A2 – Missoulian, Friday, February 28, 2014
HISTORY
WORLD
THIS DAY IN HISTORY
RUSSIA
RAISES
STAKES
IN UKRAINE
EMILIO MORENATTI/Associated Press
A man walks Thursday along a memorial for people killed in clashes with police, at Kiev’s Independence Square, the epicenter of Ukraine’s current
unrest. Ukraine put its police on high alert after armed pro-Russian gunmen seized government buildings in Ukraine’s Crimea region Thursday .
Russian fighter jets patrol border
as gunmen storm parliament
By DALTON BENNETT
and MARIA DANILOVA
Associated Press
S
IMFEROPOL, Ukraine –
Masked gunmen stormed
parliament in Ukraine’s
strategic Crimea region
Thursday as Russian fighter
jets scrambled to patrol
borders, the stirrings of a
potentially dangerous
confrontation reminiscent of
Cold War brinksmanship.
While a newly formed
government led by a proWestern technocrat in Kiev
pledged to prevent any national
breakup, there were mixed
signals in Moscow: Russia
granted shelter to Ukraine’s
fugitive president, Viktor
Yanukovych, while pledging to
respect Ukraine’s territorial
integrity.
As gunmen wearing
unmarked camouflage uniforms
erected a sign reading “Crimea is
Russia” in the provincial capital,
Ukraine’s interim prime minister
declared the Black Sea territory
“has been and will be a part of
Ukraine.
”
The escalating conflict sent
Ukraine’s finances plummeting
further, prompting Western
leaders to prepare an emergency
financial package.
Yanukovych, whose
abandonment of closer ties to
Europe in favor of a bailout loan
from Russia set off three months
of protests, finally fled by
helicopter last week as his allies
deserted him. The humiliating
exit was a severe blow to Russian
President Vladimir Putin, who
had been celebrating his
signature Olympics even as
Ukraine’s drama came to a head.
The Russian leader has long
dreamed of pulling Ukraine – a
country of 46 million people
considered the cradle of Russian
civilization – closer into
Moscow’s orbit.
For Ukraine’s neighbors, the
specter of Ukraine breaking up
evoked memories of centuries of
bloody conflict.
“Regional conflicts begin this
way, said Polish Foreign
”
Minister Radoslaw Sikorski,
calling the confrontation “a very
dangerous game.
”
Russia has pledged to respect
Ukraine’s territorial integrity. But
the dispatch of Russian fighter
jets Thursday to patrol borders
and drills by some 150,000
Russian troops – almost the
entirety of its force in the
western part of the country –
signaled strong determination
not to lose Ukraine to the West.
Thursday’s dramatic
developments posed an
immediate challenge to Ukraine’s
new authorities as they named
an interim government for the
country, whose population is
divided in loyalties between
Russia and the West.
Arseniy Yatsenyuk, named
prime minister Thursday in a
boisterous parliamentary
session, now faces the difficult
task of restoring stability in a
country that is not only deeply
divided politically but on the
verge of financial collapse.
In Crimea’s capital, a proRussian activist who gave only
his first name, Maxim, said he
and other activists were camped
overnight outside the parliament
in Simferopol when about 50
men wearing flak jackets and
carrying rocket-propelled
grenade launchers and sniper
rifles took over the building.
“Our activists were sitting
there all night calmly, building
the barricades, he said. “At 5
”
o’clock unknown men turned up
and went to the building. They
got into the courtyard and put
everyone on the ground.
”
“They were asking who we
were. When we said we stand for
the Russian language and Russia,
they said: ‘Don’t be afraid. We’re
with you. Then they began to
’
storm the building bringing
down the doors, he said. “They
”
didn’t look like volunteers or
amateurs; they were
professionals. This was clearly a
well-organized operation.
”
“Who are they?” he added.
“Nobody knows.
”
MARKO DROBNJAKOVIC/Associated Press
A poster with a photo of fugitive Ukrainian President Viktor
Yanukovych, who fled the capital Kiev and went into hiding after
months of protests against his government, is seen fixed onto a
barricade in central Kiev, Ukraine, on Thursday.
Fugitive Ukrainian president
said to be seen in Moscow
By LYNN BERRY
Associated Press
With President Vladimir
Putin largely silent, the Kremlin’s
tone on Ukraine has been set by
MOSCOW – Ukraine’s
Russian state television, which
fugitive president may be
has denigrated the Ukrainian
enjoying VIP treatment under
leader for failing to stand up to
Moscow’s protection, said to
have been spotted at an opulent the protesters and taking flight,
five-star hotel and a Kremlin
betraying those who stood by
country retreat. But beneath the him.
surface, the embrace has been
Dmitry Trenin of the Carnegie
chilly: State-run TV has
Moscow Center said the
portrayed him as a coward who
descriptions of Yanukovych in
betrayed those who stood by
state media leave little doubt how
him.
he’s seen by Moscow.
The conflicting messages
“I think he simply failed in
indicate that while Russia still
expectations that had been
considers him the legitimate
placed on him at the time that
president of Ukraine, it is far
Putin was giving him large
from happy with his handling of amounts of financial support, of
Ukraine’s crisis.
which $3 billion are in danger of
Yanukovych made his appeal
being never returned to Russia,
”
for protection in a written
Trenin said in a conference call
statement released
wi th journalists.
simultaneously by two Russian
“The relationship between
state news agencies: “I have to
Putin and Yanukovych is wellask Russia to ensure my personal
known to have been a very bad
safety from extremists, he
”
one, with the Russian leader not
wrote. Shortly afterward, the
having much respect for his
same agencies quoted an
”
unidentified government official Ukrainian counterpart, the
political scholar said. “So I think
as saying that the request had
that they will give him
been “satisfied on the territory
protection, but he is not going to
of Russia. The ITAR-Tass and
”
RIA Novosti news agencies often be an active element in any
Russian strategy vis-a-vis
are used by the government to
Ukraine in the near future.
”
issue official statements.
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Today is Friday, Feb.
28, the 59th day of 2014.
There are 306 days left in
the year.
Today’s Highlight:
On Feb. 28, 2013,
Benedict XVI became the
first pope in 600 years to
resign, ending an eight-year
pontificate shaped by
struggles to move the
Catholic Church past sex
abuse scandals and to
reawaken Christianity in an
indifferent world. (Benedict
was succeeded the
following month by Pope
Francis.)
On this date:
In 1861, the Territory of
Colorado was organized.
In 1911, President
William Howard Taft
nominated William H.
Lewis to be the first black
Assistant Attorney General
of the United States.
In 1953, scientists
James D. Watson and
Francis H.C. Crick
announced they had
discovered the double-helix
structure of DNA.
In 1960, a day after
defeating the Soviets at the
Winter Games in Squaw
Valley, Calif., the United
States won its first Olympic
hockey gold medal by
defeating Czechoslovakia’s
team, 9-4.
In 1972, President
Richard M. Nixon and
Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai
issued the Shanghai
Communique, which called
for normalizing relations
between their countries, at
the conclusion of Nixon’s
historic visit to China.
In 1993, a gun battle
erupted at a religious
compound near Waco,
Texas, when Bureau of
Alcohol, Tobacco and
Firearms agents tried to
arrest Branch Davidian
leader David Koresh on
weapons charges; four
agents and six Davidians
were killed as a 51-day
standoff began.
Five years ago: News
commentator and talkradio pioneer Paul Harvey
died in Phoenix at age 90.
One year ago:
President Barack Obama
urged the Supreme Court to
overturn California’s samesex marriage ban and turn a
skeptical eye on similar
prohibitions across the
country. Bradley Manning,
the Army private arrested in
the biggest leak of classified
information in U.S. history,
pleaded guilty at Fort
Meade, Md., to 10 charges
involving illegal possession
or distribution of classified
material. (Manning, who
has since adopted the
female identity Chelsea
Manning, was sentenced to
up to 35 years in prison after
being convicted of
additional charges in a
court-martial.)
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