Crimea and eastern Ukraine's crisis
Ukraine's crisis.
The airports in Simferopol and Sevastopol were surrounded by groups of armed men whose uniforms lacked any obvious
identifying markings as pro-Russian protesters in Crimea became more assertive.As pro-Russian parliamentarians rejected
the current administration and appointed Sergey Aksyonov, the head of the Russian Unity Party, as prime minister of
Crimea, masked gunmen seized control of the country's parliament building and flew the Russian flag. Voice and internet
connections between Crimea and Ukraine were cut down, and Russian authorities admitted to deploying soldiers there. While
Russian President Vladimir Putin described the move as an effort to safeguard Russian nationals and military assets in
Crimea, Turchynov slammed it as a provocation and a breach of Ukrainian sovereignty.Aksyonov asserted that he was in
charge of the Ukrainian police and military forces in Crimea, not the Kyiv government.
With a public vote on the issue set for March 16, 2014, the Crimean parliament decided to leave Ukraine and join the
Russian Federation on March 6. Both Russia and the West strongly denounced the action. Yatsenyuk, meanwhile, reaffirmed
Kiev's stance that Crimea was an essential component of Ukraine. The outcome of the vote was overwhelmingly in favour of
joining Russia, with observers observing various irregularities in the voting procedure on the referendum day, including
the presence of armed personnel at polling places. A number of Russian officials and members of the Crimean parliament
had their assets frozen and their travel prohibited after the interim government in Kyiv rejected the outcome.On March
18, Putin signed a treaty admitting Crimea into the Russian Federation after meeting with Aksyonov and other regional
representatives. The action was opposed by Western governments. A Ukrainian soldier was slain shortly after the deal was
signed when masked gunmen raided a Ukrainian military base west of Simferopol. As Ukraine started the exodus of about
25,000 military personnel and their families from Crimea, Russian troops moved to occupy bases all over the peninsula,
including the Ukrainian naval headquarters in Sevastopol. Putin signed a law officially integrating Crimea into Russia on
March 21, following the Russian parliament's approval of the annexation treaty.
Yatsenyuk engaged with the IMF to create a bailout plan to deal with Ukraine's $35 billion in unpaid debts while the
world's attention was still on Crimea. Additionally, he met with EU representatives in Brussels. On March 21, Yatsenyuk
signed a section of the association deal that Yanukovych had rejected in November 2013. In the end, the IMF proposed a
loan package worth $18 billion, but it was conditional on Ukraine adopting a number of austerity measures, such as
devaluing the hryvnia and reducing state subsidies that raised the cost of natural gas for consumers.
In order to receive a discount on natural gas in exchange for an extension of its lease on the port of Sevastopol, Russia
violated the 2010 agreement, further solidifying its control over Crimea. In a matter of weeks, the price Russia charged
Ukraine for natural gas surged by over 80%. While openly applying economic pressure to the Kyiv-based interim government,
Russian authorities publicly denied having any further ambitions in Ukraine. However, a NATO press conference in early
April made public the presence of an estimated 40,000 Russian troops stationed near the Ukrainian border and in a
condition of high readiness.Government buildings in the eastern Ukrainian cities of Donetsk, Luhansk, Horlivka, and
Kramatorsk were then stormed by heavily armed pro-Russian rebels. A squad of gunmen who claimed to be from Kharkiv
wrongly took control of an opera theatre, thinking it was the city hall. A number of these takeovers were carried out by
individuals using Russian equipment, wearing uniforms without insignia, and behaving with military precision, much as it
was in Crimea. Gunfight broke out in the Donets Basin city of Slov'yansk as pro-Russian militias took control of
structures and erected roadblocks.
Turchynov gave the people occupying the buildings a deadline, promising them protection from legal action in exchange for
their surrender but threatening military action in the event that they refused. Without incident, the deadline passed,
the invaders solidified their gains, and Turchynov requested that the UN send peacekeeping forces to eastern Ukraine to
bring about order. In the meantime, he gave a strong indication that he agreed with one of the main demands of the pro-
Russian side: a popular vote on the transformation of Ukraine into a federation, which would grant greater regional
autonomy.The Ukrainian military successfully retook the Kramatorsk airfield on April 15, but a larger attempt to regain
authority in Slov'yansk went horribly wrong the following day when Ukrainian troops handed over six armoured personnel
carriers to pro-Russian rebels. In Mariupol, Ukrainian troops thwarted a pro-Russian attack that left seven militiamen
dead as urgent talks between Ukraine, the US, the EU, and Russia began in Geneva.
Despite the fact that all parties at Geneva promised to cooperate to resolve the crisis in eastern Ukraine, Russia
started military exercises on its side of the border, and pro-Russian militants widened their area of control by seizing
more governmental structures and setting up armed checkpoints. Volodymyr Rybak, a councilman for Horlivka and a supporter
of Tymoshenko's Fatherland party, was abducted and murdered by a pro-Russian militia in late April. Following this,
dozens would be kidnapped and held by pro-Russian forces, including eight members of an OSCE monitoring mission, a
sizable number of Ukrainian and foreign journalists, and several Ukrainian police and security personnel.
A gunman gravely wounded Kharkiv mayor Gennady Kernes, a member of Yanukovych's Party of Regions who had switched his
pro-Moscow path and reaffirmed his support for a unified Ukraine, as the U.S. and the EU revealed a new round of
sanctions on Russia. The offensive by the Ukrainian government against the pro-Russian rebels in Slovyansk was resumed on
May 2. Turchynov said that numerous separatists had been killed or detained despite the fact that two helicopters had
been destroyed by hostile fire. In Odessa, which had been relatively unaffected up until that point, violence broke out
on the same day, and dozens of pro-Russian protesters died when the building they were occupying caught fire.
On May 9, Putin visited Crimea and gave a review of Russia's Black Sea Fleet in honour of Victory Day, a festival that
honours the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II. A warning report regarding Crimea was produced by the Council for
Civil Society and Human Rights, a Kremlin advisory body, days prior to Putin's visit. This study directly contradicted
the results of the officially publicised March 16 independence vote. The actual voter participation was believed to be
between 30 and 50 percent, with slightly more than half of those voting in favour of Russia's annexation. Ukrainian
security forces continued to fight for territory with pro-Russian militias as self-declared separatist governments in
Luhansk and Donetsk prepared to hold their own referendums on independence. A particularly bloody clash took place during this time.
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Paramjeet kaur
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