Rival rallies clash in Crimea as Putin orders military exercises
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Fistfights broke out between pro- and anti-Russian demonstrators in Ukraine’s strategic Crimea region yesterday as Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered massive military exercises across the border.
The tests of military readiness involve most of the military units in central and western Russia, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said in a televised statement. He said the exercise would “check the troops’ readiness for action in crisis situations that threaten the nation’s military security.”
He said the exercises were not linked to events in Ukraine, where the ouster of a president who turned his back on the European Union and sought closer ties with Moscow has raised worries in the West over possibility of military intervention.
But Shoigu added that the exercise will be held near Russian borders, including the border with Ukraine. He also said, according to Russian news reports, that his ministry will take steps to strengthen security of the facilities of the Russian Black Sea Fleet in Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula, without elaborating.
In Crimea’s regional capital of Simferopol, about 20,000 Muslim Tatars who rallied in support of the interim government clashed with a smaller pro-Russian rally. A health official said 20 people were injured, while the local health ministry said one person died from an apparent heart attack.
Protesters attacked each other with stones, bottles and punches, as police and leaders of both rallies struggled to keep them apart.
They started to disperse after the speaker of the regional legislature announced it would postpone a crisis session, which many Tatars feared would have taken steps toward seceding from Ukraine.
The tensions in Crimea highlight the divisions that run through this country of 46 million, and underscore fears that the country’s mainly Russian-speaking east and south will not recognize the interim authorities’ legitimacy.
Crimean Tatars took an active part in the protest movement against fugitive president Viktor Yanukovych and harbor deep resentment toward the Kremlin, having been deported en masse on the orders of Soviet leader Josef Stalin during World War II.
“We will not let the fate of our land be decided without us,” said Nuridin Seytablaev, a 54-year-old engineer. “We are ready to fight for Ukraine and our European future.”
Nearby, separated by police lines, Anton Lyakhov, 52, waved a Russian flag. “Only Russia can defend us from fascists in Kiev and from Islamic radicals in Crimea,” he said.
In Kiev, Ukraine’s acting interior minister Arsen Avakov ordered the disbandment of the feared Berkut riot police force that many accuse of attacks on protesters during three-month political turmoil.
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