Ukraine braces for Crimea breakaway
UKRAINE is today braced for a highly charged breakaway vote in Crimea that is likely to see the peninsula annexed by Russia and push tensions to breaking point.
An eleventh-hour diplomatic effort by the US to stop the referendum from going ahead failed on Friday, with Moscow refusing to make any decisions until after Crimea votes today on a split from Ukraine.
The majority Russian-speaking Black Sea peninsula has been given only two choices in a referendum hastily called by pro-Moscow authorities after a street revolt resulted in pro-European Union protesters seizing power in Kiev. Russia still refuses to recognise the legitimacy of the Western-leaning team that has taken power in Kiev.
Crimeans can vote either to join Russia or for “the significant strengthening of their autonomy within Ukraine”.
Today’s vote is expected to swing easily in favour of Russia despite discontent from the Muslim Tatar minority that makes up 12% of Crimea’s total population of two million.
The UN Security Council was due yesterday to vote on a resolution on Ukraine denouncing the referendum.
“The only objective of a resolution would be to get the Chinese to abstain and isolate Russia further,” said a council diplomat.
UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon called Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday and afterwards said he still thought a negotiated solution was possible, although it was “clear we are at a crossroads”.
However, with the result of the vote seen as a foregone conclusion, the international community is playing wait-and-see in terms of whether Moscow will actually take the extra step of annexing the region.
US secretary of state John Kerry warned Russia against accepting the results of the vote, saying it would amount to a “back-door ratification” — a move that would trigger sanctions and escalate the biggest East-West showdown since the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall.
More than 8 000 Russian troops are staging drills near Ukraine’s eastern border while Nato and US reconnaissance aircraft and fighters patrol the skies of its EU neighbours to the west. — AFP