peninsula as part of the transition, in which some military equipment is
being returned to mainland Ukraine.
Mr.
Seleznev said that a second Ukrainian officer, Capt. Artem Yarmolenko,
was detained by Russian forces for questioning and possibly taken to
Sevastopol, where the Russian military has its headquarters in Crimea.
The
shooting at Novofedorivka further heightened tensions as the government
in Kiev and its Western supporters, including the United States, remain
anxious about the possibility of a Russian military incursion into
eastern Ukraine, where there has been continuing public unrest.
On
Sunday, in what appeared to be coordinated efforts, groups of
pro-Russian demonstrators seized government buildings in several large
cities in eastern Ukraine, including Donetsk, Kharkiv and Luhansk.
Similar actions have occurred in the largely Russian-speaking region,
where some residents are demanding to follow Crimea in seceding from
Ukraine and joining Russia.
Ukrainian
and Western leaders have said that they fear the protests could be used
as a pretext for Russian military action. Last month, the Federation
Council, the upper chamber of the Russian Parliament, granted President
Vladimir V. Putin the authority to use military force if necessary to
protect ethnic Russians in Ukraine.
In
Kiev on Monday morning, the acting prime minister, Arseniy P.
Yatsenyuk, said Russia was carrying out a plan “to destabilize the
situation, a plan to ensure that foreign troops could cross the border
and capture the territory of the country.” He added, “We will not allow
this.”
Speaking
at the start of a government meeting, Mr. Yatsenyuk said: “There is a
script being written in the Russian Federation, for which there is only
one purpose: the dismemberment and destruction of Ukraine and the
transformation of Ukraine into the territory of slavery under the
dictates of Russia.”
With
tensions intensifying, former Prime Minister Yulia V. Tymoshenko, who
is running for president in elections next month, said Monday that she
would travel to the region. Ukraine’s acting president, Oleksandr V.
Turchynov, said on Sunday evening that he had canceled an official visit
to Lithuania so he could monitor the situation.
Arsen
Avakov, Ukraine’s acting interior minister, said in a statement from
Kharkiv on Monday that Mr. Putin was responsible for fomenting unrest in
eastern Ukraine. Mr. Avakov reported that the local police had expelled
pro-Russian protesters from the regional administration headquarters
there.
In
Luhansk, Ukrainian news agencies reported that several hundred
protesters had occupied the local headquarters of the Ukrainian Security
Service and were still there as of Monday morning.
COPY http://international.nytimes.com/
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