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Ukraine denounces Russian 'provocations,' troop build-up
by Staff Writers
Brussels (AFP) March 17, 2014


Ukrainian troops can serve Crimea or leave: assembly chief
Simferopol, Ukraine (AFP) March 17, 2014 - Ukrainian soldiers in Crimea will have the choice to side with the new separatist state or leave the peninsula, Crimean assembly chief Volodymyr Konstantynov said Monday, following reports they would be disbanded.

"The personnel of Ukraine's armed forces will be given an alternative: serve in Crimea and swear allegiance to the republic or continue outside the borders of Crimea in the Ukrainian army," he said.

His comments came as Ukrainian Defence Minister Igor Tenyukh, speaking in Kiev, said Ukrainian troops in Crimea "will stay there".

Konstantynov had been earlier quoted by Russian media as saying that all Ukrainian military units present in Crimea would be "disbanded" as part of a nationalisation of Ukrainian state property.

"The units will be disbanded. Those who want to live here? No problem. Those who want to swear allegiance we will examine," Konstantynov said after a session of the assembly that declared Crimea independent and approved an application to join Russia.

Crimeans took to the polls on Sunday in a vote unrecognised by the West but supported by Moscow in which an overwhelming majority cast their ballots in favour of becoming a part of the Russian Federation.

Ukraine's foreign minister denounced Russian "provocations" Monday, warning of a troop build-up on the border and the presence of "political tourists" in its eastern regions.

"We are very much concerned by the number of Russian troops on the (border)," Foreign Minister Andriy Deshchytsya said after talks with NATO head Anders Fogh Rasmussen.

Kiev's interim government was also worried by "the number of Russian political tourists in eastern Ukraine regions and with the number of provocations Russians are trying to organise," Deshchytsya said.

He said the situation looked very similar to that in Georgia in 2008 when Russia sent in troops to secure the independence of two breakaway regions, Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

Ukraine was being careful not to be duped into a military escalation, he said.

"We are instructing our military, and also suggest other people, not to go for provocations," he said, stressing Kiev's efforts to use "diplomatic means to solve and settle this conflict peacefully."

Rasmussen made no separate comment but has said earlier he views Russian intervention in Ukraine, and especially in Crimea, as a threat to European security.

Deshchytsya, speaking just as the pro-Russian assembly in Crimea declared independence and asked formally to join Russia, called for stepped up cooperation with NATO.

This would be done under existing links with the US-led military alliance and cover such things as technical help and stepped up exercises.

Ukraine has not asked for a NATO "military presence," the minister said.

Ukraine signed a partnership accord deal with NATO in 1997 after the fall of communism and the end of the Soviet Union, but is not a full member so does not come under its protective umbrella.

The alliance agreed at a 2008 summit that Kiev could seek full membership, as other former Soviet satellites such as Poland have done.

That move infuriated Moscow and two years later, the now ousted pro-Russian leader Viktor Yanukovych ditched this option.

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China re-iterates calls for restraint in Crimea
Beijing (AFP) March 17, 2014
China said Monday it respected "all countries' independent sovereignty and territorial integrity", in an ambiguous statement after Ukraine's Crimea region voted to join its ally Russia. The crisis in Ukraine has trapped Beijing in a foreign policy corner of wanting to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Moscow yet shuddering at domestic political tumult backed by foreign powers. Crimea decla ... read more


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