Ukraine crisis: fatal clashes as tensions rise before Crimea vote

 

 

Two people killed and five injured in clashes between pro-Ukrainian and pro-Russian activists before Sunday’s secession referendum

People speak in front of a placard depicting the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, as a dancing ballerina wearing a bulletproof vest with Kalashnikov machine gun. Photograph: Yuriy Dyachyshyn/AFP/Getty Images

In Sochi, President Vladimir Putin met the head of Ukraine’s Paralympic committee, a day before the Games’ closing ceremony and a referendum in the Ukrainian region of Crimea.

Ukrainian Paralympic committee head Valeriy Sushkevich told Reuters after the meeting that it was “profound, long and substantive”, but declined to give further comment.

Earlier on Saturday Sushkevich had said he regarded the Crimean referendum as illegitimate, echoing the position of Ukraine’s interim government and Western countries. “When a referendum is being carried out at gunpoint, when a referendum is accompanied by foreign troops on one’s country’s territory ... what legitimacy are we talking about?” Sushkevich told reporters in the highland Olympics cluster near Sochi.

Sushkevich said ahead of the Games that his team would pull out if violence escalated in the region. On Saturday he said the Ukrainian team was considering whether to snub the closing ceremony, or use it to make a statement in support of peace.

Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the secretary general of Nato has warned Russia and Crimea not to hold a referendum tomorrow in Crimea.

 

Secretary General statement on the so-called referendum in Ukraine’s Autonomous Republic of Crimea

I continue to follow developments in Ukraine with great concern. The so-called referendum in the Ukrainian Autonomous Republic of Crimea planned on 16 March would be a direct violation of the Ukrainian constitution and international law. If held, it would have no legal effect or political legitimacy.

Holding this referendum would undermine international efforts to find a peaceful and political solution to the crisis in Ukraine. It would run counter to the principles of the United Nations Charter. It is vital that those principles be upheld.

Today, these concerns have been discussed at a meeting of all 50 members of the Partnership for Peace in the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council, at the request of our partner Ukraine. Many partners associated themselves with NATO’s concerns.

The Russian Federation should act responsibly, uphold its obligations under international law and abide by the principles of the NATO-Russia Council and the Partnership for Peace. Dialogue and negotiations should be given a chance to succeed in bringing about a de-escalation of the situation and a political solution.

This is from Stars and Stripes.

Air Force Lt. Col. David Westover, a spokesman, said the U.S. European Command had been in the planning stages for Atlas Vision 2014, which was to take place in July in Chelyabinsk, in northeastern Russia, and focus on joint peace-keeping operations. But because of the crisis, “all planning for this exercise has been suspended,” he said.

However, planning for Rapid Trident 2014 — a large, USAREUR-led multinational exercise scheduled for July — is ongoing, he said.

That exercise, in Lviv, near the Polish border, is to “promote regional stability and security, strengthen partnership capacity, and foster trust while improving interoperability between USAREUR, the land forces of Ukraine, and other (NATO and partner) nations,” according to the USAEUR website.

In addition to USAREUR troops, Rapid Trident 2014 will include units from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Canada, Georgia, Germany, Moldova, Poland, Romania, the United Kingdom and Ukraine, Westover said. It will feature a combined U.S. and Ukrainian battalion headquarters practicing a peacekeeping operation, he said. “Exercise planning will continue until we are told otherwise.”