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Crimea’s Leader Moves to Cement Control Over Region
Putin Asks Russia’s Senate to Use Military Force in Ukraine
(35 minutes later)
KIEV, Ukraine — The newly installed, pro-Russia prime minister of Crimea declared on Saturday that he had sole control over the military and the police in the disputed peninsula and he appealed to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia for help in safeguarding the region.
SIMFEROPOL Ukraine — As Russian-backed armed forces effectively seized control of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula on Saturday, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia requested that the Russian Senate authorize him to use military force in Ukraine.
Even as the prime minister, Sergei Aksyonov, issued his public appeal for assistance from Moscow, it was clear that Russian military forces had already effectively seized control of the Crimean capital, Simferopol, and by extension much of the peninsula, making any official declaration of Russia’s role or actions little more than a formality.
Mr. Putin’s request, largely a formality, signaled publicly for the first time the Kremlin’s readiness to intervene militarily in Ukraine, and it served as a blunt response to President Obama, who just hours earlier pointedly warned Russia to respect Ukraine’s sovereignty.
The region’s two main airports were closed, with civilian flights canceled, and were guarded by heavily armed men in military uniforms. Similar forces surrounded the regional Parliament building and the rest of the government complex in downtown Simferopol, as well as numerous other strategic locations, including communication hubs and a main bus station.
Even as Mr. Putin submitted his request to the Senate, formally called the Federation Council, it was clear that forces allied with Moscow were largely in control of the disputed peninsula.
At street level, there were no indications on Saturday afternoon that the newly appointed government in Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, had remaining authority or control over Crimea, an autonomous republic on the Black Sea.
Just a few hours earlier on Saturday morning, the newly installed, pro-Russia prime minister of Crimea declared that he had sole control over the military and the police in the disputed peninsula and he appealed to Mr. Putin for help in safeguarding the region.
On Friday, officials in Kiev accused Russian armed forces of invading Crimea and violating Ukraine’s sovereign territory, and President Obama pointedly warned Russia against military intervention. On Saturday, officials in Kiev reiterated their objections but, for the moment, seemed otherwise powerless.
The prime minister, Sergei Aksyonov, also said a public referendum on independence would be held on March 30.
There was no immediate new comment from Washington, where officials seem to have very limited options in responding to Russian military intervention in Ukraine.
On a day of frayed nerves and set-piece political appeals that recalled ethnic conflicts of past decades in the former Soviet bloc — from the Balkans to the Caucasus — pro-Russian forces were said to have taken control of a government building in Kharkiv, and a crowd in the center of Donetsk pulled down the blue-and-yellow Ukrainian flag and raised a Russian one.
In his statement Saturday, Mr. Aksyonov, said, “Understanding my responsibility for the life and safety of citizens, I appeal to the president of Russia, Vladimir V. Putin, for assistance in providing peace and tranquillity on the territory of the autonomous Republic of Crimea.”
“As chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea,” Mr. Aksyonov said, “I make the decision to temporarily put the armed units and groups of the Interior Ministry, the Security Service, the armed forces, the Emergency Situations Ministry, the fleet, the Tax Service, and the border guards under my direct control. All commanders shall follow only my orders and instructions”
He added, “I ask anyone who disagrees to leave the service.”
The Kremlin, in a statement released to Russian news services, said it “will not ignore” Mr. Aksyonov’s request for assistance.
And separately, in what appeared to reflect coordinated Russian responses after the Crimean appeals for help, the Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying that unidentified gunmen “directed from Kiev” had tried to size control of the Ministry of Internal Affairs building in Simferopol.
The Foreign Ministry said that “vigilante groups” trying to seize the building had been repelled but that the attack “confirms the desire of prominent political circles in Kiev to destabilize the situation in the peninsula.” Local officials said an exchange of gunfire had occurred.
As tensions flared in Crimea, an outpouring of pro-Russia sentiment was underway in Donetsk, in eastern Ukraine, where several thousand people attended a rally to denounce the new interim government in Kiev, local news agencies reported. Many demonstrators expressed support for annexing eastern Ukraine to Russia and demanded a public referendum.
The protesters removed the Ukrainian flag from the top of the regional government administration building and replaced it with the Russian flag.
There were unconfirmed reports, meanwhile, of additional Russian military forces arriving in the Crimea, including Russian ships landing in Fedosiya, in eastern Crimea. On Friday, American officials said that they had confirmed reports of Russian troop deployments in Crimea, including special forces and specially trained marine and airborne units. Ilyushin transport planes were said to have ferried in troops and there were reports of Russian helicopter flights.
The Russian military activity prompted Mr. Obama’s warning to the Kremlin about respecting Ukraine’s sovereignty.
Crimea, while part of Ukraine, has enjoyed a large degree of autonomy under an agreement with the federal government in Kiev since shortly after Ukrainian independence from the Soviet Union. The strategically important peninsula, which has been the subject of military disputes for centuries, has strong historic, linguistic and cultural ties to Russia. The population of roughly two million is predominantly Russian, followed by a large number of Ukrainians.
The consolidation of control by Mr. Aksyonov and the appeal for help from Moscow further inflamed tensions in the dispute over Crimea and deepened the crisis confronting Ukraine’s interim government in Kiev. Officials in Crimea on Saturday announced that a public referendum on Crimean independence would be moved to March 30, instead of being held along with the Ukrainian presidential elections on May 25,
Officials here in Kiev reacted angrily to Saturday’s developments and reiterated their demands that Russia pull back its forces and confine them to the military installations in Crimea, including the headquarters of the Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol that Russia has long leased from Ukraine.
“The presence of Russian troops in Crimea now is unacceptable,” Prime Minister Arseniy P. Yatsenyuk said on Saturday in Kiev. Decrying the Russian deployment as a “provocation,” Mr. Yatsenyuk said, “We call on the government of the Russian Federation to immediately withdraw its troops, return to the place of deployment and stop provoking civil and military confrontation in Ukraine.”
On Friday, heavily armed men took up positions at Crimea’s two main airports, and officials in Kiev said soldiers had also seized control of the regional Parliament building and the headquarters of the regional government in Simferopol. On Saturday, the men patrolled the perimeter of the Parliament building. There were no signs of panic in Simferopol, where the police blocked off a central street but traffic was otherwise moving normally; many shops were open amid general calm.
Adding to the strange tableaux, a crowd of about 400 people gathered near the Parliament building to denounce the United States. Some waved orange and black flags, while others held placards that said “"Free Ukraine from US Occupation” and “The USA works with Fascism.”
One elderly woman held up a photo of Mr. Obama with a red line through it and the caption “Yankee Go Home.” She then helped lead part of the crowd in a chant of “Yankees Go Home.”
The United States and its Western allies have rushed to recognize the legitimacy of the new interim government in Kiev, though numerous questions remain about the votes in the national Parliament to remove Ukraine’s president, Viktor F. Yanukovych, from power.
Elsewhere in Ukraine, there were signs of concern among business leaders over an effort by several European countries, including Austria and Switzerland, to freeze Mr. Yanukovych’s assets as well as those of his family members and other prominent associates.
Systems Capital Management Group, the company controlled by Ukraine’s richest man, Rinat Akhmetov, issued a statement saying that its operations were not affected by the freezing of assets. In its statement, the company said that it “operates in full compliance with the law and beyond politics” and that the freezing of assets “have not affected our operations in any way.”
Mr. Akhmetov is long known as a close ally of Mr. Yanukovych and his company’s statement suggested that he wanted to distance himself from the ex-president. On Friday, Mr. Yanukovych held a news conference at a shopping mall in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, where he insisted that he was still the legitimate president of Ukraine and planned to return.
The new government in Kiev has said that Mr. Yanukovych and other top officials are now wanted on charges of mass murder in connection with the deaths of more than 80 people in clashes between antigovernment protesters and the authorities late last month.
Mr. Akhmetov’s company said it “remains committed to the common principles of corporate ethics, business transparency and responsibility to our partner and the society and, in particular, does not carry out any joint business activity with Viktor Yanukovych and his family.”
American officials did not directly confirm a series of public statements by senior Ukrainian officials, including the acting president, Oleksandr V. Turchynov, that Russian troops were being deployed to Crimea in violation of the two countries’ agreements there.
In his statement on Friday, though, Mr. Obama cited “reports of military movements taken by the Russian Federation inside of Ukraine,” and said, “Any violation of Ukrainian sovereignty would be deeply destabilizing.”
“There will be costs,” Mr. Obama said in a hastily arranged statement from the White House.
The warning came after a day in which military analysts struggled to understand a series of unusual events in Crimea, including a mobilization of armored personnel carriers with Russian markings on the roads of Simferopol and the presence of the masked gunmen at Crimea’s airports.
“The Russian Federation began an unvarnished aggression against our country,” Mr. Turchynov said in televised remarks on Friday evening. “Under the guise of military exercises, they entered troops into the autonomous Republic of Crimea.”
He said that Russian forces had captured the regional Parliament and the headquarters of the regional government, and that they had seized other targets, including vital communications hubs, as well as blocked unspecified Ukrainian military assets.
American officials said they believed that unusual helicopter movements over Crimea were evidence that a military intervention was underway, but cautioned that they did not know the scale of the operation or the Russians’ motives.
Russia on Friday denied that it had encroached on Ukrainian territory or would do so. After an emergency meeting on Ukraine at the United Nations Security Council, the Russian ambassador, Vitaly I. Churkin, said that any troop movements were in line with arrangements that allow it to station soldiers in the area.
“We have an agreement with Ukraine on the presence of the Russian Black Sea fleet and we operate under this agreement,” Mr. Churkin said.
