Gunmen seize Crimea Parliament

 

Kiev: Ukraine issued a blunt warning to Russia on Thursday after dozens of pro-Kremlin gunmen in combat fatigues seized Parliament and government buildings on the volatile Crimean peninsula and Moscow said it was protecting the ousted leader.

The dawn raid came a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin stoked fears of Moscow using its military might to sway the outcome of Ukraine’s three month standoff by ordering snap combat readiness drills near the border with the ex-Soviet state.

Interim President Oleksandr Turchynov responded by telling a boisterous parliament session that any movement of Russian troops out of their Black Sea bases in Crimea “will be considered as military aggression”.

Ukraine's bloodiest crisis since its 1991 independence erupted in November when Viktor Yanukovych — deposed as president last weekend — made the shock decision to ditch an historic EU trade deal in favour of closer ties with old master Russia.

Yanukovych broke a five-day silence by telling Russian news agencies from an undisclosed location he still viewed himself as President of the strategic but now splintered nation that has served as the geopolitical bridge between Russia and the West. A high-ranking source  said the fugitive leader’s request for personal security had been “granted by Russia and other reports claimed that the ousted President was in Russia.

 

Crimea, a rugged strategic peninsula jutting into the Black Sea, is part of Ukraine thanks to a whim of a Soviet leader, a gift that has come back to haunt Moscow.

Tensions have simmered in Crimea ever since Ukraine’s Russian-leaning president Viktor Yanukovych was ousted nearly a week ago, with calls for the autonomous republic to secede from the rest of the country.

The issue of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol has been a thorn in the side of relations between Ukraine and Russia as soon as the Soviet Union collapsed. In 2010, after years of tortuous negotiations, Ukraine agreed to extend by 25 years Moscow’s lease on the port of Sevastopol, in exchange for a 30-percent reduction in the price of Russian gas on which Ukraine depends. 

Ethnic Russians today account for 59 percent of Crimea’s population, with ethnic Ukrainians 24 per cent.