Several dozen armed men have seized a police station in eastern Ukraine and hoisted the Russian flag above the building, as tensions in the country’s Russian-speaking regions intensify.
The city of Slovyansk is about 55 miles north of the regional centre, Donetsk, where pro-Russian protesters have occupied a government building for nearly a week.
About 20 men in balaclavas armed with automatic rifles and pistols were guarding the entrance to the police station in the city of about 120,000 people, and another 20 were believed to be inside.
They wore St George’s ribbons, which have become a symbol of pro-Russian protesters in eastern Ukraine. The ribbons were originally associated with the Soviet Union’s victory in World War II.
Eastern Ukraine, which has a large Russian-speaking population, has seen waves of protests since Kremlin-friendly president Viktor Yanukovych was ousted in late February. The protesters allege that the authorities who took over are nationalists and “fascists” who aim to suppress ethnic Russians.
The predominantly ethnic Russian region of Crimea voted in a referendum last month to split off from Ukraine and was subsequently annexed by Russia in moves the West has denounced as illegitimate.
A masked guard in Slovyansk, who gave his name only as Sergei, said they have “only one demand: a referendum and joining Russia”.
We don’t want to be slaves of America and the West,” he said. “We want to live with Russia
The man said they seized the building because they wanted to protect it from radical nationalists from western Ukraine and “the junta who seized power in Kiev”.
“We don’t want to be slaves of America and the West,” he said. “We want to live with Russia.”
The Interior Ministry said in a statement that the attackers’ goal was to seize arms from the police station. It said there were about 40 automatic rifles and 400 pistols as well as ammunition inside.
Interior minister Arsen Avakov pledged a “very tough response” to the seizure while local media reported special forces had been dispatched to the area.
Local sympathisers took tyres to the police station to start building barricades.
Gunshots rang out in the background in a video from the scene after an armed man shouted to a cameraman to stop recording. No casualties were immediately reported.
The Kiev authorities and the US have accused Moscow of fomenting the unrest in the east and seeking to use it as a pretext for sending in troops. Russia has massed forces in areas near the Ukrainian border.
Mayor Nelya Shtepa said she had held talks with the protesters and added they were local residents, not Russians.
“They told me, ‘We don’t have anything against you’,” she said, adding that the men said they “want to be heard, want a dialogue with authorities in Kiev”.
Protesters, who have held the administration building in Donetsk since last Sunday, initially called for a referendum on secession but later reduced the demand to a vote on autonomy within Ukraine with the possibility of holding another later on whether to join Russia.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry yesterday warned the Ukrainian government against using force against protesters, saying that such action would derail the talks on settling the crisis between the United States, the European Union, Russia and Ukraine set for next week, as well as any other diplomatic efforts.
It lashed out at the US warning to slap more sanctions on Russia in case of an escalation of the conflict, saying that “an escalation is only and exclusively possible if Kiev dares to do so, relying on massive support of the US and the EU”.